Would 'concealed carry' guns have scared off Dylann Roof from his church massacre?

If South Carolina had a law allowing “concealed carry” weapons in churches, could the massacre carried out by Dylann Roof in Charleston have been prevented?

Most gun-rights advocates clearly believe that is the case.

David Fortunato, an assistant professor in the Department of Political Science at the University of California, Merced, agrees that concealed carry laws logically should provide a deterrent to crime.

“On its face, the claim that increasing the number of gun carriers would reduce crime seems logical (at least to an economist),” Fortunato wrote in an Op-Ed for The Washington Post. “If more people carry guns, then criminals would understand that the likelihood of their victims defending themselves with a gun is higher and would therefore be less likely to commit crime. In simple economic terms, easing concealed carry seeks to increase the cost assailants pay to commit a crime, so they choose not to, we hope.”

But what if the prevalence of new, broadened concealed carry laws in many states has not made much of an impression on the common criminal? Fortunato has published a new academic study that suggests the public, presumably including a fair share of the criminal element, does not believe there has been much of an increase in people who carry concealed weapons.

In this case, perhaps perception overrules reality. The CCW laws are intended to reduce the incidence of random crimes but what if the criminals are not convinced that there’s really much change on the streets in the number of people “packin’ heat?”

To be clear, as FBI crime statistics have abundantly demonstrated, most shooting victims know their attacker – a family member, friend, neighbor, ex-spouse or ex-girlfriend/boyfriend.

But in the cases in which a shooter attacks strangers – that terrifying random crime – such as the mass murder of nine people by Roof, it’s often assumed by gun-rights activists that the criminals target “gun-free zones,” such as schools or government buildings or even churches, to carry out their madness.  
Yet, we daily experience shootings across the country in all kinds of settings:  on the streets, at stores and shopping malls, on freeways, in parks, restaurants and night clubs.
Many of the shootings in our inner cities, where gun crimes are tragically abundant, take place in dangerous neighborhoods that represent the furthest thing from a gun-free zone. Yet, criminal predators show no fear of entering into the fray.

As for the crimes most feared by average gun owners – such as a home invasion or a carjacking – concealed carry doesn’t provide much of a deterrent if the public outlook is that nothing has changed. That’s essentially what Fortunato found after surveying 1,000 people:

“If people do not believe that there are more firearm carriers because concealed carry laws have gotten more permissive, then they do not register that the price of crime has increased, and therefore crime rates will not fall.

“… The data suggest that there is no relationship between a state’s concealed carry laws and the number of firearm carriers people believe there are in that state.

“… Perhaps most interestingly, I find very strong evidence that making it easier to carry concealed weapons does substantially increase the number of people who carry guns -- but I found no evidence that that changes public perceptions of how many people are carrying guns.”