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Arapahoe County Sheriff Grayson Robinson says an unidentified student entered Arapahoe High School with a shotgun, looking for a specific teacher. The teacher left the building. The shooter opened fire on another student. The shooter killed himself before responding police entered the building. Robinson says one student is in serious condition, another student suffered minor injuries, which may not have been directly caused by the shooter.

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169 COMMENTS

    • Maybe two hit by the same shot pattern?

      See? We can speculate BS just like the talking heads. Where’s my million-dollar paycheck?

      • I have no idea why you are being so hostile.

        Either way, both of those are good things. The VP goes on and on about his Berretta under-over shotgun and the left uses this say see the VP is pro-gun.

    • 2 students shot, one was the shooter, so you have student shooter and student shootee. 2 students shot. Anything to gin up that mill.

    • “If the teacher you want to shoot isn’t available, go out in the hall way and fire two blasts….”

  4. Ah, looks like maybe at least the Arapahoe Sheriff gets it. First deputies on the scene went right in without waiting for SWAT. Right on!

      • That’s a shame. Sheriff Maketa in El Paso County is retiring as well, which is another huge loss. Colorado has a damned good crop of sheriffs. Pretty good deputies overall, at least in my experience. They certainly done good today.

        The Denver PD is another story…..

    • He is dead. It does not matter if he is famous or not. Hiding the name of a criminal is much more troublesome in a free society.

      • You may have missed his point. Likely this kid thought hey, I’ll be as famous as the rest of the CO shooters (they have a bonafide trend here now), and the circus that will spring up around this one will just add to the compulsions of the next. Rinse, Repeat.

        • I have seen the point several times on numerous venues, after these shootings, to not print the name of the scumbag. Hiding the name of the suspect is not what should happen in a free society. I would even put “juvenile” offender’s names out in public.

      • of COURSE it matters. Why do you think these shootings happen on the anniversary of a previous one? Why do you think the shooters tend to be obsessed with the previous shooters? They’re sick nobodies that want to be known for something, and the media does that with your help.

        There’s a difference between ‘hiding’ and broadcasting. How about we take a small step and stop giving the murders post-mortem psychological handjobs by going over their entire lives on the cable news networks? How about we stop putting weird-looking photos of them all over the evening news? How about we refer to them how they deserve: as some loser. But I guess that would be too insensitive to them because they were bullied, or socially awkward, or whatever other bullshit will be trotted out to explain why (and tacitly excuse) why someone murdered a child.

  6. Hey, what timing, huh? “Random” events at “random” times seem SO perfectly matched to real-world events…

    Stop paying so much attention to the events themselves – there’s a lot of noise in that – and pay attention to the timing.

  8. So it may not be a Sandy Hook copycat then. Dec 14th is Saturday, so this is the closest school day to the anniversary. You would think most schools would be on “alert”.

    • My bet would be that a lot of them were. The trouble is that with the current culture of shelter in place cower in fear, this is their alert face: 😐

    • You can’t be safe from everything. The SH shooter just shot through glass to get in. I’m not sure how a school is ‘alert’ anyway, unless you put armed guards in there…

      which I have no problem with, so… carry on.

      • Do it.

        Hell, I post my thoughts on my guns from time to time in the comments section even when the blog post isn’t about guns.

        • I’ve kinda already done that. Except for the Bushmaster M-17S. I really don’t get to shoot often enough to write anything current. Being poor, I currently own only a 12-gauge Remington 870, a .45 semiauto, and the Bushmaster.

          But I enter every contest I come across (keep the contests comin’!) with my fingers crossed.

        • Just looked the Bushmaster up. That’s an interesting rifle, care to tell us more about it?

          Also, what .45 semi automatic do you have? 1911?

          • Did you look into its origin as a different weapon? Honestly, I have mixed feeling about it. It might take more breaking in than I’ve given it. One time, it kicked a live round into the interior of the weapon, making a takedown necessary. That was scary, though it’s never happened. One other thing that I won’t mention here, though the Statute of Limitations has run out! 😉

            The .45 is an EAA Witness (Tanfoglio) all-steel job, with a compensator. It’s amazingly accurate. I sold a Ruger .45 I had and bought the EAA. I couldn’t be happier with the decision.

