Trying to Keep Fear at Arm’s Length : Gun Stores Do a Brisk Business Amid Concerns About Crime and Possibility of Civil Unrest

Although the national defense industry in the South Bay may be hurting, the personal defense business is booming--literally. From Harbor City to Redondo Beach to Torrance, people worried about renewed civil disorder and crime in general are buying guns and ammunition and lining up at shooting ranges and firearms instruction classes in record numbers.

“Gun sales are up at least 30% to 40% over the past eight weeks,” said Darren Webb, 28, owner of The Gun Shop in Redondo Beach, as a steady stream of gun buyers crowded into his shop this week. “Ammo sales have gone up over 100%. I can’t keep ammo in stock. The phone has been ringing off the hook.”

The same holds true for the Sharpshooter indoor shooting range and gun shop in Torrance.

“Gun and ammo sales are sky high,” said Garth Gaines, 31, who co-owns the business with his brother Joe. “Between Friday and Monday we sell everything in the store and then have to restock. I’d say we’re selling hundreds of guns every month, mostly small handguns, and shotguns as fast as we can stock ‘em.”

The trend worries some local law enforcers.

“There’s an awful lot of people buying guns out there,” said Lt. Paul Nowatka of the Torrance Police Department. He added that while his department has no policy on whether law-abiding citizens should or should not buy guns, “We’re not happy about all those guns being in untrained hands.”

The brisk gun sales in the South Bay come on the heels of record statewide firearms sales last year. According to the California attorney general’s office, 553,845 firearms--more than two-thirds of them handguns--were sold in California in 1992, a 14% increase over the previous year.

The attorney general’s statistics show a marked “spike” in gun sales statewide immediately after the April riots, particularly in Los Angeles County, where handgun sales last May were up about 64% over May, 1991. The county’s gun dealers filed purchase documents for 14,000 handguns last May. Gun sales statewide declined gradually after May, but in December they began to pick up again.

Gun sales figures for the first two months of this year were not available. But reports from South Bay gun dealers, shooting range operators, gun safety instructors and law enforcement officials indicate the gun-buying trend is still picking up steam.

The primary reason, almost everyone seems to agree, is fear of renewed rioting related to the ongoing federal civil rights trial of four Los Angeles police officers accused of beating Rodney G. King.

“People are afraid, big time,” said Fred Darling, 43, a Sharpshooter range employee who also teaches gun safety classes. “People tell me they’re not going to go through the fear they went through last time.”

Darling said that, in recent weeks, the number of people attending training classes and going to the range for shooting practice has increased so much that there often is a waiting list for range space, even at 2 p.m. on a weekday afternoon.

“Since the trial started, it’s really picked up,” Darling said.

Sharon Higashi, 34, of Gardena, a longtime competitive shooter and gun enthusiast who offers firearms training classes for women, said that after a leveling off in her class attendance in recent months, interest is picking up again.

“I’m getting more calls now,” Higashi said. “April is booked, May is about half-booked. People are very concerned right now. The feeling is that, even if the police are more prepared (for riots), they still can’t be everywhere. . . . I think the riots woke a lot of people up to that.”

“There’s a lot of worried people out there,” agreed Dave Ducatman, 24, a salesman at The Gun Shop. “Considering what happened last April, I think it’s justified. And the talk on the street now is that the bad guys aren’t going to burn their own neighborhoods down this time, they’re going to burn other people’s neighborhoods.”

That is a recurring rumor heard among many gun dealers and buyers--that if riots break out again, gang members intend to carry the violence to so-called “safe areas” that were largely undamaged in last spring’s riots. Flyers warning of that possibility have reportedly been circulating at gun shops and shooting ranges in recent weeks.

“I’ve seen a couple of those flyers, but I don’t believe that is the reality of what would happen,” Lt. Nowatka of the Torrance police said. He added, however, that, “We (Torrance police) are preparing as though it was the reality.”

“People are apprehensive,” said Joseph Okon, 38, of Buena Park, an occupational therapist and longtime gun owner who was shopping at the Sharpshooter. “People realize they’re not going to be protected by the police, that they have to protect themselves.”

Many of those now buying guns have never owned a firearm before.

“Most of the people who are coming in are professional people, people who have never been around guns before,” said Webb of The Gun Shop. Webb said his two biggest-selling firearms are 9-mm semiautomatic pistols--he sells more than a hundred a month, at $350 to $500 apiece--and a pistol-grip style 12-gauge, pump-action shotgun designed for “home defense.” Recently he’s been selling about 75 of those a month, at $239 each.

“I’d say about 20% of my customers recently are first-time buyers,” said Alex Alvarez, owner of A & H Gun Sales in Harbor City, who adds that gun sales have increased in recent weeks. “A lot of them are women.”

Even some women who profess a fear and distrust of firearms are buying them.

“I hate guns,” said Melissa, 30, a San Pedro businesswoman who did not want her last name used. “But we (she and her husband) are nervous about more rioting. We hated the feeling that we were helpless last time.”

Melissa, who had never fired a gun before, and her husband, who has had some firearm experience, recently bought a Glock 9-mm semiautomatic pistol. After firing it for the first time, Melissa said, “It still makes me nervous. I guess it’s going to take a little getting used to.”

“I believe in being prepared, the way things are these days,” said Jan Bonnar of Redondo Beach, a first-time gun buyer who visited The Gun Shop with her friend Karl Flemister to purchase a .45-caliber handgun and a .45-caliber rifle. “I like to think that, if you’re prepared, nothing will happen.”

Like everyone who buys a firearm in California, Bonnar and Flemister will have to wait 15 days to pick up their guns while their backgrounds are checked. Purchasers with criminal records are ineligible for legal gun ownership. According to the attorney general’s office, the state last year denied 5,763 gun purchases--37 of which were attempted by people convicted of homicide.

All of the gun dealers interviewed said they strongly recommend that first-time gun buyers take a firearms handling course, but there are no reliable statistics on how many gun owners sign up for instruction.

That’s what worries some police officers, given the volume of guns being sold.

“We recognize the rights of law-abiding people to buy guns,” said Sgt. Bill Frio, a spokesman for the Los Angeles Police Department. “But people should remember that most of the guns that are now in criminals’ hands started off as legal guns. I’m not totally sure that a gun is the answer.”

Frio added that anyone who’s thinking of buying a gun should “absolutely” attend a firearms training class.

A new state law mandating firearms training for gun buyers is scheduled to take effect Oct. 1, but the details of the program have not yet been worked out.