Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: FRIDAY, December 9, 1994 TAG: 9412100041
SECTION: VIRGINIA PAGE: B-1 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: MARGARET EDDS STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: RICHMOND LENGTH: Long
To arm or not to arm?
Gary Baker thinks he knows the answer to the national gun-control question.
The 45-year-old Henrico County jewelry store owner met two would-be robbers last week with a barrage of gunfire that would do credit to the shootout at the OK Corral.
Within seconds after Thomas Jefferson Salter, 56, of Nashville and William Lawrence Head, 71, of New Orleans walked through the door of Beverly Hills Jewelers Ltd. wearing ski masks, all six employees - including Baker - had guns in their hands.
And within seconds, according to Baker, three employees were returning the gunfire initiated by Head's sawed-off rifle.
Before the shooting ended a minute or so later, Baker had unloaded a .38-caliber revolver and a 12-gauge pump shotgun. ``I don't know if I got into that third gun I had in my hand,'' he added. So rapid was the sequence that no one's quite sure whether his younger brother, Charles, used three guns or five, Baker said.
``There were probably a minimum of 30 shots ... The police said they'd never seen anything like it,'' Baker said.
The gunfight, which left Salter and Head dead and - miraculously, police say - no one else seriously wounded, has riveted attention at a time when much of the nation's law enforcement hierarchy discourages businesses and homeowners from relying on guns to ward off crime.
Just weeks before the shooting, Henrico County police distributed a business newsletter that warned: ``Keeping weapons on the premises should be avoided. Statistics prove that having weapons on your property adds to the danger during a robbery.''
But Bill McIntyre, a spokesman for the National Rifle Association, said the Henrico County case is proof that such pronouncements can be wrong. ``It's a dramatic demonstration of how firearms ownership can serve as a very good self-defense, self-protection method,'' he said.
Both sides in the national debate, which has escalated as the number of U.S. gun deaths has reached 38,000 annually, come armed with statistics and anecdotes.
In recent weeks, for instance, a 3-year-old in Jackson, Miss., and a teenager in West Monroe, La., were shot and killed by parents who mistook them for intruders.
``That's the kind of thing we hear about every day,'' said Susan Whitmore, spokeswoman for Handgun Control Inc., a national organization that lobbies for restrictions on handgun ownership. Whitmore cited a 1986 study showing that guns kept in the home for self-protection are 43 times more likely to kill a family member, friend or acquaintance than an intruder.
Similarly, said Pat Harris, consultant to the Virginia Crime Prevention Association, a 1986 study in the Journal of Legal Studies found that personnel who resisted during a commercial robbery were 49 times more likely to be killed that those who cooperated.
The Henrico County jewelers ``were extremely lucky that this was not met with great tragedy, as it could have been,' Whitmore' said.
But the NRA's McIntyre said those studies are faulty because they focus on deaths.
``Ninety-nine-plus percent of the time,'' he said, a firearm used to ward off an intruder or a robber ``is not fired, much less someone killed or injured.''
McIntyre cited a study by Gary Kleck, a Florida State University law professor, showing that people use firearms to protect themselves from a potential criminal attack 2.4 million times a year. Research by Edgar Suter, a California physician, suggests that for every life lost to a gun each year, as many as 65 are saved by a gun, he said.
In Henrico County, McIntyre said, ``a potential huge disaster was averted'' because Baker and his employees ``knew what to do and when to do it.''
The drama began a little after 10 a.m. Friday in a small strip shopping center several miles from downtown Richmond.
Baker, five employees and one customer were in the store, an upscale establishment where the wares range up to five and six-carat diamonds selling for $125,000 or so.
A gun buff who got his first BB gun when he was 8, Baker designed his store with security in mind. Out of view from customers, 10 guns were hidden behind a horseshoe-shaped outer counter, two more were behind a center showcase, and several more were in an elevated office area.
Silent ``panic buttons'' designed to alert a security company were strewn throughout the store, and there were other security features on which Baker refuses to elaborate.
``No matter where I am [in the store], I can get a gun within a step or two,'' Baker said.
For instance, when he looked up from his desk and saw Salter with a black ski mask over his face behind the counter a few feet away, Baker simply reached in his open desk drawer and drew out a .38 revolver. ``I had it in my hand in a flash,'' he said.
A beefy, 6-foot, 200-pound father of four, Baker said he found himself eye-to-eye with a man even larger than he. ``I was looking in his eyes. They were icy blue, the exact same color as mine,'' Baker said.
Just then, Salter - who police say was a suspect in four Nashville-area robberies earlier this year - sprang to the top of the counter. Each man saw that the other was holding a gun. ``He screamed to his partner, 'They have guns too,''' Baker recalled.
At that, Head - who New Orleans police say has a criminal record dating at least to the 1970s - began firing, according to Baker. Baker, his brother, and another employee let loose as well. For a minute or so, there was mayhem.
When the smoke cleared, five jewelry cases had been shattered or damaged, the front window had been hit by more than a dozen bullets and Salter and Head lay dead.
``I feel absolutely no remorse for them. They came in here to try to kill us. Their whole lives had been as predators,'' Baker said.
By Wednesday, life was returning to normal at Beverly Hills Jewelers. The broken glass had been replaced. Counters were dotted with poinsettias and floral arrangements from well-wishers. Employees had undergone counseling from the county mental health department.
Police are investigating the deaths, and will turn over the results to the local prosecutor to decide if charges against Baker and his employees are warranted. Legal sources said prosecution is unlikely because Baker and his employees appear to have been acting in self defense.
Meanwhile, local police are sticking by their recommendation that firearms not be kept at businesses. Employees or customers will be injured, said Lt. Lewis Shaw, a spokesman for the Henrico police.
Baker's advice to other storeowners considering arming themselves is to make sure their employees get extensive firearms training, as did his. ``If you don't do it on a regular basis," he said, "for God's sake, don't do it.''
by CNB