        • I would love to see a review of the M17S myself. I always wanted one as a teenager. Now they are about as hard to find as a unicorn or M38 mosin.

          • While I’ve experienced an issue or two, I’m not about to sell mine, short of a REALLY great offer.

    • Ok, thanks guys; now I *feel* better.

      Just talking about guns helps with all those oppression *feelings* that emerge every time the media goes on a reporting safari about another tragic shooting.

  11. but. . . the . . .school . . .is . . . a . .. gun . . . free . . . zone. . . by . . . law . . . . .WTF???

    how did he get past the school property line? How did he get into the building?

    • It is impressive that he managed to walk right past the power of an aluminum sign with vinyl lettering on it, isn’t it?

    • A while back Michigan enacted a “Super Drunk” driving law. If you’re more than double the legal limit you’re super drunk and subject to heavier fines.

      What we really need are SUPER GUN FREE zones. That’ll stop ’em for sure.

      • New Mexico needs this “Super Drunk” law; I was guys commit vehicular homicide with something like 15 DUIs on their record. When they’re “one of us” (i.e., of Spanish lineage), they get slap after slap on the wrist. They get their licenses suspended, then they drive drunk as shit without a license.

        Obviously, suspended permits is not enough. They need to send them to prison for 20 years, at least, in such cases.

        This also happens on the reservations, beyond the reach of Gringo laws.

  13. As a CU student I’m not far away from this. It can’t be 3pm local time because it’s only 2pm local RIGHT NOW. Thank goodness for the student resource officers (every school in CO has one since Columbine) and it’s kept the fatalities in these kinds of kinds of incidents very low (from what I can tell).

  14. Not to sound all conspiratorial about this…but at this current moment it is only 2:13 pm here in Colorado. Perhaps it was a typo in the post above, but it is saying the school was on locckdown around 3pm.

    • Yup, that’s it. The liberals may try and paint it as another TERROR OF GUNS while the right-wing nuts will try and paint it as a government conspiracy… but in the end it’s just another day in America and somebody wanted to kill someone else. Because he was a teacher the school was a reasonable place to find him.

  16. It doesn’t matter if it was a shotgun this time. The cry from gun control groups will be “but because it was a shotgun and not an assault weapon 20 children weren’t killed! This proves we should ban assault weapons!”

    • Which is why we need to hope that the resource officer was able to intervene. It’ll be about the only thing that will slow the defecation in it’s flight toward the rotating oscillator….

    • Non- story from a non-news source. Just reporting that they did an unofficial count. Man bit dog again.

    • The story smells of BS filler, but the question at the end is a good one. “Lock down”, along with “Shelter in place”, always seemed to me as if they would be as effective as “duck and cover” in the event of a nuclear attack.

      But, hey, anything to make them feel like they’re actually doing something to improve safety, right?

      • When those windows blow in, you’re free to stand there and look at the shards of glass coming at your face.

        • A shockwave moving near the speed of sound, with blast pressures exceeding 30 kPa with temperature around 10,000,000K……….I’ll take the glass.

  18. These assault shotguns have no place on our streets.

    They shoot multiple bullets per trigger pull and should only be owned by my NYPD officers!

  19. A very close friend that lives in Englewood CO sent me this about that—

    “Interesting. Just got a call about Englewood schools are on lock down and went to the district website. Arapahoe High School isn’t anywhere near this district, so I don’t know why Englewood is locked down. I just texted [my daughter, redacted by me] and she said, “What lockdown” when I asked her to let me know when it’s over.

    A few weeks back, they had a day off so the cops could set up an “active shooter” scene….teachers told the kids that day they were NOT allowed anywhere near the school. The following Tuesday, there was an “active shooter” drill…I kept her home that day.”

    The latest from my friend:
    “TRACY MURPHY, REMEMBER THAT NAME. The janitor said the shooter was screaming for “MURPHY” and then went on to say he shot at TRACY MURPHY but missed.”

