Wednesday, March 16, 2011

The Florida Gun Culture Spawns Another Family Tragedy

The St. Petersberg Times reports an a murder suicide that everyone saw coming:

Neighbors of the house on Ironworks Lane reported hearing screaming matches, one as recent as this weekend. Customers at the gun shop owned by Michael H. Schriebman said they often heard loud, profane arguments between him and his 21-year-old nephew, Louis E. Schriebman.

The volatility reached a tragic crescendo early Tuesday morning when, police said, Louis Schriebman set his uncle's gun shop ablaze before fatally shooting his uncle; his 75-year-old grandmother, Sarah Bricker Schriebman; and Michael Schriebman's live-in girlfriend, a 50-year-old woman whose identity has not been released by police.


What's your opinion? Why wasn't the abusive uncle not able to protect himself with a gun of his own? Why didn't someone ensure that the unstable nephew was disarmed?

What's your opinion? Please leave a comment.

4 comments:

  1. Violence begets violence?

    Put another way --- everybody has to sleep sometimes......

    ReplyDelete
  2. I've spent some time in the "gun culture", albeit not in Florida. Common activities include target shooting, gun cleaning, discussion of arms ammo ballistics and hunting, etc. Killing your grandmother isn't one of the common activities I've seen in the gun culture. In fact, it's not even an uncommon one. Out of all the gun owners I know not one has killed his grandmother or other relative or anyone at all for that matter.

    Are you sure your anti-gun bias isn't making you mis-attribute the cause of this incident?

    ReplyDelete
  3. There is no "cause" in the sense of one single thing that explains it. But gun availability is a big part. A situation in which violent, angry people have guns is just asking for trouble. I admit killing one's grandmother isn't the typical result, but given the innumerable ways violent people act out, gun availability makes it more lethal and bloody.

    ReplyDelete