There is no doubt among those who are sane among us that some form of gun control has long been a necessity in the United States of America. But that statement is argumentative by its mere existence. Reality has nothing to do with it.
Jacksonville, Florida is a mere ripple in the national ocean of violence perpetrated on a minute by minute basis: an ongoing dispute between two groups led to a Sept. 7 shooting at 6100 Raines Viking Way as a Raines-Lee high school football game was getting out. Anthony Caesar, 20, and a friend were leaving the game in a car when one of two men opened fire with an AK-47-style rifle, police said. Police have charged Bruce Cornell Jackson, 18, with second-degree attempted murder after he was identified by witnesses, Lt. Rob Schoonover said.
Hollywood is to blame some say for the escalation of violence and the proclivity some have toward their “misuse” of guns and its effects on others. Never the gun and its availability: The fired Spanish teacher who killed Episcopal School of Jacksonville head Dale Regan on Tuesday brought with him nearly 100 rounds of ammunition for an AK-47 assault rifle he purchased at a Jacksonville gun show early last month, a police source familiar with the investigation said Wednesday.
The fact that the gun, and yes certain types of guns are available and find their way into the hands of those who would do harm to others forever seems to be ignored by those of us who would keep them legal: The shooting occurred Dec. 5 at the MLK Plaza on North 19th Street in Palatka and may have stemmed from an ongoing altercation. Assistant Chief James A. Griffith said two women were shot with a gun believed to have been provided by Dequan Lutrell Paul. A 55-year-old was shot in the arm and an 18-year-old in the back. Both were taken to the hospital and have since been released.
The second amendment to the U.S. Constitution allows for the “bearing “ or possession of “arms.” It does not allow for the wanton killing and evil that it brings to the lives and wellbeing of others: A Jacksonville man was sentenced Wednesday to 58 years in prison for second-degree murder for shooting a man who may not have been the intended target.
Richard Anthony Whateley, 24, used an assault rifle in a November 2010 drive-by shooting of Harry Roy Lewis, 59, outside a Southside home.
The evil that is brought by this weapon of not so mass destruction will continue as long as persons of good will do nothing: Police Chief Gerald Pickering said Tuesday that 62-year-old William Spengler, who served 17 years in prison for the 1980 hammer slaying of his grandmother, armed himself with a revolver, a shotgun and a semiautomatic rifle before he set his house afire to lure first responders into a death trap before dawn on Christmas Eve.
Two firefighters were shot dead and two others are hospitalized. Spengler killed himself as seven houses burned around him Monday on a narrow spit of land along Lake Ontario.
One of the guns recovered was a military-style .223-caliber semiautomatic Bushmaster rifle with flash suppression, the same make and caliber weapon used in the elementary school massacre in Newtown, Conn., Pickering said.
And the band played on.
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