  20. Soooo NRA’s Wayne Lapierre said last year that there were other copycat school shooting monsters in our midst. And he was right. He said that more laws on top of the current 20,000 firearm laws won’t stop them. And he was right. He said that so-called gun free zones only direct killers to easy target environments. And he was right. He said the only way to stop a bad guy with a gun was with a good guy with a gun [either directly or by prompting the suicide.] And he was right. He said that semiauto rifles are not “machine guns” and banning them or standard capacity magazines won’t stop school shootings. And he was right.

    Yet, NRA’s Wayne Lapierre is fairly regularly bashed in here as an out of touch stiff heading a lethargic, sclerotic organization. Sounds like he was on target and has been for years.

    Soooo……..Wayne haters……do you need his email address to send your apologies…..or ya good?

    • Wayne’s statements were made in a press conference held on the 21st of December, a week after Newtown. As the head of an organization who stands at the forefront of a battle where the person who speaks first generally wins, a week is pretty damn lethargic.

      So, yeah, I’m good.

      And, I’m an NRA member.

      • Don’t care if you’re an NRA member. It’s like when libs say “I’m a gun owner, but……” Your points must stand on their own, or not, but there’s no use of credibility crutches allowed. Now, on to your point:

        That was a no-win situation. If he’d been out there immediately, they would have been accused at least of politicizing a tragedy. At least as likely, because early reports are so often faulty, he would have made an assertion that turned out to be mistaken, and he would have been pounded mercilessly for it. By the way, that’s one of he reasons to STFU after a DGU: never mind “can”, anything you say WILL be used against you, even if it’s just a misrecollection or hasty characterization on your part. You’ll be painted as a liar, obstructer of justice, and worse. Same with Wayne.

        So instead, he chose to wait a week until some of the immediate shock had subsided, and some more solid, albeit still preliminary, details of the attack emerged so as to make an intelligent statement. In waiting a week, however prudent, he then is left open to attacks of “He waited too long!” Never mind that people are *still* talking about Sandy Hook; proving that there so far hasn’t existed such a thing as “too long.” So there’s really no winning. It’s just a matter of Wayne-haters throwing a dart at the wall, then drawing in the bull’s eye around it.

        Now, that’s my assessment, which I don’t expect you to agree with all of a sudden; but it would be nice for once to hear disagreement backed by something more cogent than “Nuh uh!”

        • “It’s like when libs say “I’m a gun owner, but……””

          Believe it or not, there are some people that are able to mark a distinction between agreeing with an organizations message and deifying it’s leadership. The NRA, all 5 million members, provides a collective voice arguing against the further assault on our right to keep and bear arms. I belong because I recognize that rather than being lone voices howling in the wind we need a collective message to be sent. My like or dislike of the Executive Vice President has nothing to do with it. Frankly, I could give a damn who the VP of the NRA is.

          “If he’d been out there immediately, they would have been accused at least of politicizing a tragedy. At least as likely, because early reports are so often faulty, he would have made an assertion that turned out to be mistaken, and he would have been pounded mercilessly for it.”

          I hate to break it to you, he waited a week and was STILL accused of politicizing a tragedy. It wouldn’t have mattered if it was a week, a month, a year, a decade. The anti-constitutionalists would still have vilified him. Again, absolutely nothing to do with Wayne Lapierre specifically. Could’ve been Wayne Lapierre, could’ve been Ted Nugent, could’ve been Charlton Heston (man would THAT have gotten attention). The antis would have spewed the same hate, the same message of capitalizing on tragedy while doing the same things themselves as they did with him waiting a week. It’s their standard operating procedure.

          Finally, I really doubt that Wayne Lapierre himself had much say at all in how long he waited. I would be willing to wager a case of Knob Creek that there was a lot of NRA legal and PR team members involved in that decision. They got tripped up by their own size. AS much authority as the VP might have in the organization, that’s a lot of administrative mass to get moving. And, as you said, I’m sure a big part of their consideration was waiting to get the information. I’m sure an even bigger part was waiting to see what there opponents were going to do first.

