rigpiggy wrote:Natural selection at it's finest
3 February 1990, Renton, Washington
The following mind-boggling attempt at a crime spree appeared to be the robber's first, due to his lack of a previous record of violence, and his terminally stupid choices:
1. His target was H&J Leather & Firearms. A gun shop.
2. The shop was full of customers - firearms customers.
3. To enter the shop, the robber had to step around a marked police patrol car parked at the front door.
4. A uniformed officer was standing at the counter, having coffee before work.
Upon seeing the officer, the would-be robber announced a holdup, and fired a few wild shots. The officer and a clerk promptly returned fire, covered by several customers who also drew their guns, thereby removing the confused criminal from the gene pool.
No one else was hurt.
SYT, I think I love you.
I see your dead crook, and raise you a dead 14 year old kid. How about we stop with the stupid anecdotes?
Boy, 14, dies after accidental shooting
Youths were playing with rifle Tuesday at friend's Spanaway home
By ELAINE PORTERFIELD AND HECTOR CASTRO
SEATTLE POST-INTELLIGENCER REPORTERS
SPANAWAY -- A 14-year-old boy died yesterday after he was accidentally shot in the head Tuesday at the home of a friend where authorities said live ammunition and firearms were easily found.
Bobby Lott, who lives across the street, said it was a haunting sight when the boy was carried out of the home by emergency workers shortly after he was shot at 4:30 p.m.
"It was just horrible," said Lott, the father of sons age 11, 13 and 14. "He just looked terrible. All I could think of was my kids. I wish I hadn't seen it."
The boy was in critical condition when he was brought to Harborview Medical Center on Tuesday and died yesterday.
No one answered the door yesterday at the home where the boy was shot, in the 1500 block of 154th Street East, although a young boy could be seen peering out a window. Toys littered the driveway and spilled out from under the garage door of the aging split-level house, and several vehicles were parked in its driveway.
The boy's father, through a hospital spokesman, yesterday declined comment on the incident.
Ed Troyer, spokesman for the Pierce County sheriff, said no adults were home when the boy was shot. But three boys, who attend Spanaway Junior High, were present, and several weapons were easily accessible to them, Troyer said.
Two of the boys picked up a .22-caliber, semiautomatic rifle that was lying around and began playing with it. It apparently fired, and a bullet hit the other one in the head, Troyer said.
There was a "considerable" amount of ammunition in the home to which the boys had access, he said.
The shooting puts in stark relief the need for firearm safety and training, Troyer and others said.
"What 14-year-old boy is going to resist playing with" the rifle? he asked.
The dead boy was a ninth-grader. The other two youths attend Spanaway Junior High.
"Whenever something like this happens, it's tragic for the entire community," Bethel School Superintendent Tom Seigel said. "One lesson we can learn from this is the importance of firearm safety at home. We have to do everything possible to keep our guns out of the reach of children."
A dozen crisis counselors were brought into Spanaway Junior High yesterday to help students cope, Bethel Schools spokesman Mark Wenzel said.
"We have trained experts to help them work through their emotions," he said. "Quite a few students have taken advantage of it today."
The 14-year-old played in the school band and was a member of a school community service group called Pride, he said. He has younger siblings who attend school in the district, Wenzel said.
Tuesday's shooting is the second in recent weeks involving unsupervised minors. On Nov. 20, 12-year- old Matthew Wilson was shot and killed in Tacoma by a friend as the two played with a handgun. No charges have been filed against the boy who shot Wilson, and police have said they believe the shooting was accidental.
Lott said he often saw children playing around the Spanaway house where the boy was shot Tuesday, and while he didn't know the family there, everyone was pleasant on his small cul-de-sac.
He won't ever be able to forget the shooting, Lott said.
"I couldn't sleep last night," he said. After seeing the boy taken away by the emergency workers, he immediately called his former wife to discuss firearms safety, something he has talked with his three sons about numerous times before.
"I could just see my kids on that stretcher," he said.
"Kids are going to be curious. This happens way too much. I've always talked to my kids about gun safety.
"You just ask yourself, why weren't those guns locked up? It's a tragic thing to have happen."
Holding a gun owner liable for the accident is unlikely, as Washington state does not have any so-called child access prevention laws.
Yet, there have been efforts to pass such laws, such as the Whitney Graves Bill, named for an 8-year-old Marysville girl who died in 1996 after she was shot in the face by a 10-year-old neighbor boy.
The bill would have made it a crime to leave a loaded firearm where a child could get it. Exemptions would have been made for gun owners who secure their weapons, but the bill failed to pass.
Voters also rejected Initiative 676 in 1997, a bill that would have required gun owners to keep the weapons secured with trigger locks, and required a safety course before a person could own a gun.
Laura Lockard, executive director of Washington Ceasefire, an organization working against gun violence, said that after Wilson's death, the group has begun discussing what it could do in response.
Lockard said the group supports laws such as the Whitney Graves Bill, and "we would support it if it was introduced again."
In the meantime, it continues efforts to educate the public on the safe storage of firearms.
The National Rifle Association, which has campaigned against child access prevention laws, uses a mascot, Eddie Eagle, to promote gun safety.
The organization's campaign focuses on teaching children who find a gun to leave it alone, and to report it to an adult.
Although that's a start, some safety experts believe keeping firearms unloaded and locked up is the only way to keep children safe around firearms.
A group called the Lok It Up Campaign, which has a Web site at
http://www.lokitup.org, promotes the use of trigger locks, lock boxes or chamber locks for safe gun storage. The organization has even worked with local businesses selling firearms to make discount coupons available for these devices.
The coupons are online at the group's Web site, or by calling 1-877-LOKITUP.
Ceasefire plans to introduce a campaign next year it calls ASK, an acronym for Asking Saves Kids. The goal is to get more parents willing to ask about firearms and how they are stored in the homes their children visit.
"The data shows that people might be concerned that there's a gun in the house, but they don't know how to ask," Lockard said.
The new program is aimed at helping parents bring up the topic in non-judgmental ways that focus on gun safety.
Even with the two recent incidents in Pierce County, accidental shooting deaths don't account for a large percentage of the injuries and deaths associated with firearms.
Statistics provided by Washington Ceasefire show that nationwide about 3 percent of all firearm-related deaths are accidental.
In Washington state, 11 children age 14 or younger died in accidental shootings in the five years from 1996 through the end of 2000, according to statistics from the state Department of Health.
People would be more polite all over..
