Gun Violence 3: Thoughts and Prayers Continue to be Insufficient

[Howl]

On 4/20/2021 at 11:22 AM, Howl said:

On the day of the shooting, Broderick went to the apartment complex for "a scheduled custody visit" which led me to say to myself "WTAF?"  How is this guy getting any type of visitation with his teenaged daughter when he's out on bond for sexually assaulting a a minor child AND he's earlier had a restraining order? 

Our local paper, the Austin American Statesman, had a long article today that led with the Broderick murder and discussed problems with family court, among other things. 

When the mother applied for a restraining order last year, she noted that she and THE DAUGHTER were terrified of Broderick and Broderick had visitation rights with his son, but not the daughter.   Things fell through the cracks during the pandemic and with Family Court, because Broderick's visitation with the son was not at a neutral location or supervised, even though the restraining order was still in place. 

For anyone interested in this topic , I highly recommend a book titled No Visible Bruises: What We Don’t Know About Domestic Violence Can Kill Us,  with case studies on family annihilators and abusers and the obvious red flags in domestic violence patterns point to the worst outcomes: murder.  FYI, a history of domestic violence that includes choking a domestic partner is a major predictor of ultimate homicide, and a checklist has been developed to help determine how much danger a woman (and her children) are in. 

Review by Masha Gessen, in the New Yorker's "Page-Turner" blog

Spoiler

[Snyder] has written a book about everything: about men who beat and kill their wives or girlfriends; about people who work to predict murder, and those who try to heal the abusers; and also, deeply, about gender, poverty, depression, despair, privilege, law enforcement, incarceration, justice, mental health, and politics...It takes a writer of uncommon talent and confidence to pull this off...

 

[WiseGirl]

This is a pretty powerful thread.

 

[fraurosena]

*throws hands in the air and rolls eyes* 

What the fuck is wrong with you, America?

 

[Ozlsn]

On 4/27/2021 at 1:10 AM, fraurosena said:

*throws hands in the air and rolls eyes* 

What the fuck is wrong with you, America?

 

Feel unsafe, buy guns. More guns in population -> more accidents/homicides, increased likelihood of mass shooting -> feeling unsafe...

[47of74]

Some good news. 

Quote

A federal judge in Dallas ruled on Tuesday that the National Rifle Association cannot use bankruptcy to reorganize in gun-friendly Texas, dealing a serious blow to the influential gun rights group's effort to avoid a lawsuit in New York seeking its dissolution.

U.S. Bankruptcy Judge Harlin Hale said the NRA did not file for Chapter 11 protection in good faith, but rather did so to avoid oversight by New York Attorney General Letitia James and gain an "unfair litigation advantage" over her.

In dismissing the bankruptcy bid, Hale singled out Wayne LaPierre, the NRA's longtime chief executive, for criticism.

"Excluding so many people from the process of deciding to file for bankruptcy, including the vast majority of the board of directors, the chief financial officer and the general counsel, is nothing less than shocking," Hale wrote.

 

[47of74]

The lost high school class

Quote

David Keene, the president of the National Rifle Association (NRA) from 2011 to 2013 and current board member, was asked to give the graduation speech at James Madison Academy in Las Vegas, Nevada. “Let me begin by telling you what an honor it is to be here to help celebrate your graduation,” he said to kick off his address in front of thousand of socially distanced chairs. There was no one in the chairs, however.

There’s also no James Madison Academy — Keene, as well as More Guns, Less Crime author John Lott, had been tricked into attending the phony graduation by Change the Ref. The gun safety organization was formed by Manuel and Patricia Oliver, whose son, Joaquin, was one of 17 people killed during the mass shooting at Stoneman Douglas High School in 2018. “Ironically, had the men conducted a proper background check on the school, they would have seen that the school is fake,” a spokesperson said.

“These two guys are part of the problem,” Manuel told BuzzFeed News. “We need to call them out, we need to show everyone. This is how they process the logic behind the gun industry. We need to show we’re brave and we’re not afraid of these guys. We’ve already felt the worst possible situation. There’s no threat that can make me feel different.” Change the Ref’s goal is to “give the young generation of survivors and victims a disrupting voice to help lead the way to change – a more peaceful future.”

 

[thoughtful]

What the actual fuck?

Quote

Lawyers for Remington Arms, the now-bankrupt gun-maker being sued by nine families of those killed in the 2012 mass shooting at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, Conn., have subpoenaed the academic, attendance and disciplinary records for five slain students.

In response, attorneys for the families of the five students and four educators killed on Dec. 14, 2012, who have filed suit, asked the court on Thursday to seal their confidential records, the Connecticut Post reports.