          My problem with scenario is perception. The anti-constitutionalists (need to work on that, it doesn’t flow like anti-gunner) were out there immediately making there voices heard. Meanwhile the organization that brands itself as the representative of our core freedom was silent. And organization who gained my membership under the proposition that they would be the voice of reason, and they were silent.

          Now, I don’t know why the personal affection for “Wayne”. And worse? I don’t care….

    • Most of those statements fall into the “no-shit” category. The head of a gun-rights advocacy organization needs to be able to do better, particularly when he fumbles in other areas (video games, etc)

      • I’ll see your no-shit and raise you a duh. What *exactly*, other than an undefined “do better”, would you like to see him do? I say the problem isn’t all that complicated to begin with, so he can’t really blame him for hitting the slow ball out of the park. It is what it is and yet, millions of liberals can’t seem to wrap their minds around the issue and arrive at what even you regard as no-shit statements.

        Fact is the NRA has been doing the heavy lifting on firearms safety, proficiency and liberty for many moons; in some cases before some here were even born, in others before anyone here’s great-great-grandfathers were born. Wayne himself has lived and breathed this struggle daily for nearly forty years. That’s a tad more weighty a commitment to the cause than the occasional plinker cum frequent blogger. No disrespect intended, of course. We’re all doing what we can.

    • I don’t see why there’s a problem with that…? One is the perpetrator, the other is a victim. One deserves sympathy, the other needs to be put down.

    • Most interesting, insightful comment of the day award goes to you on that one, Jim. I’m going to borrow that bit, if you don’t mind. It’s the same media, I suppose, that regards twenty-something year old gangsters shot in the course of gangbanging as “children” victims of gun violence when it comes to compiling the stats.

  23. ANY news report of a nutjob on the loose with a gun causes other similarly afflicted lunatics to march in step and follow the leader. That’s because they have no brains and no imagination. Otherwise they wouldn’t even consider this Armageddon move. All I ask is that they stay home and pull the trigger there. Legal gun owners should beware unstable youths who could access their firearms. They are equally responsible.

    • That’s what they used to do until they found out they could get their picture all over the news by getting the highest body count. THAT’LL show those bastards that didn’t treat them right!

      Scornful anonymity is the only solution to the problem, and it’s probably why this kind of shit didn’t happen a few decades ago the way it does now. But you’ve got half the people who get off on ‘investigating’ the killings and another half who just can’t tear themselves away from the news networks whenever something tragic happens….

      We’re screwed.

    • Do you actually imagine legalized weed had anything to do with this, or did you get up this morning and decide to dedicate today to the Art of Buffoonery?

      • I’ve never smoked marijuana and really have no desire to, but in reality wouldn’t have legalized marijuana helped the situation? I’ve DD’d many, many times for friends that smoke….give them a bag of cheetos and an X-Box and they’re not going anywhere…..

    • People crazy enough to kill someone are often crazy enough to be on medication so…. no bet.

      Although this sounds like it may have been more of a straight up murder plot, not a mass shooting sorta thing.

      • One thing that’s been notably missing is what prompted the shooter to cap himself. Did armed security get the drop on him, or did he give up spontaneously? Did he have more shells? Would it have been a spree shooting without armed security? I suspect the latter, but the antigun media is censoring that part.

  28. It you all feel like being angry, wade through the endless anti comments on CNN. They’re ridiculous

      • Healthy doses of bourbon usually calm me down….but then that turns into unhealthy doses and I get angry again.

        • Anger, properly channeled, can be a very good thing indeed. If you have a reason to be angry, you can tell anyone who says you’re “too angry” to go off their meds. This shit is REAL.

    • One particular comment cited numerous “factual” reports that claim that gun ownership increases crime rates. I felt compelled to reply with a link to Nick’s earlier writeup. Because. Facts.

  29. IM very interested to hear about the teacher….and why specifically this person was being called out. How that teacher managed to evacuate while the school was on lockdown? Perhaps via the assistance of the school resource officer?

    Also lets hear from the parents. Because a lot of children are acting out in some seriously fucked up ways. I blame the touchy feely parenting.

