Sunday, March 7, 2010

They're Calling it an "Accidental Shooting"

39OnLine.com has the story.

The mother of a man charged with murder for shooting at a car and killing a 13-year-old girl says it was an accident. Richard Calderon, 24, appeared in court today. He is free on bond. Calderon is accused of crashing into and speeding away from the car Alexis Wiley was riding in on Wednesday.

"It's a tragedy that this accident happened," said Isbel Calderon, the suspect's mother. "If the the mother was in the car then she should know exactly what happened, it was an accident."

Now, I hate to generalize, but this happened in Texas. Do you think the general shoot-em-up attitude in Texas partly explains this?

Or is this an ethnic thing? Is this all about Chicano and Black people?

Or is this another case of an individual doing something wrong who is 100% responsible for his actions, those actions having nothing to do with anyone else or the gun laws or, god forbid, any law abiding citizens?

I would add something else, contrary to popular opinion, I am not soft in criminals. The fact that this young man is out on bail is a travesty. The fact that in his area of Texas they've got plenty of marijuana offenders doing time as well as other non-violent offenders, is a travesty. Saying this was an "accidental shooting" is a travesty. What's your opinion? Please leave a comment.

5 comments:

  1. MikeB: "Now, I hate to generalize, but this happened in Texas. Do you think the general shoot-em-up attitude in Texas partly explains this?"

    No, that happens everywhere. But did you see that white pickup that pulled into the BBQ restaurant? Now THAT only happens in Texas.

    -TS

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  2. Just curious, why did you put quotes around “accidental shooting” like you did in the prior post? Did you “read into the story” and you think the 8-year old had it in for his toddler sister and is now playing the accident card defense?

    This is the kind of shared responsibility that I can get behind; a parent being held responsible for their children's actions resulting from their carelessness. I agree with the article that no punishment will match losing a child. No, I don't agree that they are likely to repeat. Given that they personally suffered a tragedy, I think they are less likely to make the same mistake which is basic human nature.

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  3. TS asked, "Just curious, why did you put quotes around “accidental shooting” like you did in the prior post?"

    I was thinking a real accidental shooting would be when you try to grab a dropped gun and it goes off accidentally. These cases were more like unintentional killings, but the shooting part wasn't accidental.

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  4. MikeB: "I was thinking a real accidental shooting would be when you try to grab a dropped gun and it goes off accidentally. These cases were more like unintentional killings, but the shooting part wasn't accidental."

    I'll buy that definition. But, both the 8 year old shooting, and dropped gun grabs are preventable, where as the road rage guy knew exactly was he was doing.

    -TS

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  5. Mikeb says:

    Now, I hate to generalize . . .

    Now that's funny.

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