Concealed in the Chicago Suburbs

President-Elect Donald Trump has expressed support for concealed carry, and he suggested that restrictions should be reduced for those who legally carry firearms. The idea of people carrying hidden weapons is frightening to some. Patch introduces you to one group in the Chicago suburbs that is dedicated to the armed lifestyle.

Steve Watson creeps through the dark hallway. He holds a flashlight in a reverse grip with his left hand. He presses the backs of his hands together to make a stable shooting platform for his Glock. Shadows dance in front of Watson as he scans left and right with his pistol and light.

This middle-aged former Navy submariner is not sure what he might find. There’s three young children, who love stuffed animals, in the house. He has his pistol out because he heard glass break, a child cry out, and a gruff voice say ‘shut up kid.’

Steve is breathing hard. His palms are sweating. The pistol feels a bit slippery in his hand. He edges around a corner, careful not to expose too much of his body to a potential attacker. Steve is cautious, but doesn’t want to waste any more time.

He inches around the corner and sees, in an open doorway just a few feet away, the edge of a human form close to the ground.

“I’m going to get the bad guy,” flashes through Steve’s mind.

Years of practice kicks in as Steve pops out from behind the corner. His right eye focuses on the pistol’s front sight post, the proper technique he has practiced to the point of becoming a natural reaction. The target beyond is slightly blurry as he starts to pull the trigger.

Then he sees them, a stuffed rabbit and a teddy bear just below his aim point.

Too late. His brain can’t stop his right index finger from executing the double head shot that he has performed hundreds of times before.

Pop-pop.

His flashlight illuminates the two holes just punched in the head of the brown cardboard target.

His heart sinks, but Watson keeps moving, and he finishes the training run by shooting another target representing a kidnapper.

One thing he knows: he can’t let that happen again.

The scenario was part of an International Defensive Pistol Association match held at the H.P. Shooting Center in McHenry, Illinois. The children and kidnappers were cardboard targets and the walls of the house were made of tarps hung from the ceiling of the gun range, but this night in the summer of 2003 had a lasting impact on Watson. He had three children under the age of 11 at the time. He did the realistic shooting scenarios to better protect his family, but now he was devastated.

“In this scenario I would have been the worst thing for the people I was trying to protect,” Steve later said. “I felt I was more of a danger to my family with a weapon than without it.” Other shooters at the match made the same mistake.

One woman who also had young children sobbed at the range after shooting the target with stuffed animals. She quit the shooting league. Steve considered selling his guns, but he decided instead to delve deeper into firearms training.

Over the next ten years Watson became a NRA certified instructor for pistols, rifles, and shotguns. When Illinois became the last state in the nation to legalize some form of concealed carry in 2014, Watson began teaching the course required to get a concealed carry license.

“Deciding that you’re going to carry is a lifestyle change,” said Watson, who carries a pistol 18 hours of every day.

On a bulletin board in Steve’s office in between schedules and orders for pistols to be picked up is a small piece of paper with “Titus 2:7.” The Bible verse, in part, states “In your teaching show integrity, seriousness.” Steve has the serious demeanor expected of firearms instructors, but the tall suburbanite with a trimmed gray mustache is unassuming, and he would blend in just about anywhere.

Watson is just one of the 181,489 Illinois residents licensed to discreetly carry a deadly weapon. In Cook County about one in every hundred residents has a concealed carry license, and every other county in the state has a higher rate.

Just by walking down the street or going to a store in the last two years in Illinois, you have probably passed by a few people who were legally carrying a loaded pistol. Some find that disturbing.

Opposition

One person who would disagree with Watson’s view on concealed carry is Maria Pike. Her 25-year-old son Ricky was shot and killed in the Logan Square neighborhood of Chicago in August 2012. After her son’s death, Pike became a gun control advocate. A former hotel manager and realtor, she now spends her time talking with families affected by gun violence.

“I don’t think concealed carry should have a place in an urban community,” Pike said. “I think guns always escalate situations.” She is concerned that someone with a concealed carry license could misinterpret an altercation between other people.

“You may act good faith and shoot someone who appears to be an aggressor, and that aggressor could have been trying to help someone else,” she said.

Maria is not alone in her concern about concealed carry. A 2014 poll conducted by the Paul Simon Public Policy Institute at Southern Illinois University found that more than half of Illinoisans felt less safe after the passage of the concealed carry law. A Chicago Tribune poll in the same year found 55 percent of residents of that city felt unsafe after the law changed.

While she opposes concealed carry, Pike supports gun ownership. Maria grew up in a rural area near Lima, Peru, and was exposed to firearms at an early age. Her father and four brothers hunted with the family’s rifles. “I thought it was a natural thing to own,” Pike said. “I felt protected-if we had robbers come in, my dad had guns.”

“If you have a gun at home and you keep it safe, without risking the lives of anyone who lives in that house, you the right to, you should have it,” Pike said.

When asked if regular citizens who received police-style training should be allowed to carry weapons, Pike thought for a moment then said, “My brain says, ‘why not?’ My heart tells me ‘no.’ It might be because I am a victim of gun violence.”

