janie's got a gun: open carry and the new york city public transportation system

Passenger is packing on a city bus on a Saturday afternoon (photo by twi-ny/mdr)

So I’m riding on the M42 bus, headed west toward Times Square to see a Saturday matinee of Summer, 1976, a new Broadway play in which Laura Linney and Jessica Hecht portray two mothers who meet during that fireworks-laden bicentennial season.

But suddenly I have thoughts about the summer of 1977, famously known as the Summer of Sam, when David Richard Berkowitz, aka the Son of Sam, aka the .44 Caliber Killer, terrorized New York City with a different barrage of fireworks. His murder spree actually began in July 1976 and continued for a year before he was arrested in August 1977, leaving six dead and seven wounded in his wake.

The bus was extremely crowded, with the standing passengers all gathered in the front. Spotting a seat at the center of the back row, I squeezed through, not so much because I had to sit down, but because it would hopefully inspire others to move back, providing additional space so more people could get on board. I wedged past a family of four, a mother and father with two daughters who appeared to be in their late teens or maybe early twenties, and took my seat, from where I could see everything that was happening on the bus.

“Can you all move to the back,” the driver announced. “If you don’t, this bus isn’t going anywhere.”

I turned to the man sitting to my right and said, “I guess I’m not the Pied Piper,” since no one followed me to the rear. People were still packed in at the front. He smiled and nodded.

The passengers began shuffling to create space; the family of four, who seemed to be tourists, were the only ones who stepped up to the back platform.

It was then that I saw it.

A few feet in front of me was a gun. It looked like a Glock, but I’m no expert.

The older of the two daughters had the pistol in a black thigh holster tied tight on her right leg.

I strained a bit to my right and left, trying to see if it could have been a toy, or maybe a tool. Perhaps the young woman was a cop, although if she were undercover, being so obviously strapped was not the best way of going about it.

I turned to the man sitting to my left and asked quietly, “Is that a gun?”

He followed where I was pointing and said, “Yes.”

“Are you allowed to open carry on a bus?” I asked.

He wasn’t sure but looked at his daughter, who was about six and was sitting in front of him.

I snapped a photo of the gun and searched my phone for MTA rules.

Jessica Hecht and Laura Linney safely discuss their new play on Broadway (photo by twi-ny/mdr)

According to section 1050.8 (a) of the Rules of Conduct & Fines, “No firearms or other weapons (as the term is used in the New York State Penal Law) may be carried in or on any facility or conveyance except as permitted by law.” Carrying a weapon carries a $100 fine.

In June 2022, the US Supreme Court struck down a 1911 New York State law that required gun owners to have “proper cause” to openly carry a firearm. In response, the Empire State enacted legislation that affected who could get an open-carry permit and declared certain areas to be gun-free “sensitive locations,” including Times Square and “public transportation and public transportation stations, including subways, buses, and subway stations.”

In addition, the official city website explains, “State law continues to require that all individuals wishing to carry or possess a firearm in or through the city obtain a license from the NYPD. The city generally does not honor concealed carry licenses from other states or other parts of New York State.”

However, it also specified, “The prohibition of carrying guns in sensitive locations does not apply to police officers, retired police officers, peace officers, armed security guards, active-duty military personnel, or any person who is lawfully engaged in hunting.”

None of those exceptions seemed to be relevant in this case. But I wasn’t about to say anything; readers of this column know that I don’t exactly hesitate to talk to passengers who don’t pay their fare, refused to put on masks during the pandemic, or don’t give up their seats for pregnant women, the elderly, or the infirm.

I couldn’t help thinking that if this young woman were from a “stand your ground” state, she might have a quick trigger finger and use it if she felt threatened. As a friend wrote on my Facebook post about this situation, “Imagine being that filled with fear or machismo.”

Per Florida statute 776.013, for example, gun owners are allowed to protect themselves in a “dwelling,” “residence,” or “vehicle,” the last one including “a conveyance of any kind, whether or not motorized, which is designed to transport people or property.”

Sure, those laws don’t apply in New York, but little good that will do you when your bullet-riddled body is lying bleeding on the floor of a bus.

In 1984, white “Subway Vigilante” Bernhard Hugo Goetz pulled out an unlicensed Smith & Wesson .38 and shot four Black teens on a downtown 2 train who were allegedly demanding five dollars from him. He was found not guilty on every charge, including attempted murder and assault, but was convicted of third-degree criminal possession of a weapon.

The decision in People v. Goetz reads in part, “We cannot lightly impute to the Legislature an intent to fundamentally alter the principles of justification to allow the perpetrator of a serious crime to go free simply because that person believed his actions were reasonable and necessary to prevent some perceived harm. To completely exonerate such an individual, no matter how aberrational or bizarre his thought patterns, would allow citizens to set their own standards for the permissible use of force.”

Goetz served eight months in prison; his defense was funded in part by the NRA, which used the case to successfully lobby for fewer restrictions on citizens carrying guns.

I thought about calling 911, but I didn’t want to alert the young woman or her family and get into a fight about her right, or lack thereof, to have a Glock on a bus. I also considered going to the front and telling the driver, but it was too crowded to even push my way to the back door, run outside, and get back on at the front.

My stop was approaching, so I decided I would immediately grab a police officer on the street; Times Square is usually bursting with NYPD. But I couldn’t find any cops until Forty-Seventh St. Maybe the nasty, rainy weather was a factor.

Spike Lee explores a dangerous NYC summer in 1999 film

They were in a white van, and I asked them to roll down the window. When I showed them the picture of the gun, they became very concerned.

“What bus is it?” the man in the driver seat asked.

I told him it was the M42, heading west.

“Do you have the bus number?”

Damn, I hadn’t thought of that; I assumed it would be easy to almost instantly track down a police officer on Forty-Second St. and Broadway.

“The M42 comes about every ten or fifteen minutes, so it’s probably only at Ninth Ave. by now,” I said.

The officer in the passenger seat started giving reasons why the young woman might be authorized to openly carry the weapon, but I was fairly certain that this was a tourist family and not some elaborate undercover operation or a marshal from another jurisdiction on vacation.

Ultimately, the police decided that I had done the right thing by not confronting her and that they didn’t have enough information to call it in or chase after the bus themselves. They told me that next time I should call 911 and be sure to get the bus number.

I thanked them for what they do for the city every day.

That night, I had another show, the award-winning Blue Hill Troupe’s adaptation of Gilbert & Sullivan’s The Pirates of Penzance or, The Slave of Duty at el Museo del Barrio. All attendees had to empty their pockets and go through a metal detector in order to get inside.

I felt a bit of relief; there would be no pistol-packing tourists in this audience, although there were plenty of imaginative prop weapons onstage, where no one in the audience was worried about anyone standing their ground.

[You can follow Mark Rifkin and This Week in New York every day here.]