A Christmas Eve Happy Ending for One Family, a Tragic Holiday for the Families of Two Others

We can only hope this little boy is too young to understand what was happening, and too young for this to be a clear long term memory.  His family will be grateful for so much more than material gifts this Christmas.

The family and friends of the two people found dead, sadly, will from now on remember Christmas eve as the holiday where those people died violently from someone shooting them.f

A felon with a gun who killed two people......odds are 50% that he got the gun from family, friends or a straw purchase, or 40% that he got that gun from another criminal on the street.......who got it from someone who originally acquired it as a legal purchase at some point.

We have too damned many firearms, and by having so damned many firearms in the hands of people who are NOT responsible about keeping them secure from people who do bad things with them, we have more firearm deaths and more firearm crime than places with fewer firearms. 

Guns are the problem, not the solution.  These two people who were killed still might have ended up dead, but it wouldn't have been as easy for someone to kill them with some other kind of weapon.

From MSNBC.com and the AP:

Va. police find 2-year-old boy in stolen SUV

By The Associated Press

updated 12/25/2011 1:19:40 AM ET

RICHMOND — A massive Christmas Eve search for a 2-year-old boy who was in the backseat of an SUV that was stolen following a double-slaying in Richmond ended around midnight with the boy being found safe, police said.

Richmond police said in a Tweet late Saturday: "2-year-old Kaiden Burnside is OK. Found alone inside SUV off Jennie Scher Road. Thanks to everyone for assistance."
City police spokeswoman Karla Peters told the Richmond Times-Dispatch  the child was found sleeping alone in the parked vehicle.
"He's being checked out by EMS and will soon be reunited with his mother," Peters said.
Authorities late Saturday identified the suspect as 27-year-old Jamal Louis Clemons of Richmond, Va. They say Clemons is wanted for abduction, robbery, robbery with a firearm and use of a firearm in the commission of a felony by a convicted felon.
Richmond city police said in a press release that shortly after 5 p.m., officers responded to a report of two persons down and found an adult man and an adult woman inside a Church Hill residence. Both had been fatally shot.
Witnesses reported that a man fled the scene inside a 2012 white GMC Terrain SUV that was left with the motor running and the boy strapped in the back seat, the news release said.
The Virginia State Police issued an Amber Alert at 9:39 p.m. EST Saturday for the boy, identified as Kaiden Gage Burnside. They described him as having short blond hair and blue eyes, and wearing a red plaid shirt, a cream-colored vest with a red truck carrying a Christmas tree, dark green corduroy slacks and white light-up sneakers.
"The child is believed to be in extreme danger," the alert said.
City police described the suspect — later identified as Clemons — as a black man in his mid- to late 20s, 5-foot-8 and 150 to 160 pounds, with black hair and wearing dark jeans and a black zip-up sweat shirt with a hood. He is believed to be armed with a revolver.
"We don't believe that he knew there was a child in the back seat," Richmond police Maj. Steve Drew told the newspaper.
Police said they didn't believe the shooting was random but have not released additional details about the victims or their potential relationship to the suspect.
Officers continued to search early Sunday for the suspect.
Richmond police did not return repeated calls from The Associated Press on Saturday evening.