The last time we heard from Cincinnati CityBeat on the issue of concealed carry reform, it was in a race-baiting, anti-gun article by columnist Kathy F. Wilson, written just days after the first open carry Defense Walk in Cincinnati in 2003.

That article accompanied another inflammatory review of the history-making Defense Walk, in which author Gregory Flannery referred to walk participants as a "vigilante posse", "all of them white, all of them men" (a completely false claim, by the way), and which referred to how the daughter of one Walk participant was accused by a protestor of being a "potential future murderer".

Given this history, it may come as a surprise that Cincinnati CityBeat's April 6, 2005 cover story is one of the most interesting, objective, and sincere pieces of journalism on Ohio concealed carry to come from a mainstream media organization.

The Dayton Daily News is reporting that a New Carlisle man is challenging Miami Co. sheriff Charles A. Cox's denial of a concealed handgun license in the Ohio 2nd District Court of Appeals Tuesday. The DDN reports the challenge appears to be the first to reach an appeals court in the region since licenses first were issued in April 2004.

From the story:

William R. Harris, who has worked at Wright-Patterson Air Force Base for 35 years, applied for a license last May following procedures outlined in the new law. Miami County Sheriff Charles Cox denied the application after a background check showed Harris was the subject of a five-year temporary or civil protection order issued in a Greene County court in December 2000.

A civil protection order is one of the legal reasons to deny a concealed weapon license. That order, however, was later dismissed in favor of consent decree that did not specifically prohibit him from possessing a weapon.

Harris told Miami County Judge Jeffrey Welbaum last summer he would not have applied for a license if there was a prohibition.

Welbaum, in a decision that led to Tuesday's appeal hearing, ruled that Harris remains subject to the Greene County civil protection order.

Harris' lawyer, Jeff Slyman, told the appeals court that Harris is a retired Army major with no criminal record and has a top security clearance.

Slyman argued the sheriff could have looked at the consent decree and would have seen there was no firearm prohibition. He said Harris believes "from a constitutional, a fairness ... standpoint that that particular agreement he entered into is not a protection order and shouldn't permit him from carrying."

James Dicks Jr., an assistant county prosecutor, said the sheriff has no discretion and is not required to review a court order's content. "He checks if the order exists," he said.

So let's get this straight - when it comes to a retired United States Army Major with top secret clearance, it's letter-of-the-law time in Miami County. But when Miami Co. Prosecutor Gary Nasal is appointed special prosecutor to investigate a sheriff for committing a felony by releasing CHL-holders' private, protected information, and when clear evidence of the violation exists in the form of a newspaper article in the Sidney Daily News, the "investigation" is delayed for months before grand jury is used to sweep the entire affair under the rug. Sound fair?

Columbus' NBC4i.com is reporting that Ryan Salim was arrested at Alden Library on the Ohio University campus at about 9 p.m. Tuesday, and that police discovered two loaded handguns concealed on his person.

Police were pursuing Salim after receiving reports that he had earlier kidnapped his roommate and took him on a 24-hour drive across the state.

According to reports, Salim, 25, was taken into custody as Athens police officers were searching the library floor-by-floor, evacuating as they went along.

From the story:

Salim was found with two loaded handguns. He was charged with two counts of carrying a concealed weapon and one count of abduction. He did not have a concealed carry permit.

"We had confirmation that (Salim) carried at least one pistol in a shoulder holster," said Athens police Lt. Anthony Fish. "We knew that as a fact because every roommate we talked to said that he carried it with him almost everywhere."

While media reports commonly make note of a lack of a driver's license when accidents or crimes are committed by drivers, this is, as far as we are aware, the first time an Ohio news organization has made note of the fact that a criminal act was committed without a concealed handgun license. Many other Ohio news organizations are also reporting on this incident, but are again failing to mention the fact that it is illegal to carry guns at the college, and that Salim committed is alleged acts without a CHL.

"Safety Zones or Victim Zones?"

