Houston-based lawyer Charles Cotton, listed as a national NRA board member on the gun lobby's website, made the comments in an online chat room he administers called texaschlforum.com, a discussion board devoted to gun rights and firearms issues.
In an online thread about Wednesday night's mass shooting at the Emanuel African Methodist Church in Charleston, Cotton said that one of the nine people slain, church pastor and Democratic state Senator Clementa Pinckney, had voted against legislation in 2011 that would have allowed concealed possession of handguns in restaurants, day-care centers and churches.
"Eight of his church members who might be alive if he had expressly allowed members to carry handguns in church are dead," Cotton wrote.
In an online thread about Wednesday night's mass shooting at the Emanuel African Methodist Church in Charleston, Cotton said that one of the nine people slain, church pastor and Democratic state Senator Clementa Pinckney, had voted against legislation in 2011 that would have allowed concealed possession of handguns in restaurants, day-care centers and churches.
"Eight of his church members who might be alive if he had expressly allowed members to carry handguns in church are dead," Cotton wrote.