The state of Illinois requires police officers to fire a minimum of 30 rounds every year. This training standard does not include dynamic situations, such as engaging multiple targets or taking cover behind objects while shooting. There are some concealed carry license holders around Chicago who regularly conduct rigorous and realistic training that far exceeds the minimum police standards.

Shooting

“Eyes and ears!” Steve Watson shouts across the indoor range.

The nearly two dozen people with pistols on their hips know exactly what this means, and they don their ballistic glasses and ear protection. The group is mostly middle-aged men, many with graying or thinning hair, but there are two women and a few younger men. There’s even a 15-year-old closely watched by his father.

Known simply as the ‘league,’ this group of shooters meet every other week at the Article II range in Lombard, Illinois, 20 miles west of Chicago.

Illuminated by fluorescent bulbs, the polished concrete floor and white painted walls of range #4 are marred by thousands of little bullet streaks. The range is normally used for stationary shooters who fire on paper targets, but Watson and the other members of the league have set up black tarps and arranged cardboard silhouettes on stands for the night’s first scenario, “trouble in the alley.”

Lombard, Illinois, May 11, 2016 - Shooters of the ‘League’ inspect the complex arrangement of targets before the night’s first scenario. (Photo by Patrick Martin)

Watson has already given a safety brief, and he designated individuals to perform first aid and call 9-1-1 in case of an accident.

The electronic beep from the timer in Steve’s hand signals an individual shooter to draw their weapon and engage the targets. Two of the cardboard targets have been spray painted with blue hands with fingers spread out, as if to say ‘don’t shoot.’ The competitors are penalized if they hit one of these in the scenario.

The shooters fire on the first two targets at the starting position, then jolt 15 feet across the “alley” to tuck behind another tarp. They reload and shoot the next target until it falls, which then activates by string another turning target that appears for less than second. Shooters are scored on speed and accuracy, but there is no prize other than pride for the top score.

The second scenario required shooters to engage three targets while walking forward and backward.

After that, Watson gathered the shooters and announced the title of the night’s last scenario, “This is strong hand, weak hand.” The group emitted a collective groan. Shooting a pistol single-handed is challenging, shooting with one’s non-dominant hand is even more difficult.

Greg, a slim, white-haired 52-year old, explained the importance of off-hand shooting. Greg asked that his last name not be used in this article.

“What happens if one of your hands get hurt? In a real life situation someone would probably be shooting back at you,” he said. Greg has shot with the league for the past year. He appeared comfortable on the range, but said the first time he carried in public was nerve wracking.

Greg explained with a hint of a Chicago accent how he concealed his pistol and ventured to a Walmart near his home after getting his license.

“You think everyone knows you’re carrying a gun,” he said. Greg appears to be far more comfortable carrying now. He said that he carries a weapon 90 percent of the time when he is out.

Steve Watson and Greg stepped away from the range. The sound of pistol shots echoed through the windows as the other league members continue through the scenarios.

“Did you enjoy Defensive Pistol One?” Steve Watson asked, referring to a training course Greg recently took.

“Oh God yes. Not only did I enjoy it, but it exposed one of my big, big weaknesses” Greg said.

Greg explained how he was focusing his vision on the target, rather than the front sight of his pistol. The counter-intuitive technique of focusing on the sight at the end of a gun’s barrel results is critical for accurate shooting. The course instructor suggested that Greg put pink nail polish on his front sight as a reminder.

“No, I’m not going to do that,” Greg says with a laugh.

“Or orange or whatever,” Watson said.

“I want it the way it is…how I’m doing here isn’t as important to me as making myself better,” Greg said.

When it’s Greg’s turn to shoot the final scenario, he approaches the starting point with measured breaths. Greg is completely focused on the first cardboard target between two plywood doors on dollies.

The timer beeps. Greg pulls up his black t-shirt with his left hand and draws his Smith and Wesson semi-automatic pistol. He extends the pistol with both hands and fires three rounds at the first target before tucking behind the right plywood door. He leans out and fires with only his right hand on the pistol on each of the three targets on the right, starting with the furthest one and working his way forward. He tucks back behind the door to reload.

Lombard, Illinois, May 11, 2016 - A shooter fires at the target during the night’s third scenario while Steve Watson holds a timer. (Photo by Patrick Martin)

Greg presses a button on the left side of the pistol with his thumb, dropping a magazine to the floor. He pulls a full magazine from his waistband and slaps it into his pistol. Greg finishes firing on the right and bolts to the other door. He fires two rounds into each remaining target, and Steve Watson stops the timer.

“Doing this again and again and again, if something real were to actually happen, you are a lot more prepared that someone who doesn’t do it,” Greg said. His biggest point of pride was avoiding the targets with the innocent blue hands, often called ‘no-shoots.’

“I didn’t hit any no-shoots tonight, I’m pretty happy about that,” Greg said.

In the parking lot of the range Steve Watson loads a truck with targets, tarps, and wooden stands, to be stored until the next league night in two weeks. The shooters drive into the night, melting back into the world, where people won’t know about the pistols hidden on their bodies.

Photo at top: A concealed carry licensee from the western suburbs of Chicago shows his .357 caliber Smith and Wesson revolver. Photo by Patrick Martin.

Note: Interviews for this article were conducted in May 2016.