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Fagan answered a 10:15 p.m. knock on their front door Thursday, Oct. 24. A friend having just left their apartment, he assumed the friend had come back. Instead, John Michael Taylor, a felon who showed them his ankle bracelet tracker in an attempt to intimidate them, faced him. Taylor asked Fagan for money, and became agitated when Fagan turned him down."
When he sensed Taylor might enter the apartment, Fagan yelled for McIntosh, who brandished his pistol, for which he has a concealed weapons permit. Taylor quickly fled. Little did they know, removing Taylor from their doorway would lead to potential university sanctions.
Fagan, 21, and McIntosh, 23, rent their two-bedroom off-campus apartment, No. 5, from owner Gonzaga University. Complications arose after the men called both the Spokane Police and CAMPO to report the trespasser, in doing so declaring the pistol to SPD Officer Adam Valdez. SPD quickly apprehended the suspect, who was arrested on outstanding felony warrants. Valdez congratulated the students for safely warding off a possibly dangerous menace.
But according to the Gonzaga Student Handbook, students may not possess weapons on campus or university-owned property. This clause triggered an early-morning return by CAMPO and a residence director, resulting in the seizure of two guns, including a shotgun owned by Fagan. This occurred at 2:30 a.m., more than four hours after the initial incident. Director of Security Brian Kenny served the men with hearing notices at 9 a.m. that morning.
Gonzaga Online Bulletin
8 comments:
It's interesting to notice that the education industry seem to have the most stupid rules, rule makers, and rule enforcers. This only adds to my suspicion that education does not educate nearly as much as it did once, and certainly not in balance with the cost. It believe it quite possible you will pay them to make you dumber. Buyer beware.
The college has to CYA. Most kids are not responsible enough to own a gun. These kids were, but were living in an off-campus apartment owned by the university. It's one of those things. If they signed a lease, gun possession would have been listed.
If you are going to prevent people from protecting themselves, and these guy likely prevented a violent crime, then you should be liable for anything that happens that could have been prevented with that protection.
If you allow legal guns on your property, and they get misused, I see that as far less your liability than if you prevent people from protecting themselves and they get hurt by a criminal when being armed really is the only effective way to prevent it. I know the uninformed see it the opposite, but one is simply acknowledging people's legal rights, and the other is actively putting them at risk.
I think the key here is the kids signed a lease agreement that I assume said no guns.
Sure, but I bet the motivation for the lease provision is liability, and I just think it's backwards.
I was talking the other day with old friends and we were remembering how as kids in highschool that lots of guys would bring their hunting rifles to school, including mounted in plain sight in their trucks, so they could go straight to hunting before or after school. Nobody thought anything of it, and crime rates were much higher then than now. Our concerns and policies are not based in reason, they are a result of the pusifying and urbanizing of the culture.
I get your point completely, but I have to see the university's point. These are college kids, and are statistically much more likely to accidentally kill each other than be in a situation where they would need to defend themselves. In general, I think this will have a happy ending, the kids will not be expelled, and in the future certain kids and parents will be more careful when it comes to choosing off-campus housing.
And? They violated the Universities lease. No guns. Case closed.
They should sue the U for failing to provide adequate protection in lieu of self-protection.
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