Saturday, December 22, 2012

Four Dead in Pennsylvania Shooting

Local Fox News reports
A man fatally shot a woman decorating for a children's Christmas party at a tiny church hall and killed two men elsewhere in a rural central Pennsylvania township Friday before he was fatally shot in a gunfight with state troopers.

The shootings began in Frankstown Township at about 9 a.m. and investigators were processing five crime scenes within about a 1.5-mile radius, authorities said at a news briefing Friday afternoon. The troopers were responding to a 911 call of a shooting in the township when they heard calls reporting at least one other shooting elsewhere, state police spokeswoman Maria Finn said.

Family members of the victims said they were told the woman at the church was the first victim shot, the Pittsburgh Tribune-Review reported. The gunman then shot two men in the driveway of a home after a confrontation at a stop sign, authorities said.

Two troopers driving to the scene of one shooting were fired upon by the driver of a pickup truck headed in the other direction, and the truck smashed head-on into a cruiser driven by a third trooper. The truck driver -- believed to be the gunman who killed the other victims -- exited the truck and immediately fired at the troopers, who returned fire and killed him, Finn said.
Anyone want to bet he was not a lawful gun owner?

The easy access to legal firearms by unstable people is a serious problem. We need to raise the bar on qualifying for gun ownership.

What's your opinion?  Please leave a comment.

7 comments:

  1. Remember the Second Amendment! To Keep it Holy!

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  2. How horrible. Sadly, the outcome could have been much better.

    Two things are obvious to me. First, the criminal could have just as easily killed the first victim (a women decorating a small church) with a steel pipe or baseball bat. Second, regardless of whatever weapon the criminal used to kill that first victim, police were unable to prevent it.

    That women's best option to defend herself was her own firearm. Apparently she didn't have one and now she is dead. I will never understand why most people -- especially women, physically handicapped, and elderly -- go through life unarmed and unable to defend themselves from violent attackers.

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    Replies
    1. He wasn't a criminal until he did this. That means up until yesterday you were preaching that he should be armed to protect himself. Do you see the problem?

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    2. Mikeb, you don't know anything about this man. Your speculation that he was a lawful gun owner before this event is not evidence.

      But if someone has no criminal record and hasn't been found to be a danger to others, on what grounds would you deny that person a right? Your glib proposals ignore this fundamental question.

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    3. The attacker's criminal record before this attack does not matter: the police did not prevent this crime. And the police could not prevent the crime regardless of whether the attacker used a steel pipe or a firearm. The only person that could have prevented this crime and saved that woman's life was that woman herself ... and she almost certainly would have needed a firearm to do that. Sadly, she did not have the means to defend herself and paid the price with her life.

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    4. Anonymous, you're being a good Wayne La Pierre suck-boy. The official theme now is "we need to arm more people."

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    5. Suck-boy? What does that even mean? On second thought, don't explain. Just see what I've told you about how your side acts.

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