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Area Gun Owners Not Supportive Of Greater Restrictions

(CBS) -- The National Rifle Association seems to be silent in the wake of the massacre in Connecticut, and local NRA representatives declined to comment.

Still, the shooting is expected to renew calls for stronger gun controls.

CBS 2's Dorothy Tucker went out Monday to see if gun owners are now willing to support more controls.

LISTEN: WBBM Newsradio Political Editor Craig Dellimore Reports

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T.D. Roe, a firing instructor at a local Gun range, feels terrible about last week's shooting.

But she also expressed the view of many gun advocates at the range – that the shooting is proof more people should be armed.

"If a teacher that had some kind of system that was knowledgeable that maybe had a firearm in the school to defend the children it could have stopped it," Roe says.

Among the guns at the range was a Bushmaster .223-caliber, like the one the gunman used to kill innocent children. It's also similar to the assault weapons killers used in the shopping mall in Oregon and the movie theater in Colorado. It was among the assault weapons banned in 1994, but the law expired in 2004.

Anti-gun advocates want to renew the ban. Lyn Hostetler, who keeps a gun at home for protection, doesn't support greater gun controls.

"I don't think you can legislate or protect against people who are bent on doing something like that," she says of mass killings.

But Chris Kaldis, a newcomer at the range, was among the few at the gun range willing to support tougher gun laws.

"I don't think you should be able to get that type of a gun that easily," Kaldis says.

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