Remington also requested employment files for the educators whose families are involved in the case, according to the Hartford Courant.

https://www.npr.org/2021/09/03/1033950752/remington-subpoenas-the-school-records-of-children-slain-at-sandy-hook

What are they thinking? A teacher showed up late for work 3 times, two of the kids were caught chewing gum, so . . . what? They deserved to die?

How could those records possibly be relevant in any way?

[Audrey2]

15 minutes ago, thoughtful said:

What the actual fuck?

https://www.npr.org/2021/09/03/1033950752/remington-subpoenas-the-school-records-of-children-slain-at-sandy-hook

What are they thinking? A teacher showed up late for work 3 times, two of the kids were caught chewing gum, so . . . what? They deserved to die?

How could those records possibly be relevant in any way?

Okay, I'm going to play extremely twisted "logic" (note the quotes) that makes sense only to conservatives and not to anybody that actually has functioning brain cells.

I wonder if future earnings are a part of this lawsuit. If so, Remington could be arguing that a student couldn't be on the path to a Harvard education if they missed a couple of days, only met a standard instead of exceeding it, or got in trouble in the cafeteria, and future earnings would be adjusted down accordingly. I bet if they could sue for parents' marriage records, financial info, and education level they would.

This is disgusting.

[Audrey2]

Sorry, double post.

Edited September 4, 2021 by Audrey2

[thoughtful]

On 9/4/2021 at 2:58 PM, Audrey2 said:

Okay, I'm going to play extremely twisted "logic" (note the quotes) that makes sense only to conservatives and not to anybody that actually has functioning brain cells.

I wonder if future earnings are a part of this lawsuit. If so, Remington could be arguing that a student couldn't be on the path to a Harvard education if they missed a couple of days, only met a standard instead of exceeding it, or got in trouble in the cafeteria, and future earnings would be adjusted down accordingly. I bet if they could sue for parents' marriage records, financial info, and education level they would.

This is disgusting.

You're right - from the point of view of a lawyer trying to do what they are supposed to do for their  client, that might be the impetus.

And yes, it's all disgusting.

[fraurosena]

It could also be the simple tactic of ‘blame the victim’. They’ll try and push the narrative that the teachers and the children weren’t innocents, because they were late for school, got rebuked for saying a bad word in class, or didn’t do their homework. The aim is to diminish the act; by saying these kids were ‘bad’ they are implying that kids being shot by their guns wasn’t as bad as all that, as Remmingtons are specifically manufactured to take out bad guys.

Yes, it’s a stretch— and one I don’t think will work— but I can see them going this route nonetheless. For what else could they possibly say that mitigates their culpability?

Edited September 8, 2021 by fraurosena

[Cartmann99]

Rest of thread under the spoiler:

Spoiler

 

 

[AlmostSavedAtTacoBell]

3 hours ago, Cartmann99 said:

Rest of thread under the spoiler:

  Hide contents

 

 

His mom's takeaway was to tell him to learn not to get caught.  Clearly he failed to learn the lesson well enough, as he is charged as an adult and will likely never see the outside of confinement ever again.  But his mom is taking her own lesson to heart and is on the run while her kid is (rightfully and justly so) facing multiple charges.  

Fucking gun nuts and their fucking irresponsibility.  Multiple young lives lost, injured, and traumatized.  I don't even want to know what assholes are posting the usual "thoughts and prayers" bullshit.  I know you fellow FJers are probably as devastated and distraught as I am and I want you to know I am with you all in spirit. 

[AlmostSavedAtTacoBell]

Update: parents caught (located hiding in an industrial building) and arrested. It appears they had help hiding out. 

Also: Bond set at $500,000 with GPS monitoring; home confinement with movement limited to court appearances, work, attorney appointments, or medical treatment/appointments; and no alcohol or illegal drugs. 

[Cartmann99]

[SassyPants]

Who In H E double L buys a 15 YO a handgun for Christmas? A Hunting rifle sure, but a HANDGUN? 

[Audrey2]

3 hours ago, Cartmann99 said:

In other words, oh crap! We just realized that possible future Republican voters have been killed in some of these School shootings. Quick let's stop making kids go to school if they don't want to go so we can raise some more dumbasses who will vote Republican. If they're not educated we can tell them anything and they'll believe it! We can tell him drinking water out of the toilet will counteract any vaccine particles they might have been exposed to by vaccinated people and next thing you know they'll be slurping from the toilet. 

[GreyhoundFan]

I'm glad the parents have been charged in the MI shooting. These idiots deserve to spend mot of their lives in prison. The paragraph I bolded below is what totally floored me.

"Why is it rare for parents of school shooting suspects to face charges? It’s ‘really hard,’ experts say."

Quote

When the parents of a 15-year-old boy accused of fatally shooting four fellow students at a Michigan high school this week were charged with multiple counts of involuntary manslaughter, it was a reminder of how extraordinarily rare it is for mothers and fathers to face charges related to heinous crimes allegedly committed by their children.

