After an incident in which two men carried AR-15 rifles and handguns to an Appleton farmer’s market, one former police chief is advocating an end to openly carrying weapons in Wisconsin.
James Lewis, a former Green Bay police chief, said he thought the practice makes the public less safe because no background checks are required for carrying weapons in Wisconsin.
“We can in essence have an 18-year-old take an AR-15 type weapon, who’s never even fired the weapon, who’s not familiar with it. He or she can take that weapon down to the 4th of July fireworks in Green Bay, he can take it to the Christmas Parade … and walk around carrying that weapon,” Lewis said. “There’s a good possibility innocent people would be injured by that weapon.”
Instead of a “blanket” statewide permission to carry weapons, Lewis said he advocated for allowing counties and municipalities to prohibit openly carrying weapons as fitted their unique needs.
“Common sense has to play a part,” Lewis said. “I have no problem with open carry for a guy who’s out hunting…but I think an urban setting is different.”
Lewis said he was also dubious about whether carrying weapons prevented crimes.
“Most of us will never be the victim of a crime, but we can be terrorized by that thought,” he said.
For those that do want to feel safer, he said, concealed carry permits would require the training and background check necessary to ensure safer carrying.
Lewis also defended the police response to the two men in Appleton, which has been criticized by gun advocates as an overreaction.
“I think they had no other options,” Lewis said. “There’s no other tools in their toolbox in this case. They don’t know those are automatic weapons unless you actually take them and check them…They don’t know if those two young men were convicted felons that have no right to have those guns. They don’t know if they’re intoxicated if they don’t contact them.”
James Fendry, a former police officer and director of the Wisconsin Pro-Gun Movement, said there was no reason to change the law over the Appleton epidsode since many times such incidents are attempts to generate lawsuits or otherwise prove points about gun rights.
“People have been putting on stunts like this since at least the late '90s,” Fendry said.
He said he would probably have felt worried had he, too, been at the farmer’s market where the incident occurred, but that didn’t change his mind.
“I both sympathize and empathize with people that are in that position,” he said. “But just because that occurs doesn’t mean you can modify that person’s right.”
Instead, Fendry said, citizens should get used to seeing more guns around -- and welcome them.
“We’re going to have get used to the fact that the courts are ruling in favor of gun owners’ rights and it’s going to become more and more common,” he said. “And while I’m not arguing in favor of those two young men … we have to remember the bad guys are out there. They’re going to be carrying their weapons concealed until they actually bring them out and start using them.
"Our society is much safer now that we’ve got people like myself, others … that have guns, will be carrying guns, and if the bad guys start to open fire they’re going to find it’s going to be stopped quickly by citizens with guns," he said.
