Posted on 10/09/2007 7:09:16 AM PDT by presidio9
High school English teacher Shirley Katz insists she needs to take her pistol with her to work because she fears her ex-husband could show up and try to harm her. She's also worried about a Columbine-style attack.
But Katz's district has barred teachers from bringing guns to school, so she is challenging the ban as unlawful, since Oregon is among states that allow people with a permit to carry concealed weapons into public buildings.
"This is primarily about my Second Amendment right and Oregon law and the simple fact that I know it is my right to carry that gun," said Katz, 44, sitting at the kitchen table of her home outside this city of 74,000.
"I have that (concealed weapons) permit. I refuse to let my ex-husband bully me. And I am not going to let the school board bully me, either."
In Oregon, a sheriff can grant a concealed-weapons permit to anyone whose criminal record is clean and who completes a gun-safety course.
Thirty-eight states, along with the District of Columbia, prohibit people from taking guns to school, according to the National Council of State Legislatures. But it's unclear how many offer an exemption for people holding concealed-weapons permits, since the council does not track such exceptions.
Superintendent Phil Long insists employees and students are safer without guns on campus at South Medford High School, where Katz teaches. The district plans to make that argument when the case comes before a judge on Thursday.
Katz's request appears to be rare. School security consultant Ken Trump, president of National School Safety and Security Services in Cleveland, said he has never heard of a similar case while working in 45 states.
Katz won't say whether she has ever taken her 9 mm Glock pistol to school, but she practices with it regularly and has thought about what she would do if she had to confront a gunman. She would be sure students were locked in nearby offices out of the line of fire, and she would be ready with her pistol.
Our safety plan at our school now is that if somebody threatening comes in, you try to avoid eye contact, and do whatever they say, and that is not acceptable anymore," she said. Shootings at Virginia Tech University and the one-room Amish school in Pennsylvania, "reinforced my belief we have to take action, we can't just acquiesce as we have been taught to do."
Katz never owned a gun until she and her then-husband, commercial photographer Gerry Katz, moved to Oregon from Atlanta eight years ago and bought 20 acres on a gravel road in the foothills of the Cascade Range.
"Being out in the country, we just felt we needed to have a gun here for personal safety," she said.
In 2004, Gerry Katz, who had a concealed weapons permit, was arrested for pulling a .38-caliber revolver after a confrontation that began in a parking lot with two men whose car almost hit his.
According to the police report, he did not point the weapon at anyone. The police seized it, and the charges were later dismissed. Gerry Katz said he never went back for his gun.
Shirley Katz said she bought her own gun in 2004 after Gerry Katz grabbed her by the throat and threatened to kill her - an allegation he denies.
He argues that her desire to take her gun to school is about reopening their divorce to get exclusive custody of their 6-year-old daughter.
"She's just scamming everybody," he said. "As soon as this thing started ... I called the principal at her high school and told her ... I am not coming to your school. I am not a threat to her. I have no desire to hurt her."
Oregon had a school shooting in 1998, when student Kip Kinkel killed his parents at home, then drove to school and opened fire in the cafeteria of Thurston High School in Springfield, killing two and wounding 25 others.
Since then, the Legislature has considered barring people with concealed weapons permits from carrying guns in schools, but the bills have failed, said Dori Brattain, general counsel to the Oregon School Boards Association.
Some South Medford students say they are uncomfortable with the idea of a teacher carrying a gun, especially since they cannot bring even scissors to school.
"I totally understand she wants to protect herself," said Lauren Forderer, 16, a junior. "But I don't agree she should bring her problems around 2,000 other people."
Even if she wins, Katz said, she may not bring the gun to school.
"The whole point of carrying concealed is no one should know you're carrying," she said. "So I feel like my carrying concealed on campus now sets me up as a target."
Along with beer and ammo.
5.56mm
right.....better to be judged by 12 than carried by 6
It's only a matter of when, not if, a "Beslan" type incident visits a school in America.
You weren’t there but based on the newspaper report you are ready to say “dumb gun owner.” The charges were dropped. Those two men might have been threatening. Pulling the .38 might have been sensible under the circumstances.
What is so strange about this thread is that the woman will presumably be carrying at the mall, in church, in restaurants, in the movies,on public transit, and at the ball game. She threatens kids as much there as in school. What is it about school that will make people considered safe to carry in any other venue suddenly more dangerous?
In Israel, teachers can carry at school if they want. It would seem that given the mass murders in schools here and abroad it makes more sense to adopt the Israeli approach than to pretend that people are somehow safer if they can’t mount an armed response to a school invader.
‘NOW that all the students will know she carries, if she is allowed to carry in her school, they will know where to find a gun in school. rme’
Thats one point of view, a valid one.
Given the area, I’d say the kids also know which families hunt, and have guns in the home. Which is the ‘bigger risk’ a house that might be unattended during the day and subject to a break in, or the teacher who may, or may not, be ‘carrying’. If she’s ‘carrying’ you have to acknowledge the ‘risk’ the kid accepts trying to take it from her, right?
No such obvious risk with a break in.
The fact of the matter is from Columbine to the VTU shootings, a teacher with a firearm has a better chance of survival than the teachers that in effect yelled ‘stop, or I’ll yell stop again’ to the Columbine idiots, or the punk at VTU.
Its a tough call, and its not easy to discern beforehand where it might or might not be appropriate for the teacher to carry concealed.
Personally, if this woman is honestly in fear of her life from her ex husband (I think she’s got a point based on what I read of him in this article) she shouldn’t have said a word, and just carried concealed.
As the saying goes, ‘better to be tried by 12, than carried by six’.
“So, in your little world, the people of which occupations are allowed the right of self-defense, and which aren’t?”
Ummm, you may have a point. Maybe certain rights “should” be exempted to certain professions or demographics - based of course on their demonstrated ability or lack of to use said rights intelligently...
Using the same rationale . . . I also think any student who can pass a firearms safety training class should be permitted to carry a concealed weapon, too.
Partly to protect themselves from teachers, of course.
I would recommend moving to a place where common sense and respect for the Constitution of the United States exists.
No ID. No fingerprints. The price should be $2.25 for a Glock (federally subsidized). Most of these vending machines should be located in preschools and airports.
I like this woman’s fight and support it.
She should have every right to conceal carry at work.
Then other people can conceal carry without anybody else knowing about it.
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