A guest on Fox News Thursday following the shooting at a California bar suggested that people who are caught in a mass shooting should run at the gunmen attacking them to stop the shooting, despite admitting that someone could get shot.
During a Fox and Friends segment on Thursday following a shooting that left at least 12 people dead after a gunman burst into the Borderline Bar and Grill in Thousand Oaks, California, former New York Police Department Lieutenant Darrin Porcher said there are two ways any patron would act in this situation: run and hide or confront the shooter.
"One of the things that's interesting in terms of if I was a patron, or anyone that was a patron in one of these types of establishments for that matter. There's two focuses," Porcher said during the segment. "There's one that I've heard; run, hide, and dial 911. That's one aspect. And there's another aspect, whereas you confront the shooter directly."
He continued to say that there has been success by confronting active shooters in the past. Porcher said that although someone could risk getting shot by attempting to stop the shooter, it could decrease the chances of the shooter doing more damage.
"We've seen a lot of success with confronting the shooter directly, and we look at what happened with the 9/11 hijackers in Pennsylvania, for example. There are so many people at that location, if they converge on the shooter, it'll stop it," Porcher said. "Granted, someone may get shot, but the truth of the matter is this will decrease the carnage far greater than if you look to run, hide, and dial 911."
The man who opened fire at the Southern California bar was identified as 28-year-old Ian David Long, authorities said during a briefing to the press on Thursday. The shooting began at approximately 11:20 p.m. PST during "college night" at the bar, leaving at least 12 people dead, including a police officer, and another 23 injured.
Officers said Long used a .45 caliber Glock 21 handgun during the shooting and was found dead at the scene. Law enforcement officials said they believed Long killed himself after the attack and his motive remains unknown.
"It's a horrific scene in there," said Ventura County Sheriff Geoff Dean. "There's blood everywhere. Obviously for someone to do this, you have to have some kind of mental illness. And we have people with mental illness all across the country."
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