Arapahoe High School gunman Karl Pierson's class picture (courtesy theeagle.com)

“Investigators believe a gunman who opened fire at Colorado’s Arapahoe High School had selected at least five spots he wanted to target on his rampage,” theeagle.com reports. “The Arapahoe County sheriff said Tuesday that letters and numbers corresponding to the labels of the school library and four adjacent classrooms were written in marker on Karl Pierson’s arm. Investigators are looking into who was in the rooms to see if those people were deliberate targets of the gunman.” The revelation adds weight to the “good guy with a gun stopped a bad guy with a gun” narrative that began when it became clear that armed Arapahoe High School Resource Officer Deputy James Englert‘s quick response hastened Pierson’s bloody demise. “Also found written on Pierson’s arm was a Latin phrase that translates to ‘The die has been cast.'” But not for parents, who still have a chance to repeal Bush the Elder’s Gun Free School Zones Act.

39 COMMENTS

  1. Media still doesn’t bother mentioning that he was confronted by armed SRO. Every single radio & TV report I’ve heard just says he was “confronted by police.”

    • Well, in this case the SRO was an off duty deputy. So in this case the media is kinda right, even though they are mostly wrong.

  2. Not to dimish the (singular) victim in this case but these photos of the young boys who have been let down so hard by what we are doing to them as a society break my heart.

    Really.

    • I don’t understand how society failed this kid. The roles seem quite reversed to me- he’s the one that tried to wreak havoc on other people, not the other way around.

      There was nothing in this kid’s life that was so tough he couldn’t have gotten over it without resorting to shooting up his school. And there was no problem he had that shooting up his school could’ve solved.

      If that ever seemed like a solution in his mind, then he was broken out of the box. Nice words and hugs don’t fix broken people.

      • I am not excusing his actions, I’m glad he’s dead.

        School is compulsory so to many parents it is the only option for kids. If he really was being bullied daily it will trigger something. He might confront the bullies, he might try avoidance, he might do nothing and take it in until something (being benched from debate) makes him explode.

        I physically confronted both my bullies in the early 2000s and both became friends with me. However our society now teaches people to just take it, which is bad.

        • There was a time when kids were allowed to settle problems with REASONABLE violence, with no real repercussion. No one brought guns to school (to use on someone, anyway) because you could settle it under the flagpole after school without the threat of incarceration or missing graduation. The kid who made life miserable for others would eventually get a bloody nose, and he’d be a better person for it. Others would learn that you would get hurt and embarrassed for being a jerk, and the world was a more polity place.
          We aren’t giving kids reasonable outlets, so they get spun up and shoot each other. In that sense, I agree with Mina.

  3. I am still grappling with the irony of a rabid socialist gun grabber going on a shooting rampage with a Joe-Biden special shotgun, which he bought days before having gone though a background check.

    If Obummer, Mayors Against Guns, or Mom’s Demand, had a staff member who shot up a school, he/she would look just like Karl Pierson. In fact, I’d bet $1000 Karl was not an NRA member, but a member of one of those other groups. Which laws protect us against them.

  4. Why does any of this matter? Why is there an investigation? What could possibly be learned? What does it matter what he might have done? We are punished in law only for what we did do, not what we thought about doing. All the facts that were of any relevance–how he got his gun, how many he shot, how he was stopped–was all known the very day of the shooting. Let it rest; the perp is dead.

      • I am dumbfounded by the complete waste of resources (and taxpayer money) in an on-going investigation that cannot possibly reveal anything of importance, the total hypocrisy of the press (who wouldn’t report this more than once if it was two black kids in an inner city school) and the suggestion that this was some “mass shooting event” that should be played for gun banning jolly points, and the unnecessary intrusion into a family’s grief. It is disgusting.

        • For perspective, I am a gun owner and a strong gun rights believer. Also, this shooting happened less than 5 miles from my house. This is the HS my daughter would be going to if she was 12 years older.

          This matters because a young woman is in a coma because of this person’s inability to cope with some demons inside him. There is an investigation to find out why no one detected this person was going to carry out this heinous act. We can possibly learn why a high schooler thought picking up a shotgun, a machete, and a few molotov cocktails and taking them into a school with the intent to kill multiple people was the answer to his problems.

