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I'm sure by now that everyone has read about the stabbing of the eleven year old in a crowded movie theatre in Springfield, MA. Well, this sure is a sore spot for the teatre industry. Will we now have to istall metal detectors. Will we have to employ plain cloths police to monitor our thatre? The bleeding hearts of America are going to have a feild day with this one.

when I was in houston we had 14 off duty police officers for security. the main prob there was theft of cars. Some gang wanna bes would try to "tag" the place etc.
Never anything like stabbings though

It's disheartening to think that small town theaters or any theater for that matter would have to resort to the use of plain cloths police or metal detectors. But I'm sure in some the big cities these practices are being used today.
It is truely a sad refection on or times and sadder still that because of a few mindless people we all may be put upon to suffer.
In my mind, there is no reson for a child of eleven to stab another of his peers. That child has problems that should be addressed from behind bars.


[This message has been edited by poppajoe (edited February 07, 2001).]

This was an isolated incident. It couln't have been forseen. Perhaps better employee monitoring of the lobby could have stopped this sad event before it happened. No amount of increased security will stop this random kind of event.

In Denver at the Commonwealth, University Hills 3 a man pulled a gun out and shot the guy sitting in front of him in the head, for no good reason at all.

We will not increase security at our little Art-plex. We don't draw that kind of crowd. But perhaps I will change my mind when a little old lady pulls a knife of one of our little old men.

When I transfered with the comapny I was working for to a small city I employed 1 deputy just as a show piece to keep the punk kids in line this really helped and it also helped when I became a deputy.

This has almost never been a problem but with bigger and tougher places come a more serious customer. If your style of management allows acting out by patrons it's easy for things to go too far very quickly. Kids often bring school and after school anger that's been brewing a long time with them when they go to the movies. We intervene at any confrontation immediately. The police station is across the street and this helps. But trying to prevent something that will happen 1 in a 1090 years is a losers game. Last year there were 30,000 bomb scares at schools. And that resulted in a net of zero bombs found. Clearly there's an over reaction to the nut.

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Mike Hurley
www.bigscreenbiz.com