    Also what’s the over under that this kid was on meds? Because you know, the parents being pillars of child rearing probably had little Timmy choking down a prescription cocktail so “they” could deal with him.

    • I don’t totally understand the nuances of over/under. I feel more confident with percentages. I think it’s about 95-5 that this kid was on SSRI drugs, based upon past experiences.

      How does that translate as an over/under?

  30. Why is it when a nearly unique 15 y/o White kid shoots someone it is national news. A lone White kid, prolly on FDA approved Rx drugs is not a threat to the fabric of society.

    Yet when a 15 y/o black thug with a criminal history gets what he deserves it is a horrific example of racism?
    Let’s keep track of the stats here and challenge the media’s attempt to vilify Whites as crazed criminals.

    Get real, be honest. The black community needs to take ownership of the criminal element that is rampant in their midst.

  31. “Why is it when a nearly unique 15 y/o White kid shoots someone it is national news. When a 15 y/o black thug with a criminal history gets what he deserves it is a horrific example of racism?”

    Because GUNS. And race-baiting.

  33. Just listening to the live coverage and classmate of the student shooter described the shooter/student as an outspoken Socialist/Marxist. Hrm…..

    • And here I thought Lee Harvey Oswald was already dead. Or James Earl Ray. Or Sirhan Sirhan, or whatever….

  34. I am sure I will get flamed for this but, why don’t these parents (or any parents for that matter) with kids in the house lock up the guns?

    Here in CA, if you have anyone under 18 in the house, you must have safe. And if anyone under 18 gets a hold of a weapon and causes a problem, you can kiss a good 10 to 20 years of your life away.

    Most parents think their kids are NEVER capable of such acts, little Johnny is always an angel….he showed no signs…etc etc. Personally, if we have any kids come over to the house, everything is locked up. The only time a gun is out is if it’s on my hip and I am home.

    Meh, perhaps I have lived in CA too long. Flame on!

    • Wasn’t that the case in sandy hook? Even if the firearms are locked up all a lock does is keep an honest person out.

      • I don’t recall any locked-up guns coming in to play in Sandy Hook. Are you sure about this?

        Reference?

    • Not a flame, but a disagreement on one point. I agree, on your body or in a safe. My problem is with “you must have safe”.

      NO ONE has the right to tell me what I MUST HAVE.

      • You must have a drivers license to drive. You must pay income taxes. The list goes on and on. Of course, you can choose to NOT do these things but you will obviously face prosecution.

        Just playing devils advocate. You are absolutely right, it should be my decision to own a safe or not.

        • I wasn’t baiting, promise, but it occured to me a couple of hours ago that someone was going to come up with driver’s license and taxes….

          No one is telling me I have to drive. I CHOOSE to drive, a requirement of which is getting a license….which reminds me, need to get to the SOS….

          No one is telling me I have to work for a wage. I CHOOSE to work, a requirement of which is paying income tax.

          Now, a counter point will be no one is telling a resident of Kalifornia they have to own a gun, because the requirement is locking them in a safe. There is a subtle, but important difference. I can OWN a car without a driver’s license. I can work to feed myself (just not earning a wage doing it) and not pay income tax. They’re making the act of owning a firearm contingent on also owning a safe. NOT cool.

    • “Here in CA, if you have anyone under 18 in the house, you must have safe. And if anyone under 18 gets a hold of a weapon and causes a problem, you can kiss a good 10 to 20 years of your life away.”

      Was it in Kalifornia that the teenage girl, left alone with the two younger kids, was faced with a pitchfork-wielding madman, and couldn’t rescue the younger kids, because the gun was locked, as per regulation, in a safe? She had been trained to shoot by her father.

      Anyone else remember this case? Guns are useless if one can’t get to them; this was MURDER BY REGULATION. For SHAME!

        • No crow required. This case is one of the most disturbing ones ever, to me. It shows the danger of mandating locked gun cases or lockers. Two young kids DIED because of this mandate. The parents should be the ones to make the decision, not the state or federal governments.