          What is relevant here isn’t what is known but rather what was unknown prior to Friday afternoon. As uncomfortable as it may be to some, there are some people with problems in this world, and the mental health aspects of the “gun control debate” have been repeatedly and consistently discarded. The focus has been on the gun types, the magazine capacities, and the methods by which people acquire firearms that have been reported about almost uniquely, and it’s about damn time we investigate and TRY to understand the elements that lead to these sorts of things.

          Remember, I am from Colorado, where as of mid-2013, I can’t legally buy a 16 round magazine nor can I legally buy a lower from a friend I have known for my whole life. The answer isn’t, and has never been, the inanimate objects used to commit crimes. The answer is the mindset of the people who do these things. And that means an investigation, interviewing of witnesses, friends, family members, etc. It means using taxpayer money to find out how to prevent this from happening again. This isn’t “CSI Colorado” where they stop investigating once the perp is cold on a slab. And I am damn glad they are investigating. This matters because 12 years isn’t that far away.

    • Well, on that note, what does it matter what happened in Benghazi? Everyone’s dead already, let it rest.

      • We can’t let Benghazi rest until we punish Hillary completely for it. We should all be talking about Benghazi until Hillary the tyrant is completely destroyed…

    • I want an investigation ran, if for no other reason, to be sure he was indeed alone in his plans and actions. Highly doubtful in this case that he had a partner or outside influence, but i want to know with a reasonable certainty before the books are closed on his actions.

  5. But why did he use a shotgun instead of a SBR? Could he have bought one in Colorado with their awesome new gun laws? Could this be “proof” for the gun grabbers, that their policies curtailed his rampage? (Not what I am thinking, just the way it could be viewed.)

  6. For the love of all that’s holy, please quit running that prick’s picture.

    Don’t give these scumbags publicity.

    They are the lowest form of despicable human beings.

    John

    • He is dead and soon to be rotting in the ground He is unable to get publicity. Printing his name and picture helps him in no way.

      • It’s not about him. It’s about the next nut job who wants the publicity this guy is getting. Do not publish his picture. Don’t use his name. Minimize his notoriety.

    • On the other hand, we see here a picture of a kid that could be anyone’s nice son. (As compared to some of the wild as hell looking shooters of recent history.) It does serve to remind the sheep that wolves come in all manner of appearance.

  7. Why do we treat all these cases like the guy was some Lex Luther or Bond bad guy? Every utterance of theirs is handled like a pronouncement from Moses. This is a nutty dangerously disturbed kid. If he said/wrote that he had a super duper rocket ship and was going to fly off to Jupiter after his assault would that be treated as gospel also? The cops build up this nonsense to inflate their next budget. The media do it for rating pizzazz. We don’t have to buy into this though.

  8. We need a hero. What I mean is that it would send quite a message if some science teacher had drawn a snub nosed revolver and plugged this kid. Unlikely, sure, but more and more schools are allowing teachers to arm themselves. The resource officer saved many lives BUT wouldn’t it be nice if for once a teacher just shot the rascal. It would send one hell of a message to those contemplating future attacks.

    • Alea iacta est is supposedly what Julius Caesar said when he crossed the Rubicon on his way to start a civil war, quoting a Greek phrase meaning roughly “let the game begin.” Whether he understood the true meaning or not, it’s a bit chilling.

      • Seems he might have wanted to start a political craptornado to further his beliefs or otherwise wanted to send some grand message.

  9. this shooter in particular really an annoys me! he seems like the kid who would make the whole class aware he finished his test first or the kid who snitches on someone for name calling.

  10. Another product of leftist political ideology. Why is it that each of these “shooters” always turns out to be a leftist/Progressive/Democrat? Is it the fact that their “ideology” is a mental disease, just like Islam? Or is it that mental defectives are drawn to this sick assed, anti-human ideology? Doesn’t really matter, in the end it all comes down to a total failure of “the system” which is supposed to stop all of this. Schools, psychiatrists, parents. Once again we have a “shooter” with years of red flags and clear warnings of its potential, all ignored, while the same bunch of jackasses brought their power to punish down on kids simply because they act normal and refuse to submit to their sick assed ideology.

    And this WILL happen again. Why? Because it serves the political purposes of the left. Period. Full stop.

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