(AP Photo/Gerald Herbert)
There's been a gunfight at the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum in Washington., D.C.
I'm including the Google News link for search terms holocaust museum shooting. It should update with new report links as they become available.
Here's what is being reported so far, from The Washington Post:
A security guard and two other people were shot today inside the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum...U.S. Park Police said a gunman armed with a shotgun opened fire on the security guard and that other security guards returned fire. The gunman was reported wounded.
It should be noted that the museum, as well as all of Washington D.C. are "gun free zones" as far as carrying guns by non-government law enforcement personnel is concerned. Which is ironic when you consider the "Personal Histories" headline on the museum's "Resistance" page:
"At that time, a gun and a million dollars, the gun was worth more than a million dollars."
"Never again" is nothing more than a hollow slogan without the means to protect against it. Disarmament helped make genocide possible.
Museum visitors are fortunate that men with guns were immediately present to protect them.
I'll be checking back in throughout the day to see if newsworthy updates are available. In the mean time, you can continue to check the above Google News link.
UPDATE (3:28 pm EST): A history with "hate groups"?
He's 88?
James W. Von Brunn's "Holy Western Empire" website appears unavailable at this time--perhaps more people are visiting it than the servers can handle. Even Google cache would only get me to the main page and not allow me to explore the site.
For now this link via the Internet Archive "Wayback Machine" appears to be working.
You should also be able to access earlier versions of his site from here.
UPDATE (4:00 pm EST): Read the first six chapters of his racist screed "Kill the Best Gentiles" here, via the Internet Archive.
Scary stuff.
UPDATE (4:46 pm EST): Security guard Stephen Tyrone Johns reported dead. Statement of Holocaust Museum:
A shooting incident occurred at the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum's 14th St. entrance. An assailant shot a Museum security officer. Two Museum security officers returned fire hitting the assailant. The Museum officer and the suspect have been transported to a local hospital.
The Museum is closed for the remainder of the day and expects to be open tomorrow. We will release more information as it becomes available.
Our thoughts and prayers go out to the officer and his family.
UPDATE (5:00 pm EST): He was a "prohibited person," so that's another set of 'gun control" laws that did absolutely nothing to protect the public.
In 1983, Von Brunn was convicted of attempting to kidnap members of the Federal Reserve Board. He was arrested two years earlier outside the room where the board was meeting, carrying a revolver, knife and sawed-off shotgun, the AP reports.
UPDATE (6:55 pm EST): The predictable demonization of conservative gun owners has begun.
------------
Other Examiner coverage:
- Holocaust Museum shooting: one officer down
- Fenty’s own words: D.C. shooting ‘extremely isolated incident’
- Holocaust Museum shooting short-circuited by a gun
- Holocaust Museum shooter von Brunn a 9/11 'truther' who hated 'neo-cons', Bush, McCain
Check out other Gun Rights Examiners:
- Atlanta: Armed customer stops robbery
- Austin: Justifying deadly force (Part 3)
- Boston: Derrick Z. Jackson’s hot air, will Obama listen?
- Charlotte: The gun debate (explained for liberals)
- Cleveland:
Courts now Second Amendment battleground
- DC: How would Churchill vote in Virginia's Democratic primary for Governor on Tuesday?
- Denver: There they go again...
- Los Angeles: Two patriotic non-profits close.
- Minneapolis: Dirty Deeds in Virginia
- Seattle: Fenty’s own words: D.C. shooting ‘extremely isolated incident’
- St. Louis: Celebrating gun rights in the enemy's back yard
- Wisconsin: Gun rights advocates make progress
Comments
Jews For Preservation of Firearms ownership should be all over this one.
See? SEE?!? <I>This</i> is exactly why we shouldn't allow guns in National Parks! /sarcasm
Another scum with a gun!
If the leftists were blaming O'Reilly and Limbaugh etc for Tillers murder, can this be blamed on Obama and his antipathy toward Israel?
I'm not much for consperacies but this seems to fit the bill just alittle too close. He's a veteran (which according to DHS are prone to terrorism). He had a "long gun" which they are having trouble banning because not enough violent acts are committed with them, and he's a racist (which i think they would love to pin us all with that to take away free speech). Please don't get me wrong this guy was totally wrong and definatley had some issues, but it seems to me that he just fits the Obama ajenda just a little too closely. Am I nuts??
This guy was an ex-con, is he even allowed to legally own a gun of any kind? If not, where did he get it? I suppose the gun dealers lined up by the droves to sell this man a weapon!
He is a hate monger, pure and simple, he is not a law abiding citizen, and he was in a gun free zone, but somehow the left will blame guns and try once again to strip our rights!
My prayers go out to the family of the officer that was killed.
jh mentioned "long gun". I saw that term on EVERY left wing news program last night. Sometimes it was in parentheses.
This is the beginning of the left defining the terms again and putting "long guns" in the news to vilify them for removal.
This is not about the evils of guns. This is about anti-semitism, pure and simple.
I was there a week ago and read down the sign they have in the front with the "No weapons in DC schpeal".
What made me sick(er) was the fact there wasn't one mention in the entire museum (that I saw) of how Hitler disarmed the Jews.
So is it time to start exploiting this tragedy by making some nonsensical argument about how a bunch of citizens with CCWs would have deterred this guy or shot him faster?
It's coming...wait for it.
No, LG, no one would have shot him faster. In this case he was immediately engaged by armed guards.
But making that argument had there been no guards, or had he defeated them, is not unreasonable.
Now that you mention it, LG, I'll make that argument. Or rather, I made it long ago. A lot of the links are likely dead, but you'll get the point, even if the focus of this one is slightly off from yesterday's tragic events.
www.ncc-1776.org/tle1999/libe59-19991115-01.html
First, my condolences to the families of the victims.
I do however have a question, Question, an 88 - Year old "Neo-"Nazi named Von Brunn...
Has anyone investigated the possibility, that given this guy's age, there's the possibility that there was nothing "Neo" about him?
Got something to say?
Examiner.com is looking for writers, photographers, and videographers to join the fastest growing group of local insiders. If you are interested in growing your online rep apply to be an Examiner today!