Sunday, April 29, 2012

Accidental Shooting of Hunter by Another Hunter - No Charges

Local news reports

A man has been shot dead by his friend on a hunting trip in Southland today. 

The man was in a group of five who were spotlighting using a vehicle in the Cattle Flat area. He was killed instantly when one of the group fired a shot. 

"The deceased male was walking on a hillside attempting to locate a second deer after one had been initially shot and located by the group,'' Senior Sergeant Richard McPhail said in a statement.

It is the second hunting death in recent weeks. In March a 24-year-old Wanaka man was charged with careless use of a firearm causing death after a late-night hunting trip with a mate turned to tragedy. Dougal Fyfe died when he was shot in the back of the head while out hunting with two friends in the Maungawera Valley, near Wanaka. 

Emergency services were called to today's shooting just before 4am. Police from Invercargill and Gore attended, along with a helicopter with a paramedic onboard.
I realize that if you take all the hunters who are shot and killed by other hunters and divide by the number of stars in the galaxy, you come up with a small percentage. Nevertheless, there are too many of these "accidents."

The sad reality is too many gun owners have no knowledge of the 4 Rules of Gun Safety and too many of them lack the common sense to implement these common-sense safety protocols into their own personal gun management program.

 I mean, how intelligent do you have to be to realize you shouldn't shoot at something if you're not certain of the target and what's behind it? How sharp do you need to be to realize instinctively that you shouldn't point a gun at someone or put your finger on the trigger before you're ready to fire?

Unfortunately too many lack these basic connections in the brain.  They are unfit to own guns in the first place and in my opinion should lose their gun rights as soon as they demonstrate their incapacity.

What's your opinion? Please leave a comment.

7 comments:

  1. You do realize that this happened in New Zealand, right?

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  2. "Spotlighting", hunting after dark with a searchlight? Gosh, that's sporting of those gents.

    "You do realize that this happened in New Zealand, right?"

    Oh, it didn't happen here, so it's not an issue?

    Sorry, Greggy, what the story shows is that gunzloontehburnin'stoopit is an international phenomenon.

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    1. Democommie, the point, which you weren't bright enough to note, is that this happened in New Zealand, a country with much stricter gun laws than America. This shows that laws won't save knuckleheads from themselves.

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  3. Even if you take the "right" to own a gun away after one bad incident, you can still have situations like these. So you take this guy's gun away - the other guy is still dead. Problem not solved.

    Honestly, there is a certain child-like naivete on the left that in other venues might be cute. Not all tragedies are preventable and even if they are humans suck at preventing preventable problems. There is an ahistoric optimism (dogma) that permeates many people in the world. They honestly believe that "this time will be different." Why? Because they are involved.

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    1. My idea of one-strike-you're-out is anything but child-like naivete. It's based on the logical presumption that people who do stupid shit like this are likely to repeat their mistakes.

      Of course the guy they killed the first time would still be dead, but recidivism will be eliminated.

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  4. Greg Camp:

    That whooshing noise you might have heard was the POINT of my comment going right over your floppyhatted skull. I know where the shooting took place. I know, unlike the MurKKKanSKKKrotalPatriotiKKK Front's favorite hottie, St. Sarah of Wassilla, how to read a newspaper article and use the "Five W's" (and the single "H").

    Boy, these rules are draconian:

    1b) The seven basic rules

    The seven basic rules explained

    Rule 1: Treat every firearm as loaded
    Rule 2: Always point firearms in a safe direction
    Rule 3: Load a firearm only when ready to fire
    Rule 4: Identify your target beyond all doubt
    Rule 5: Check your firing zone
    Rule 6: Store firearms and ammunition safely
    Rule 7: Avoid alcohol and drugs when handling firearms

    Somehow with all of the "restrictive rules" on firearms, New Zealanders still hunt and use gunz for other legitimate purposes.

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    1. Demomoron, I wasn't talking about safety rules, and if you had a brain, you'd realize that. I referred to the draconian firearms laws of New Zealand as compared with ours. But somehow, even with the stricter laws that your side wants, bad things happen. How could that be?

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