In a landmark ruling today in the lawsuit against Cinemark by victims of the Aurora, Colorado theater shooting, US District Court Judge R. Brooke Jackson ruled that because they are Gun Free Victim Zones,

“the patrons of a movie theater are, perhaps even more than students in a school or shoppers in a mall, ‘sitting ducks.'”

This means that the owners of the Century Aurora 16  Theater should have known its patrons faced a risk, and taken steps to protect them, which they did not.

Undoubtedly this opens the door for more lawsuits by anyone hurt by an attacker in a Gun Free Victim Zone. It certainly reinforces the message of this blog over the last few years.

Of course, the simplest precaution any business owner can take, and which the movie theaters where I live in Kennesaw espouse, is not to prohibit the carrying of guns by its patrons. That’s because shooters are known to pick venues where they know they will not be challenged, and a theater that allows guns represents an unknown. They pass it by in favor of easier pickings.