By Dave Workman|Senior Editor
SAF founder and Executive Vice President Alan Gottlieb
Using a rifle that was reportedly legally-purchased in Nevada, an alleged killer identified as 19-year-old Santino William Legan opened fire on people enjoying the last few minutes of the Gilroy, CA Garlic Festival, underscoring the recent call by the Second Amendment Foundation to end “gun-free zones.”
SAF founder and Executive Vice President Alan Gottlieb only nine days earlier had called such zones “shooting galleries for maniacs.”
According to the Los Angeles Times, Christmas Hill Park, where the festival was held, “had security checkpoints with metal detectors.” It was a “gun-free zone,” except for the shooter, who was shot dead by police within a minute of launching his attack. There were several officers at the festival working security, according to published reports, and many more lawmen rushed to the scene.
Today, with three people dead including a 6-year-old child and a 13-year-old girl, and a dozen more injured, authorities in Gilroy are trying to sort out why the killer opened fire after apparently cutting through a wire fence to gain access, thus avoiding security. The third victim was described as a 20-year-old man. Legan is reportedly from Nevada, but his father lives in the area.
Gottlieb had called for an end to “gun-free zones” in a news release on July 19 by launching a national advertising campaign. Its message is simple: “Nobody wants to be a sitting duck in a maniac’s shooting gallery.”
The dead youngster was identified as Stephen Luciano Romero of San Jose.
Police officers on the scene, acting as security, quickly engaged the suspect and shot him dead. Investigators are trying to determine a motive, and there is also an on-going search for a possible second suspect, according to published reports.
Reacting to the Sunday afternoon shooting that broke out near the end of the weekend festival, author and researcher John Lott, head of the Crime Prevention Research Center, wrote at his website, “Do you wonder why there isn’t someone to stop some of the mass public shootings in places such as California? Santa Clara County where the attack occurred at the Gilroy Garlic Festival provides an all too typical example. Three people were killed and 15 injured. In 2018, the County with a little over 1.5 million adults had issued just 113 concealed handgun permits — that is just 0.007% of adults. To put it differently, that is only 1 permit issued for every 14,300 people. General citizens in Santa Clara County are banned from being able to carry concealed handguns.”
But because weapons of any kind were prohibited at the festival, and visitors were checked before being allowed to enter, having a carry permit apparently would have made no difference.
Police were able to quickly engage the shooter, but the incident underscores what many California gun law critics have contended is the futility of laws that have disarmed the wrong people. The Golden State has among the strictest gun control laws in the nation, yet this incident happened.
Whether the Gilroy tragedy will add momentum to the SAF effort to eliminate gun-free zones remains to be seen. What is known is that SAF’s Gottlieb offered this perspective: “Without a self-defense option, we are all at greater risk.”
He said designating an area a “gun-free zone” creates “the mere illusion of safety.”
“For more than two decades,” Gottlieb said ten days ago, “the U.S. has perpetuated a false sense of security with gun-free zones. It’s time to end this dangerous folly.”
