FLASH: Armed robbery at ''no-guns'' Bureau of Workers' Comp garage

5:29pm Wednesday, December 29, 2004

Ohioans For Concealed Carry has learned that there has been a robbery at a parking garage that is leased to the Ohio Bureau of Workers' Compensation in Columbus.

While information is still sketchy, initial information is that a female attendant who was working in a ticket booth (behind prominently displayed "no-guns" signs) was robbed on Wednesday morning, December 29.

The criminal informed the attendant that he had a gun, took her purse and stole her car. The attendant is being described as having been "shaken" by the incident.

The scene of the robbery is one block away from the main downtown Columbus police headquarters.

According to our information, the BWC is now offering "personal safety tips" to its employees as a means of consolation. But as regular readers of this website may recall, the BWC was offering advice that was promoting anything personal safety earlier this year, when it published an article advising private businesses to post signs rendering concealed handgun license-holders defenseless.

Click on the "Read More..." link below for more.

A Summer 2004 Issue of Worker's Comp Quarterly article, written by contributing writer Rick Burson, stated as follows:

"Because of the risk of injuries caused by mishandled firearms or intentional acts of violence, the workplace should be added to the list of places where firearms cannot be carried."

In the article, Tom Wersell, the Bureau's special investigations/ security director advises:

"This is one more way to provide a safe environment for both your workers and your customers."

This robbery is the latest in a string of state-mandated victim zones - places where you can be sure only the criminals are armed.

As OFCC's Chad Baus told the Columbus Daily Reporter in August, BWC has "first-hand knowledge that gun bans don't work," referring to a 1996 hostage-taking at the BWC offices.

Signs will not stop criminals, Baus said, and "gun control does not stop gun crime."

Thanks to a ban on CCW in all state-controlled buildings, the BWC had no choice about making this attendant defenseless. But it DOES have a choice about giving out such poor and incomplete advice to other businesses.

The majority of multiple victim-public shootings occur where guns are banned, and the Ohio Bureau of Workers' Compensation has no business offering such negligent advice to private companies.

In the same August article on the controversy, Baus told the Columbus Daily Reporter, "Now that they published a political piece, they owe it to Ohio businesses to publish a safety piece."

Now more than ever, that article needs to be written.

Bureau of Workers' Comp snub: OFCC members' concerns ''overblown''

Mea culpa: Bureau of Workers' Comp buries ''apology'' on page 9