Jennifer and James Crumbley each pleaded not guilty to four counts of involuntary manslaughter during a Saturday arraignment hearing, hours after police say they found them hiding in a warehouse-like Detroit building. Oakland County Prosecutor Karen McDonald said there was a “strong” likelihood of a conviction, telling Judge Julie A. Nicholson that the parents of 15-year-old Ethan Crumbley “could have stopped” the attack.

Shannon Smith and Mariell Lehman, defense attorneys for the couple, denied McDonald’s accusation that the parents provided their son “total access” to the weapon and said they had always intended to cooperate with law enforcement. Ethan Crumbley faces multiple charges as an adult in the attack Tuesday at Oxford High School, including murder and terrorism.

The charges brought against Crumbley’s parents are not the norm when it comes to the history of school shootings in the United States.

“It’s really hard to show that parents have a disregard for human life, and that they could actually foresee their child doing this,” Eve Brensike Primus, a law professor at the University of Michigan who focuses on criminal procedure, told The Washington Post. “That’s why these charges are so rare.”

How unusual is it to bring charges against parents of suspected school shooters?

It’s highly unusual.

A Washington Post review of 145 school shootings committed by children in the two decades after the Columbine High massacre in 1999 found that the weapon’s source had been publicly identified in 105 cases. In total, the guns those children used were taken from their own homes or those of relatives or friends 80 percent of the time.

However, in just four instances did the adult owners of the weapons face any criminal punishment for not having locked them up — and none of those prosecutions stemmed from negligent-storage laws.

Among those cases, the harshest penalty was given to a man in Michigan who used a shoe box to store his .32-caliber semiautomatic handgun. A 6-year-old visitor found it and took the weapon to school, fatally shooting a first-grade classmate. The man was convicted and sentenced to 29 months behind bars.

“It’s very hard to hold anyone responsible for gun violence who isn’t the shooter, especially parents,” said Jonathan Metzl, a professor at Vanderbilt University who studies gun violence.

What does it take to bring charges against parents of suspected shooters?

The legal standards for parents to face charges is “so high,” Primus said, because of the challenges prosecutors face in proving gross negligence.

To prove gross negligence, prosecutors must prove that the parents of a suspected school shooter had a wanton disregard for the consequences of their actions, which reflects “a higher culpability of recklessness,” she said. In Michigan, state law defines gross negligence as “conduct so reckless as to demonstrate a substantial lack of concern for whether an injury results.”

“A prosecutor has to show in a school shooting case like this one that the parents knew of the situation to avert injury and had the ability to avoid harm, and that their failure to do so is proven disastrous,” Primus said.

The pistol used by Ethan Crumbley, purchased by his father on Nov. 26, was stored in an unlocked drawer in the parents’ bedroom, according to authorities.

A day before the fatal shooting, a teacher noticed Ethan Crumbley using his cellphone to search for information on firearm ammunition. Jennifer Crumbley did not respond when the school contacted her via voice mail about her son’s “inappropriate” search, McDonald said. Instead, she exchanged a text message with her son that read, “LOL I’m not mad at you. You have to learn not to get caught.”

Kris Brown, president of the Brady gun control advocacy group, said prosecutors usually need clear and “pretty straightforward” evidence to consider bringing charges against parents in school shooting cases.

“This prosecutor feels like she has a straightforward case for involuntary manslaughter, and I have to agree,” Brown said.

Whether a jury would convict the parents remains unclear, Primus said.

“You need a special set of facts to convince a jury that the parents would know this would happen or had reckless disregard,” she said.

What are the laws restricting minors from having access to guns?

The shooting has torn apart the small Michigan community, located about 45 minutes outside Detroit, and reignited calls for tighter gun laws, with more states considering laws to punish parents if children fire unsecured guns.

Existing laws nationwide aimed at restricting gun access are not always enforced and the strength of the legislation varies state to state, experts told The Post.

Only 23 states and the District have some form of a secure storage law that holds gun owners accountable in keeping firearms away from minors, said Shannon Watts, founder of Moms Demand Action, a group seeking to end U.S. gun violence.

While minors in Michigan are not allowed to possess guns, the state has no law requiring gun owners to keep firearms locked away from young people.

“If there were stronger gun laws in these states that require gun owners to store their guns safely, there would not be school shootings,” Watts said.

Brown echoed Watts’s frustration, saying a lack of legislation has fueled “our failure to prevent these horrific tragedies.”

That could change in Michigan. In June, Michigan state Sen. Rosemary Bayer (D), whose district includes Oxford High School, introduced legislation that would hold parents accountable if they failed to secure their firearms. The bill states that a parent would face up to five years in prison if a minor obtains a gun and uses it to injure or kill others.