          Accidental gun deaths such as this one should not be the mandate of the states, but of the parents. In this case, Daddy knew best, but the state of Kalifornia thought it knew best. IT DIDN’T.

        • The problem is parents who let their kids have access to guns when those kids (1) aren’t properly trained (2) are not mature enough or (3) are freaking disturbed.

          When little johnny kills someone out of negligence or angst and did it with mommy’s gun, which was left unlocked because she thinks he’s just a little ‘blue’, she should face more than just her kid’s funeral.

          I don’t know if this would lead parents to recognize these problems in their kids more… but it’s something to try.

  36. Long Beach, you are correct; the victims tend to be overlooked unless the anti’s seize upon their deaths or injuries to make them involuntary martyrs for the anti gun cause.

    I guess we here have become conditioned by the anti’s and their media mouthpieces; all they see is the gun; all we hear is the bogus rhetoric, leaving the victims to fend for themselves in this unrelenting war on guns and the law abiding citizens who happen to own and use guns.

    Consequently, the victims get overlooked or lost to the battle just like any civilian casualties of war.

    To me personally that’s a sad reality and result of the politics of this sensless war on guns.

  37. Prayers for the families affected. On a side note what if a fires destroyed schools as often as there are school shootings? Would the American people suggest that a simple sign on all entryways banning fires from school property be a sufficient safeguard?

    • Kids in schools don’t die of fires because the schools are made to be flame-retardant and they’ve got alarms, extinguishers and sprinklers in every hallway and room.

      Maybe if teachers could (and could be encouraged to) conceal carry schools would begin having similar defenses against shooters.

    • I think I read a figure this year stating something to the effect that there hasn’t been a death due to school fire in the U.S. in something like 80 years. Yet, we spend all this time on fire drills which nobody doing them has ever needed. Meanwhile, we refuse just about everywhere to arm the teachers or station retired cops on campus to address a problem that pops up several times per year.

  38. Wait….what? This is a lie! That school is a gun free zone. Didn’t that kid realize how much trouble he was going to get in to?

  39. Vin Suprynowicz is assistant editorial page editor of the Las Vegas Review-Journal.

    Deaths In Merced

    by Vin Suprynowicz

    SEPT. 24, 2000

    Shouldn’t we repeal the gun laws … if it’ll save a single child?

    Jessica Lynne Carpenter is 14 years old. She knows how to shoot; her father taught her. And there were adequate firearms to deal with the crisis that arose in the Carpenter home in Merced, Calif. — a San Joaquin Valley farming community 130 miles southeast of San Francisco — when 27-year-old Jonathon David Bruce came calling on Wednesday morning, Aug. 23.

    There was just one problem. Under the new “safe storage” laws being enacted in California and elsewhere, parents can be held criminally liable unless they lock up their guns when their children are home alone … so that’s just what law-abiding parents John and Tephanie Carpenter had done.

    Some of Jessica’s siblings — Anna, 13; Vanessa, 11; Ashley, 9; and John William, 7 — were still in their bedrooms when Bruce broke into the farmhouse shortly after 9 a.m.

    Bruce, who was armed with a pitchfork — but to whom police remain unable to attribute any motive — had apparently cut the phone lines. So when he forced his way into the house and began stabbing the younger children in their beds, Jessica’s attempts to dial 9-1-1 didn’t do much good. Next, the sensible girl ran for where the family guns were stored. But they were locked up tight.

    “When the 14-year-old girl ran to a nearby house to escape the pitchfork-wielding man attacking her siblings,” writes Kimi Yoshino of the Fresno Bee, “she didn’t ask her neighbor to call 9-1-1. She begged him to grab his rifle and ‘take care of this guy.’ ”

    He didn’t. Jessica ended up on the phone.

    By the time Merced County sheriff’s deputies arrived at the home, 7-year-old John William and 9-year-old Ashley Danielle were dead. Ashley had apparently hung onto her assailant’s leg long enough for her older sisters to escape. Thirteen-year-old Anna was wounded but survived.

    Once the deputies arrived, Bruce rushed them with his bloody pitchfork. So they shot him dead. They shot him more than a dozen times. With their guns.

