*SIGH* How quickly this has turned in to a gun control debate. I should state that I'm neither pro or anti-gun. I am a gun owner (Glock 23 and Ruger .45ACP) but I don't consider a CC permit the answer to all of our violence problems nor do I consider an outright ban the answer either. People are too polarized one way or the other on this issue and refuse to listen to the other point of view, which I believe is the first step towards civilized dialog and maybe actually trying to answer the problems rather than try to "win".
To answer some of the issues brought up in the thread since my last post:
1. What I meant was IMHO no civvie was going to make a difference with a concealed weapon in that short amount of time, and more than likely would've been capped himself as the offduty police officer a) had his wife call 911 an describe to him SLC PD that he was an off duty armed cop and b) even under that situation, it appears that SLC PD initially thought he was a second gunman. Some guy waving a gun around not yelling "Off duty Ogden Police, get down, get down, get down" more than likely would've had his ass handed to him by SWAT.
2. I consider an off duty police officer to be much more capable of handling his firearm than the guy who paid his $70 to get his CC permit, spend 4 hours in a class, show he knows how to handle a firearm, go through a background check and that's it. No offense to those of you who carry, but in Utah, unless you're a felon, you get a permit, no matter how competent (or lack there of) you are. It doesn't instill a lot of confidence in me that the lowest common denominator of carrying a gun is NOT being a felon.
3. The cop had position, from the 2nd floor shooting down to the first floor, with very little chance of a bystander being hit. I would loathe to be that person with a CC permit, draw my weapon, shoot and have it hit some lady hiding in a store. If it was a 1 on 1 duel, yeah, no problem, but I don't know if I could live with myself if the above scenario happened.
4. Utah law allows private property owners (regardless of public access or not) to restrict firearms. I find it funny that those of us who have very libertarian or conservative political views get all bent out of shape when the gov't says we can't develop on land because of some endangered species and that's gov't interference, but when they give us the right on how we determine our property is used, if the property owner does something we disagree with, it's SUE! This IS PRIVATE PROPERTY, regardless of what type of public access there may be. As long as the owners don't discriminate against one of the local or federal protected classes, I'm pretty much of the opinion they can do whatever they want. If people don't like it, don't shop there. Now, the law is different for public or gov't buildings. They can't restrict based on firearms, so if this happened in a county building and they banned firearms, that's different in my book.
All that being said, let's not lose focus here that 5 people who woke up Monday morning never got to see Tuesday. The biographies on these people make this incredibly sad. Most were out on dates, buying Valentines, or having dinner with their families. Regardless of ones' stance on firearms, we can talk about what we would've done till the cows come home, but unless we're faced with that situation, that's all it is, talk. To be honest, I don't know what I would've done, but like my coworker, my first concern would've been for my family and to get them to safety. After that, it's all speculation and bravado.