“We must start holding people accountable for what their kids do,” Bayer, who supports the charges against Crumbley’s parents, told NBC News. “This is not a toy.”

Now that Crumbley’s parents have been charged, could other parents be charged in future school shootings?

While history shows how difficult it is to bring charges to parents whose children are suspects in school shootings, some experts told The Post they believe the charges brought against Crumbley’s parents could help influence future cases.

Metzl said he was unaware of a situation analogous to the one with Crumbley’s parents. He noted that a case could have potentially been made against Nancy Lanza, the mother of Sandy Hook shooter Adam Lanza, if her son hadn’t killed her before the 2012 attack on an elementary school in Newtown, Conn.

“But this Michigan shooting is one of the more egregious cases I’ve seen in terms of the parents’ involvement,” Metzl said.

The involuntary manslaughter charges brought against Jennifer and James Crumbley should be eye-opening for prosecutors in future school-shooting cases because those charges can be brought anywhere, Brown said.

“I think many other prosecutors looking at this case will take notice,” Brown said. “If there is a conviction, that will spur many other similar charges against parents, and not just in cases of school shootings.”

Watts agreed, saying McDonald bringing charges against Crumbley’s parents is a level of accountability needed for parents who are gun owners.

“It is important for gun owners to understand there is an obligation to safely storing firearms,” she said.

Others, however, cast doubt on the charges in Michigan leading to other charges against parents in future school shootings. Primus said the high legal standards in place in cases like these indicates to her that the charges against Crumbley’s parents could be an isolated, rare example in school shootings.

“I don’t think this is going to spark some wave of charges against parents,” she said. “It’s not an easy charge to make.”

 

[smittykins]

I can see the GQP nutters going apeshit over the parents being(justifiably)charged.  Y’know, the same ones who scream “IT’S THE PARENTS, STUPID!” whenever other students shoot up a school.

[GreyhoundFan]

1 hour ago, smittykins said:

I can see the GQP nutters going apeshit over the parents being(justifiably)charged.  Y’know, the same ones who scream “IT’S THE PARENTS, STUPID!” whenever other students shoot up a school.

[AlmostSavedAtTacoBell]

Two school active shooters today. One on a college campus in Virginia who killed a campus safety officer and a campus police officer who had just been the best man in the safety officer’s wedding. One at a high school in Minnesota who killed one student and injured another. Please forgive the lack of links. I am just to saddened and sickened. Two in one day. 

[fraurosena]

But by all means, ban books! Because they pose the greater danger, right?

[AlmostSavedAtTacoBell]

17 hours ago, fraurosena said:

But by all means, ban books! Because they pose the greater danger, right?

Fuck every single person who wants to ban books but screams about gun rights. I have never advocated for a total ban but believe in “not all guns, not all people.” Some guns do not need to be available to the general public and some people should not have access to guns. Why is it so difficult to understand? 

But yeah, let’s freak out about books that have people who love each other (who happen to be same sex) or that reveal this country’s racism or that show the horrors of the Holocaust because kids might develop empathy and humanity and love for others and acceptance and a desire to stop violence from being perpetrated for bullshit reasons and @fraurosena thank you. Really, thank you. I am outraged and I am just so grateful to see I am not alone. I know I am among many here but the surreal hypocrisy is so infuriating. 

[47of74]

The Des Moines area has really been taking it on the chin lately.  The tornado that killed several people was in Winterset, which is fairly close to Des Moines (about 35 miles).  And now there was a shooting outside a Des Moines area high school that left one dead and two seriously hurt;

Quote

Des Moines police have confirmed that there has been a shooting outside of East High School Monday afternoon.

Police are at the scene and said there are “multiple shooting victims outside of the school.”

Police said they do not believe there is a continued threat to the public. Streets around the school have been shut down.

The shooting happened outside of the school but on school grounds just before 3 pm.

 

[47of74]

There was a mass shooting in downtown Cedar Rapids the other day that left two dead and ten injured.  They arrested one of the shooters.

Quote

Police in Cedar Rapids have made an arrest in a weekend mass shooting that killed two people and injured ten others early Sunday morning.

Timothy Ladell Rush, 32, is charged with second-degree murder, willful injury, intimidation with a dangerous weapon, reckless use of a firearm and possession of a firearm as a felon.

Michael Valentine, 25, and Nicole Owens, 35, were identified as the two people killed in the shooting.

Police responded to the Taboo Nightclub Lounge at 415 3rd Street SE around 1:27 am Sunday morning. Cedar Rapids Police Chief Wayne Jerman said that officers were standing outside of the club when a rush of people exited, fleeing the shooting. 911 dispatchers started receiving calls about the incident at around the same time. Officers went inside the club to find the 12 total victims and started administering first aid to the injured.