Thread: Ben Carson's advice on mass shooting under scrutiny

http://bigstory.ap.org/article/1568c...-advice-future

Ben Carson's advice on mass shooting under scrutiny
By JILL COLVIN
Oct. 7, 2015 6:59 PM EDT

NEWARK, N.J. (AP) — Ben Carson's call for those caught in mass shootings to rush the attacker is drawing criticism from public safety experts and little support Wednesday from his presidential rivals.

Speaking days after an Oregon community college shooting left 10 dead, the Republican presidential candidate and retired neurosurgeon offered advice to potential victims of future attacks.

"I want to plant in people's minds what to do in a situation like this. Because unfortunately this is probably not going to be the last time this happens," he told CBS. Earlier, Carson had said that if he had been present at the Oregon attack, he would "not just stand there and let him shoot me. I would say, 'Hey guys, everybody attack him. He may shoot me, but he can't get us all.'"

Rushing the shooter should only be used as a last resort, advise public safety experts, including the FBI. Carson's presidential rivals either didn't respond to his comments or dismissed them.

"I think Mr. Carson has no idea what he would do" in a mass shooting, said South Carolina Sen. Lindsey Graham in an interview on CNN. "That's not what we need to be saying as leaders of the country," he added. "You have no idea what you would do."

Carson's guidance to attack the shooter is consistent with what the federal government has recommended for responding to a situation with a gunman on the loose— but only if other avenues fail, said John Cohen, a Rutgers University professor who led the Department of Homeland Security's programs on how to respond to these situations.

The program advises people to "run, hide, fight," Cohen said. "As a last resort, fight for survival."

In an active shooter situation, he said that people should run to escape a gunman if it's possible to do so safely. If not, they should find a place to hide and barricade themselves.

Only as a last resort, he said, are people advised to fight.

In those cases, according to an FBI video on "Surviving an Active Shooter Event," people should fashion weapons out of whatever items are available and, "commit to taking the shooter down, no matter what."

Carson also told to SiriusXM radio host Karen Hunter on Wednesday that he was once held at gunpoint at a Popeye's fried chicken fast food restaurant in Baltimore. But his approach was nothing like the one he advocated.

"Guy comes in, puts the gun in my ribs. And I just said, "I believe that you want the guy behind the counter,'" Carson recounted in his usual, laid-back tone. "He said, 'Oh, okay,' and moved on."

Carson, a retired neurosurgeon with no political background, has been climbing GOP opinion polls, fueled by voters fed up with Washington and looking for an outside voice. His campaign has been punctuated by a series of controversial remarks on such topics as whether Muslims should be elected to the White House. Carson's campaign says his remarks have only fueled support from donors.

When it comes to the issue of gun violence, the Republican presidential contenders are generally opposed to further restrictions on gun owners' rights, blaming incidents like the Oregon shooting on a weak mental health system they say should be fixed.

Republican presidential front-runner Donald Trump, who has been far less critical of Carson than his other GOP rivals, said Carson's words had been misinterpreted.

"Ben Carson was speaking in general terms as to what he would do if confronted with a gunman, and was not criticizing the victims. Not fair!" he wrote on Twitter.

Florida Gov. Jeb Bush and Sen. Marco Rubio did not respond directly to questions about Carson's fight-the-shooter remarks.

A gun rights supporter, Carson says one solution is more aggressive intervention for people with psychological problems and keeping guns from people declared dangerous by psychiatrists.

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Associated Press writers Eileen Sullivan in Washington and Thomas Beaumont in Muscatine, Iowa contributed to this report.

Carson also told to SiriusXM radio host Karen Hunter on Wednesday that he was once held at gunpoint at a Popeye's fried chicken fast food restaurant in Baltimore. But his approach was nothing like the one he advocated.

"Guy comes in, puts the gun in my ribs. And I just said, "I believe that you want the guy behind the counter,'" Carson recounted in his usual, laid-back tone. "He said, 'Oh, okay,' and moved on."

This story makes no sense. Where did the armed gunman move on to? Did he then hold up the Popeye's? Did he run out of the restaurant? Did Carson call 911 and report the robber? This is just a crazy story.

But what it shows is when he was confronted with a gunman, he didn't yell "everyone attack him, he might kill me but he won't kill everybody". No he diverted him over to another pour soul.

I know what Carson was trying to say. I just don't know why he was saying it. These young people who have spoken have said they froze, they couldn't move, they couldn't think. And I believe that's a natural reaction for many people. The only real way to alter that is to train people on what to do in these situations, so they've been through it before, at least on a mock basis, and their minds are trained to follow those steps when in those situations.

It's the same way we train for fire drills, walk don't run, it's the same way we train for if you're caught on fire, drop and roll, it's the same way we teach life-saving, turn and hold, knowledge and training are ways that we can both learn and teach how to better handle these situations. Of course, the best way to prevent these shootings on school campuses with students of any age, is to avoid gun-free zones. That doesn't mean there are guns in the room, it means there could be, and the very possibility that a teacher or a student depending on the age of the students may have a gun or administrators or security guards or all of the above, may or could have guns. This tells the shooter, you may not be the only guy in the room with a gun. That possibility is going to dissuade these shootings at these facilities where they openly advertise there are no guns, therefore, there is no defense, and you've set up the entire facility and all its occupants as a target for these types of shootings.

NUMBER ONE: Just STOP with the gun-free zones, and allow teachers, security guards, and students to have guns if they want to protect themselves, especially handguns that are small that they can wear or carry on them safely.

Anyway, it makes no sense to me why Carson would tell this story that makes him look like a coward, diverting an armed robber to some poor unsuspecting cashier trying to defend his other story that if it were him at the community college he would attack and tell everyone else to do the same.

But he did say it, I saw it on both Fox and CNN this morning.