More gun licenses, more debates ...

[spin]

More gun licenses, more debates
Right to carry concealed weapons revisited
1:25 AM, Aug. 1, 2011

LANSING -- The right to carry a concealed weapon in Michigan -- 10 years ago a red-hot topic -- is pretty much uncontested. No one is talking about rolling back the CCW changes of 2001, or enacting new gun restrictions.

But the argument over whether authorizing more people to carry concealed guns was a good idea continues unabated. The number of CCW permit holders has quintupled to nearly 276,000 in Michigan in 10 years. Advocates of gun rights and gun control don't agree on the facts.

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Washtenaw County Prosecutor Brian Mackie, who opposed the 2001 CCW reforms, said it has worked out better than he expected. But maybe, he said, that is because changing the law did not change the number of guns on the street as much as it changed the number of people licensed to carry a gun on the street.

"I wonder how many of them actually carry," Mackie said "Hauling a gun around with you everywhere can be a real pain."
http://www.freep.com/article/20110801/NEWS06/108010323/Part-2-More-gun-licenses-more-debates?odyssey=tab|topnews|text|FRONTPAGE

The article from the Detroit Free Press discusses both sides of the concealed carry debate and has links to an interactive map on concealed carry and several other articles. One discusses two different shootings involving people with carry permits.

2 shootings produce 2 outcomes

Since Michigan's law on carrying concealed weapons was changed a decade ago, there have been cases of carriers using their weapons -- sometimes in justified self-defense, sometimes illegally.

Two cases in metro Detroit, one year apart, highlight the extremes in concealed gun use.

One resulted in the death of an armed robber who was holding up a Detroit barbershop when a concealed license holder shot him.

The other ended in murder charges, with an uncle accused of settling a dispute by shooting his nephew at a Troy gas station.
http://www.freep.com/article/20110801/NEWS06/108010325/2-shootings-produce-2-outcomes?odyssey=mod_sectionstories