Penalties for carrying in a prohibited place.

[m16ty]

I was at a place yesterday when a incident happened, it had the makings of a active shooter situation.

This place is posted, and is owned by a private college. What I’m wondering is what the penalty is if I actually got caught?

It’s a place I’m required to be, and I’ve got to decide if I will continue to go there unarmed, go armed and deal with the consequences if caught, or make arrangements to not go back.

[Will Carry]

I don't know if they are obligated to ask you to leave or not. If they arrested you it would be bad. 

[Grunt67]

If it's posted, and you obviously know it is, you're pushing your luck. They could ask you to leave, or you could be arrested, depending on the place.

If you are required to be there, you might make other arrangements with management, or attend unarmed.

JMHO

[m16ty]

When the incident happened last night, some of the management did ask me if I was armed. I told them no, because it was posted. They said “screw the signs”, but they aren’t the head people that sets policy. 

I did talk to a officer off the record and asked him what are the odds of getting arrested and charged, he said “very slim”.

[Omega]

I would think that during an incident, the last thing LEO or management would want to do is cause trouble for a CCW permit holder, specially one that helped.

[300winmag]

If you are carrying on school property, Tennessee generally prohibits people, even with handgun carry permits, from carrying inside buildings owned by public and private schools and colleges.  There are some exceptions and one of those is that private schools and colleges can allow carry by policy to make it legal.  I highly doubt many private schools have written policy making carry by people with permits legal in the buildings.  Full time faculty and staff can carry at public colleges and universities.

You might want to look at 39-17-1309 for carrying on school property.  One offense is intent to go armed on school property (felony) and the other is possession of a firearm (misdemeanor) on school property and the exceptions to that.  

It sounds like you were at it would not matter if there were 'no guns' signs or not.  What matters is that it sounds like that is college owned property.

It's a bad law that our 'conservative' NRA endorsed legislators don't seem to want to make better for people with handgun carry permits.

Edited March 18, 2018 by 300winmag

[peejman]

Carrying on school property is a felony. But, the law also clearly states that you cannot be criminally charged for carrying illegally if you used the weapon in justifiable self defense. 

The key word there is "criminally". There's no protection from the civil suit that would likely occur. 

[m16ty]

Well the incident that happened was that there was a assembly of people at said place, the "girlfriend" of a guy was in attendance of said assembly, he was drunk and mad, and shots were fired out in the parking lot. I honestly think he was just trying to put on a show and scare her or something (who knows why drunks do what they do) but he could have just as easily entered the assembly before he started firing. You don't know the feeling you get when you are put on lock down with shots fired, and all you can do is hope the shooter doesn't breach the lock down, until you've been there. It's a situation I don't want to find myself and my family in again. It is a soft target, plain and simple, and I knew that for awhile and it concerned me, it just hit home last night.

I'm going to talk to the Sheriff, who is a personal friend, about setting up a Special Deputy program. Looks like that would be a way for certain persons to get around all these prohibited places. 

[DaveTN]

Wow. I’ve been in active shooter situations while I was armed; I imagine that unarmed is pretty scary.

Normally I don’t worry too much about postings. The chance of me being detected is slim, the chance of me being cited is even less. But I wouldn’t do it at a school; the risk is too high. If making arrangements not to go back is an option that’s the one I would choose.

Was the guy cranking off rounds in the parking lot arrested? Scaring his girlfriend by firing rounds? I don’t care how drunk or how mad he was; He needs to do prison time.

[m16ty]

Yes, he was apprehended before they let us out.

[bersaguy]

Glad everything turned out ok but my question is was the girlfriend impressed?

[m16ty]

2 hours ago, bersaguy said:

Glad everything turned out ok but my question is was the girlfriend impressed?

I don’t think so. 

Before I knew what was happening, while we were still on lockdown, a officer did come inside and escort a woman out. I assume that was the girlfriend and they were wanting to ask her some questions.

[bersaguy]

2 hours ago, m16ty said:

I don’t think so. 

Before I knew what was happening, while we were still on lockdown, a officer did come inside and escort a woman out. I assume that was the girlfriend and they were wanting to ask her some questions.

I don't know about that. If she is willing to be with a guy that acts like that she will probably be the type that will go bail him out. A lot of times women that have boyfriends like that they will do stupid things like get him out. I knew a girl who's boyfriend use to beat her up and they would arrest him and she would have him bailed out before the ink dried on the paper work. That one didn't end well but it did end. She ended up shooting and killing him during one of the beatings. They didn't arrest her but she has not been right in the head ever since.