Liabilities of Gun Free Zones in PA

[bungiex88]

Does pa recognize any defenseless victim act or gun free zone liability laws?
To hold gun free zones of all liabilities if a shooting occurs or any other criminal activity that could of been stopped by a law abiding citizen with a ccw.

[jerryg]

Great question, can't wait for the answer.

[tl_3237]

A lot depends on what the possessor knows or should have known about the likelihood of criminal activity and what reasonable preventative measures were taken, if any. Allowing randomized patron carry would not, IMO, satisfy any arising affirmative duty since there's no guarantee that 1. an armed patron is present during exigent event; 2. that the armed patron will elect to take decisive action to prevent the occurrence; 3. that the armed patron would have sufficient skills to prevent collateral injury; 4. etc.

The law regarding this duty is well set forth in Section 344 of the Restatement 2d, Torts: `A possessor of land who holds it open to the public for entry for his business purposes is subject to liability to members of the public while they are upon the land for such a purpose, for physical harm caused by the accidental, negligent or intentionally harmful acts of third persons . . . of the possessor to exercise reasonable care to (a) discover that such acts are being done or are likely to be done, or (b) give a warning adequate to enable the visitors to avoid the harm, or otherwise protect them against it.'

"Comment f to Section 344, applies with specific particularity to the present case at bar, and states as follows: `Since the possessor is not an insurer of the visitor's safety, he is ordinarily under no duty to exercise any care until he knows or has reason to know that the acts of the third person are occurring, or are about to occur. He may, however, know or have reason to know, from past experience, that there is a likelihood of conduct on the part of the third persons in general which is likely to endanger the safety of the visitor, even though he has no reason to expect it on the part of any particular individual. If the place or character of his business, or his past experience, is such that he should reasonably anticipate a careless or criminal conduct on the part of third persons, either generally or at some particular time, he may be under a duty to take precautions against it, and to provide a reasonably sufficient number of servants to afford a reasonable protection.'

431 Pa. 432 (1968)
Moran
v.
Valley Forge Drive-In Theater, Inc. et al., Appellants.
Supreme Court of Pennsylvania.

[Kabloosh]

You could argue through research that gun free zones actually create a target of interest for increased criminal activity. I would suspect it would take some serious research though.

My school is a little weird. It is a private college so it isn't the same as PSU or any other publicly funded higher education institution. However in a very small section of the handbook it does state that it is against the rules for students to carry any sort of weapons to include firearms on school grounds. They however have no signs on the front so I think it would only apply to students since you agree to the rules when enrolling obviously.