After store owner, customer thwart robbery, Richland deputies start training barbers

Chris Toliver has a few rules if you get your hair cut at Toliver’s Mane Event: No sagging pants, no swearing, and conversations must remain respectful.

Also, if you have a concealed weapons permit, and Toliver has known you long enough, you’re encouraged to bring your weapon along.

“I’ve let them know: Look here, I would appreciate it if you could bring your gun into the shop for safety purposes,” said Toliver, 46. “If it was brought to my knowledge and I didn’t know them well, I would tell them do not bring your gun into our place of business.”

Toliver and some of the barbers at his shop took the concealed weapons permit course last year from the Richland County Sheriff’s Department. The agency began offering the course for free to barbers and beauticians after a 2016 armed robbery attempt at a Columbia barber shop was thwarted by a permit-carrying patron and barber, who fatally shot one of the suspects.

“Most barbers like myself, we deal within a cash business,” Toliver said. “I advise anyone in any type of business to make sure they get their CWP.”

‘Kids were crying, hollering’

It was just before closing time on a busy Friday night at Next Up Barber and Beauty on Jan. 22, 2016. There were 20 or so people in the shop, including several women and children, when two masked gunmen entered.

Elmurray “Billy” Bookman, who was cutting hair at his station, and one of his customers each pulled their concealed weapon and fired at the suspects, who had forced one customer to the floor and were taking money out of the pockets of the barbers’ jackets. The suspect carrying the shotgun ran out the front door, and the man with the handgun ran out the back but was later found near the shop. He was taken to a hospital, where he was later pronounced dead.

Bookman told The State newspaper the day after the incident that he and his client drew their concealed weapons and fired when one of the suspects had his back turned to go search a customer sitting against the wall.

“The kids were crying, hollering, and their parents were hollering,” he said at the time. “I was thinking we had to keep everybody safe.”

Police later said Bookman and the client who fired each had a valid concealed weapons permit, so were carrying and using the guns legally.

‘An untrained person with a gun is so dangerous’

In the weeks after the failed armed robbery, Sheriff Leon Lott reached out to Toliver about getting other barbers to get their concealed weapons permits.

“It brought awareness to the barbers and beauticians that they’re not immune to robberies or somebody coming in with a gun like that,” Lott said. “It opened their eyes up: ‘Hey, we can be victims too.’ ”

The sheriff’s department for several years has offered the concealed weapons permit course free to certain groups of people, usually after a crime or incident affects that group, according to Lott. In addition to barbers and beauticians, the sheriff’s department has offered the course to Realtors, home builders, members of the S.C. Bar Association, judges, and spouses and family members of law enforcement officers.

The agency also offered it to some churches after the 2015 massacre at Mother Emanuel AME Church in Charleston.

“We take a bad situation and try to turn it into something good by doing training,” Lott said. “We believe the training with the CWP is so important. An untrained person with a gun is so dangerous.”

Lott laments that the department cannot open the training to all members of the public.

“We’re just not able to do that,” he said. “We usually use it as a follow-up to something that’s happened.”

The course is taught at the sheriff’s department’s firing range by an off-duty or reserve deputy who is trained in firearm and concealed weapons permit instruction, Lott said. Those taking the class have to provide their own weapons and ammunition.

Under an old state law, the course had to be at least eight hours long; however, recent changes now leave the length up to individual instructors. Lt. Dominick Pagano, who teaches the course for the sheriff’s department, said instructors don’t cut corners.

In addition to teaching people where they can and cannot legally carry, how to load and unload a firearm and how to talk with children about guns, Pagano said instructors also work with students on their stance, grip, trigger squeeze and drawing a weapon from a concealed location.

Students also are instructed in de-escalation techniques.

“We don’t want people just buying a gun and not knowing how to use it,” Pagano said. “Sometimes, the right answer is not the firearm.”

‘You’re basically choosing life and death’

Derek Castile keeps a firearm in his Parklane Road business, Razors Barber Shop, but hadn’t had any formal training until he took the course provided by the sheriff’s department last year.

Castile, 30, said the course taught him not just how to use the firearm but to respect it.

“Always treat the firearm like it’s loaded,” he said. “I thought it was just gonna be lectures on what we need to do and how we need to do it. It was teaching us on how to protect yourself. If anything happens, you always want to be in the right.”

Toliver said the course also teaches responsibility and how to make decisions with little time.

“To shoot your gun, you must be able to ascertain whether your life is being threatened to the point it justifies using your gun,” he said. “Before you shoot your gun, you must determine what is behind the person you’re shooting at, to where if you miss, those bullets don’t go astray and hit someone else.”

Getting students to realize the gravity of shooting a firearm is one of the key points Pagano tries to drive home for people getting their permits.

“They have to understand that once that round leaves that weapon, you cannot take it back,” he said. “You’re basically choosing life and death when you squeeze that trigger. You need to know what you’re doing.”

Concern about constitutional carry

Castile said he knows other barbers interested in getting their permits.

They aren’t the only ones: The number of concealed weapons permits in South Carolina has more than doubled from the 127,657 active permits in 2010 to the 308,406 in 2016, according to the S.C. State Law Enforcement Division.

While Toliver appreciates the peace of mind that comes from having a gun and being trained in the laws and usage of firearms, he is alarmed by what he says will be a spike in gun violence if the General Assembly passes either of the pending proposals that would allow South Carolinians to carry a firearm without a permit.

The proposals for what proponents call “constitutional carry” also would allow for open carry, meaning weapons holders could carry their firearms for everyone to see.

“I hope that law never passes,” Toliver said. “There are certain people that just don’t need to have guns. To put that many guns on the street, you’re gonna have people settling arguments and disputes with guns instead of verbally.”

Lott has spoken out against permitless and open carry, and said any proposals that dilute the training requirement will face opposition from law enforcement.

“The CWP is so important in today’s world,” he said. “We’re talking about allowing citizens to walk around with open carry. It is the training that is the most vital part of owning a gun.”

This story was originally published April 29, 2017 at 10:34 PM with the headline "After store owner, customer thwart robbery, Richland deputies start training barbers."