The classroom was dark and uncomfortably warm. A police scanner blared in the background, creating an annoying distraction.
Gregory Colon, training to become a licensed armed security guard, was nervous when he entered the firearms class. The atmosphere was designed to add to the tension and get his heart rate up.
“We need to know what our body is going to do in a stressful situation,” instructor Andre J.W. Queen told the students. “If it’s not a deadly force threat, you should not be shooting at it.”
The simulated incidents Colon encountered — a hostage situation on a school bus, a shootout in a hallway and an attack by a man wielding a knife — were generated on a computer and projected onto a large screen. But Colon, armed with a SIRT laser gun that resembled a Glock 17 semi-automatic pistol, had to react as if they were life-and-death situations.
“It was much more intense than I expected,” Colon, a 21-year-old Chicago resident, said after shooting his attackers in self-defense. “I was sweating and my palms were sticky. It shows in real life how fast you can get hurt.”
As the Illinois State Police work out the details of the new concealed carry law giving Illinois citizens the right to have firearms in public, a debate is brewing over the 16 hours of training it requires.
Some gun rights advocates argue that requiring essentially two days of training is excessive and unnecessarily prolongs the process for obtaining a permit. Others, including some firearms instructors, want to see Illinois adopt standards that go beyond the gun handling instruction and marksmanship offered in basic civilian firearms safety courses. They say it’s important to teach people not only how to shoot a gun but how to defuse potentially dangerous situations so they don’t have to use a firearm.
Those who oppose extensive training said it is out of line with the requirements in other states and is far more rigorous than the five-hour course mandated by the city of Chicago to obtain a permit to keep a gun at home.
In Illinois, residents must also obtain a Firearm Owner’s Identification card to carry a concealed weapon. No training is required for a FOID card, but applicants must undergo a background check.
“The court said it’s unconstitutional to prevent people from carrying. We’re thinking you should be able to carry a firearm now if you have a FOID card,” said Richard Pearson, executive director of the Illinois State Rifle Association.
But some firearm training instructors who are certified by the National Rifle Association and are strong supporters of the concealed carry law said gun owners need to be trained to react appropriately in life-threatening situations.
It is important, they said, for people to understand that a concealed carry permit does not give an average citizen the right to assume the duties of a trained law enforcement officer.
“The concealed carry permit, realistically, is only there for you to protect yourself. It’s not a license to go out and go looking for trouble or deal with a situation that is best left to law enforcement,” said Queen, executive director of the Fidelity Investigative Training Academy in Chicago.
“Law enforcement training is about securing and containing the danger,” he said. “Concealed carry training is about protecting yourself and moving away from the danger.”
Ordinary citizens, armed or not, should never interject themselves into dangerous situations, instructors said. But simulated exercises like the one Colon participated in allow students to experience the psychological and physiological changes that firearms trainers said occur during an attack.
A rush of adrenaline causes the hands to shake. Blood flows away from the fingers and toes, dulling the senses. Motor skills weaken. The perception of time changes to where everything seems to move in slow motion. You lose peripheral vision, and it seems as though you’re looking through a tunnel.
“People need to think about what is happening when they’re stressed out,” Queen said. “They need to be trained to be aware of their surroundings, other people and other possible threats. They are not going to get that training at a (firearms) range where nobody is going to shoot back.”
In addition to the basic firearm safety training and time at a firing range, the Illinois concealed carry law requires applicants to be familiar with state and federal laws regarding ownership, storage and transportation of a firearm. They also must be instructed on how to interact appropriately with law enforcement while carrying a concealed weapon.
Some firearms instructors said they would like to see Illinois’ training requirements modeled after the 16-hour Personal Protection Outside the Home course designed by the NRA. That course includes topics such as wearing a holster, shooting from cover, shooting with one hand and shooting while sitting or in motion. It also teaches techniques to avoid life-threatening confrontations as well as legal and social issues that might develop after a defensive shooting occurs outside the home.
But they said it should go a step further and include elements of the NRA’s law enforcement training curriculum, which offers a more in-depth look at the physiological impact of being in a life-threatening situation.
“I personally believe that the concealed weapon courses are too easy,” said Neil Obus, a certified NRA firearms instructor in Ohio, which requires 10 hours of instruction and two hours shooting at the range. “We make sure you know how to shoot and how not to sweep guns across a populated area. … I’m a total Second Amendment person, but there’s more that needs to be taught.”
Though Ohio law does not require it, Obus, a former law enforcement officer with eight years of military experience, said he also teaches an advanced course where students get to experience what a high-pressure situation might feel like. Carrying a loaded weapon, he said, carries great responsibility.
“It is a big deal, and you really need to know what you’re doing,” he said. “I carried a gun for over 20 years while I was working and it’s a scary thought, the thought of having to take somebody’s life. If you’re carrying a gun, you have to understand the ramifications and the responsibilities that go along with it. But you also have to understand that there are other options. Using a firearm is a last resort.”
The amount of training required for a permit varies from state to state. Indiana requires no training at all and offers lifetime permits. Michigan and Missouri fall in the middle with eight hours of training. In Wisconsin, Minnesota and Iowa, classes vary in length. The shortest approved class in Iowa is 30 minutes long.
Illinois officials estimate that about 300,000 people will apply for concealed carry permits.
Though the Illinois State Police has yet to issue specific guidelines for the training, Queen, also a certified NRA instructor, said he is developing a simulation program involving situations average citizens might encounter, such as road rage or carrying a cash deposit from a business.
“If I go to a restaurant and step on your foot and we start slapping each other back and forth, I’m not expected to stand there and take it all day,” said Don Haworth, another NRA-certified instructor and owner of Chicagoland Firearm Training on the North Side. “But I have to know what’s considered above and beyond.”
Before enrolling in Queen’s security guard course, Gloria Sauno said she did not realize that a gun should be the last course of defense, even for self-protection. She said she is pleased to know there are other options that should be tried first, including trying to talk the assailant down.
“I thought if you came across a bad situation and you had a gun and training, you could use it,” she said. Now I know that you have to sit back and hold on a second.”
That is what opponents of the concealed carry law worry about most.
“I don’t think it will turn into the Wild West, but there are, potentially, things that can happen,” said Colleen Daley, executive director of the Illinois Campaign to Prevent Gun Violence. “It’s not the fear of someone walking down the street with a gun that bothers most people; it’s the unexpected consequences. Someone going out to have a drink does not intend on killing somebody, but it happens.”
Though Daley’s group lobbied against the bill, she said she is pleased with the 16-hour training requirement. Being the last state to pass a concealed carry law, Illinois also has a road map provided by the other 49 states and can learn from their mistakes, she said.
“We realize there are rural and urban communities with high-density populations, and we need to treat those areas differently based on their needs,” Daley said.
Regardless of the training requirements, some residents, like Donald Lightfoot, of Chicago’s South Shore neighborhood, said he’s just pleased to get the chance to carry a firearm for self-protection.
A few years ago, he and his son had ridden their bikes to his mother’s house and were confronted by a teenage gunman who tried to steal the bikes from the front porch. He remembers how defenseless he felt.
“I told him to put the bike down and he pulled a gun out on me. I told my son to run upstairs with his grandmother, and I was standing at the front door just waiting for this guy to try and force his way into the house,” Lightfoot said.
The gunman came only as far as the front porch and ran away with the bike.
“I was going to have to fight for the life of my family,” Lightfoot said. “If I’d had a gun, he never would have come back on the porch. The bike would never have been taken. And we all would have felt safer.”
