Montana Sheriff Explains What Happens To You If You Take Down An Active Shooter

The nation was rattled this past weekend by a crazed shooter who attacked customers and employees at an In-N-Out in Twin Falls that left three dead and seven more injured. Thanks to a private citizen and an off-duty state trooper, both of whom drew their own weapons on the shooter to protect everyone else, many lives were saved that day.

Montana Reacts to Idaho In-N-Out Tragedy

As the people of Idaho and throughout the country continue to try to make sense of this awful tragedy, so too are the people of Montana.

What could compel someone to pick up a gun and shoot at innocent people, yet alone while they're doing something as wholesome and innocent as trying to get a meal at In-N-Out?

As we've all heard at some point: "Bad things can happen anywhere."

And that's not fear-mongering, that's simply the harsh truth and I hate it to break it to the person who thinks the world's been a tough place: it's only going to get tougher.

Cascade County Sheriff Slaughter Reacts to In-N-Out Shooting

The truth of the matter is this: we have to look at what's happening around the country and determine whether or not we would be prepared if a similar scenario took place in our community.

Are we prepared? Do we all know what to do in the event of an active shooter? What about the people who stepped up with their own firearms to shoot at the active shooter? What happens to them? What would happen to them if they had successfully taken down the shooter before he got to anyone?

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I had a chance to get some answers to these questions when catching up with Cascade County Sheriff Slaughter and let me tell you: he made me think a little bit.

Again, I want to stress and cannot stress this enough: this is not fear-mongering. This is reality and it's never a bad thing to think about preparedness, and what any of us would be getting ourselves into if we decided to jump in and "save the day."

(Author's Note: Portions of this interview have been removed to make it a more concise reading experience. You can see the full interview regarding Sheriff Slaughter in our video below the interview transcript.)

Chris: "What is your big takeaway as the Cascade County Sheriff when you see an incident like this at an In-N-Out in Twin Falls? I wanted your perspective as sheriff to say what is your takeaway from this incident and as casket county residents is there anything we can learn from this situation

Sheriff Slaughter: Well the best deterrent we can have is that our citizens are armed. What's really unique and random about In-and-Out is they'll attack a gun-free zone, an area where you can't have guns typically active shooters.

I'll say this you know I think if a society has responsibly armed people first of all it's way less likely that it occurs but then if it does occur it's way way way more likely that you're going to save dozens if not hundreds of people's lives.

The only the only word of caution that the citizen has to think about ... [is] that you want to be careful if you are a citizen, you don't have a badge, you don't have a vest, you don't have any identification on you, and you now pulled out your gun and the police are coming to a 'man or person with a gun.'

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What happens if the police, you're well intended, but they shoot you because they're like 'hey we got called here to this guy shooting everybody and we saw you'?

And you just happen to be the first guy I see and I can see you shooting in some direction, you're not wearing law enforcement credentials.

That's the only thing you have to think about. So now that I said that let's get to some facts: an active killer who's out there doing that... it's usually long over before the 9-1-1 dispatch call gets sent in so if you're there and you can stop it and you're confident and competent in your skillset and you're willing to accept the consequence for doing it right because even if you're justified there's consequence...

Chris: So that was my question for you, Sheriff. What if, let's say the gentleman (who was photographed shooting at the active shooter) takes the perpetrator down? And at that moment he sets his gun down he just waits for law enforcement hands up, what kind of process would that person who saved lives stood up and did the right thing (go through) because a lot of people think about that part. They don't think about the aftermath, right, he just took another man's life regardless of the situation and he used his firearm to do so... what happens to him?

Sheriff Slaughter: So whether it's a citizen or whether it's a law enforcement officer, it's still a homicide investigation, still homicide so you have the cause and manner of death.

He died due to gunshot wounds - okay, that's the cause.

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The manner of death is a homicide. Everyone gets freaked out when they hear that word like, 'oh homicide' and it's just a manner of death. You died purposefully and knowingly and intentionally by someone else's hand. That's all homicide means.

Now, it could be justifiable or it could be unjustifiable because you can you can commit the act of homicide and you can be good to go and it'll be just self-defense. And in the state of Montana we have an affirmative self-defense law so you have to prove beyond a reasonable doubt that it wasn't self-defense and then you also have to prove beyond a reasonable doubt that it was homicide. In our state, we have really good self-defense laws so to answer your question it's possible and highly, well it's highly likely... I'll say this that you're going to be processed meaning your firearms going to be confiscated; your clothing is likely going to be confiscated; you are going to be interviewed, you might, depending upon circumstances, you might have a body search warrant done on you; and you might have blood taken from you and everything.

But that's also designed to protect you too. We've established this is justifiable or this is self-defense because you can also you can also use deadly force to protect another person... doesn't just have to be yourself, can be to protect another.

So, you know so you got a lot of variables, a lot of factors in there but you're going to likely be processed. Just like you were if it was an unjustifiable because you can't treat them any different. The truth is when we first get there we don't know and 10 hours later we still don't know we may think we know right right but we don't know.

Chris: And so when that person goes through their court process, are you guys able to be involved in the process to "help" this guy through his process?

Sheriff Slaughter: Absolutely, so yeah the reality of it is is like especially say in this county, let's let's say it was, you know, justified. The county attorney's not even going to bring it to prosecution. He's not gonna press charges on it so it's not gonna be a court issue later on. But let's say it does have to go through some hearings or whatever, in fact, the person who did the shooting, the citizen - their attorney will likely call law enforcement to testify on that person's behalf even if the state's like 'ah, we don't really get involved,' that defense attorney's gonna call us and go tell us what you saw.

That's one thing too like something to really consider, you know, in the light of this horrible tragedy in Twin Falls... if you carry a gun you should really get insurance.

There's all these ones out there you just go online and Google, I think it's like 20 bucks a month, but for the cost of retaining a really good attorney who's specialized in this type... yeah, absolutely. It's just smart.

You don't want someone to be doing everything legally justified and then getting sued. It happens all the time in law enforcement, we're legally justified, we were legally correct, still get sued.

So, it's one of those things that like if you're carrying a firearm, buy yourself some insurance.