Woman Claims Man Threatened Her On "No-guns" COTA Bus
This same issue was covered by local news months ago – the man continues to menace women on the #2 bus which goes up and down High Street. The driver allegedly told the woman to get off the bus and call the police herself – when the woman objected; the driver reportedly stated "'It's not my problem, lady".

Woman Robbed Outside Her "No-Guns" Dayton Church
Ohio law makes churches off-limits to self-defense. This is yet another example that the predators among us do not take the day off. They don't observe the Sabbath to obey God's law, they don't obey man-made laws, and they certainly do not obey "no guns" signs. They do pick their victims. An 81-year old woman exiting church is an easy target for the young predator. This woman can be very thankful that she was not physically harmed.

Two Charged with Selling Drugs, One With Weapons Charge, Near "No-Guns" Schools
So much for the laws keeping the drugs and guns away from school zones.

The Second Amendment Foundation (SAF) today released the results of a recent poll it commissioned, conducted by Zogby International, which shows overwhelming rejection by likely American voters of the notion that banning guns would be effective in the fight against terrorism.

Asked whether they agreed or disagreed that banning guns would reduce the threat from terrorists, respondents to the poll disagreed by a margin of 75 percent. Only one in five respondents supported the notion, and five percent were not sure. Zogby polled 1,009 likely voters chosen at random nationwide with a margin error of plus/minus 3.2 percent. Polling occurred between March 30 and April 1.

SAF Founder Alan Gottlieb said the results of this poll clearly show that anti-gunners trying to use terrorism as an excuse to pass more restrictive gun laws are out of step with the American public.

"It's been pretty clear for a long time," Gottlieb observed, "that gun grabbers don't have a clue. All they want to do is take guns away from people, any guns, all guns, and they don't care how much blood they dance through or how much false hysteria they spread to get the job done.

"Look at their track record," he said. "Anti-gunners have used every excuse, every tragic event, to demand increasingly restrictive gun laws. They pushed gun bans to stop urban crime, but look how that has failed in places like Washington, DC and Chicago. They pressed for a gun free school zones law but that hasn't stopped tragedies like Columbine and, more recently, Red Lake High School in Minnesota. And lately they've tried to gull America into supporting bans on certain firearms as a way to thwart terrorism.

"America," he said, "has finally awakened to what is essentially a one-note campaign being waged against their gun rights. Present anti-gunners with a problem and their only solution is to take guns away from law-abiding citizens. Well, that's not a solution, it's a sham. Whatever else terrorists happen to be, they are criminals, and you do not stop criminals by disarming their intended victims. Average Americans have figured this out, and we can only wonder why the gun control crowd hasn't."

The Second Amendment Foundation (www.saf.org) is the nation's oldest and largest tax-exempt education, research, publishing and legal action group focusing on the Constitutional right and heritage to privately own and possess firearms. Founded in 1974, The Foundation has grown to more than 600,000 members and supporters and conducts many programs designed to better inform the public about the consequences of gun control. SAF has previously funded successful firearms-related suits against the cities of Los Angeles; New Haven, CT; and San Francisco on behalf of American gun owners, a lawsuit against the cities suing gun makers & an amicus brief & fund for the Emerson case holding the Second Amendment as an individual right.

April 6, 2005
Cleveland Plain Dealer

Karen Tucker's March 30 letter "Fewer guns in fewer hands - not the opposite" was so void of the truth that I had to respond. Tucker complains about Plain Dealer columnist Phillip Morris wanting felons to own guns. Apparently, she did not read his whole article (March 22). Morris was referring to nonviolent offenders who have since been law-abiding.

Tucker's reference to the ease with which assault weapons allow perpetrators to commit murder on a large scale is false, since "assault weapons" pose no more danger than any semiautomatic firearm. She also claims that gun manufacturers have immunity to safety regulations, which is also false; they adhere to the same regulations that govern any U.S. product. Tucker refers to almost 30,000 gun deaths and leaves out the fact that those include police shootings and suicides. She doesn't mention the more than 1 million times a year that law-abiding citizens defend themselves with a firearm.

She has the same, old, tired anti-gun argument.

Anthony Romano
Euclid