    Get it?

    The following Friday, the children’s great-uncle, the Rev. John Hilton, told reporters: “If only (Jessica) had a gun available to her, she could have stopped the whole thing. If she had been properly armed, she could have stopped him in his tracks.” Maybe John William and Ashley would still be alive, Jessica’s uncle said.

    “Unfortunately, 17 states now have these so-called safe storage laws,” replies Yale Law School Senior Research Scholar Dr. John Lott — author of the book More Guns, Less Crime. “The problem is, you see no decrease in either juvenile accidental gun deaths or suicides when such laws are enacted, but you do see an increase in crime rates.”

    Such laws are based on the notion that young children often “find daddy’s gun” and accidentally shoot each other. But in fact only five American children under the age of 10 died of accidents involving handguns in 1997, Lott reports. “People get the impression that kids under 10 are killing each other. In fact this is very rare: three to four per year.”

    The typical shooter in an accidental child gun death is a male in his late teens or 20s, who, statistically, is probably a drug addict or an alcoholic and has already been charged with multiple crimes, Lott reports. “These are the data that correlate. Are these the kind of people who are going to obey one more law?”

    So why doesn’t the national press report what happens when a victim disarmament (“gun control”) law costs the lives of innocent children in a place like Merced?

    “In the school shooting in Pearl, Miss.,” Dr. Lott replies, “the assistant principal had formerly carried a gun to school. When the 1995 (“Gun-Free School Zones”) law passed, he took to locking his gun in his car and parking it at least a quarter-mile away from the school, in order to obey the law. When that shooting incident started he ran to his car, unlocked it, got his gun, ran back, disarmed the shooter and held him on the ground for five minutes until the police arrived.

    “There were more than 700 newspaper stories catalogued on that incident. Only 19 mentioned the assistant principal in any way, and only nine mentioned that he had a gun.”

    The press covers only the bad side of gun use, and only the potential benefits of victim disarmament laws — never their costs. “Basically all the current federal proposals fall into this category — trigger locks, waiting periods,” Lott said. “There’s not one academic study that shows any reduction in crime from measures like these. But there are good studies that show the opposite. Even with short waiting periods, crime goes up. You have women being stalked, and they can’t go quickly and get a gun due to the waiting periods, so they get assaulted or they get killed.”

    The United States has among the world’s lowest “hot” burglary rates — burglaries committed while people are in the building — at 13 percent, compared to “gun-free” Britain’s rate, which is now up to 59 percent, Lott reports. “If you survey burglars, American burglars spend at least twice as long casing a joint before they break in. … The number one reason they give for taking so much time is: They’re afraid of getting shot.”

    The way Jonathon David Bruce, of Merced, Calif., might once have been afraid of getting shot … before 17 states enacted laws requiring American parents to leave their kids disarmed while they’re away from home.

    ~~~o~~~

    Vin Suprynowicz is assistant editorial page editor of the Las Vegas Review-Journal.
    His new book, Send in the Waco Killers is available at $24.95 postpaid from
    Mountain Media, P.O. Box 271122, Las Vegas, Nev. 89127; or by dialing 1-800-244-2224

    BACK 2nd Amendment

  40. Just trying to insert a less tone deaf comment in the conversation. OK it wasn’t a AR or AK type rifle and everyone seems happy to mock the “assault rifle” media hype and gun free zones policies (not undeservedly mind you I agree). However when did it become acceptable to have 2 kids dead in a shooting as long as it ‘s with a shotgun? Should the frequency of these not ring some alarm bells? Is the new norm to turn schools into fortresses with armed guards or have shootouts between armed teachers and these kids now?

    • I don’t think anyone has suggested that it is “acceptable to have 2 kids dead in a shooting as long as it‘s with a shotgun”.

      1. The comments above and elsewhere merely point out that assault weapons bans, magazine capacity limits, universal background checks, “safe storage” laws, etc. would not, could not, and did not have any effect on this incident.

      2. Fortunately, we don’t have “2 kids dead”. We have one 15-year-old victim wounded (critical condition at a local hospital) and one adult shooter dead.

      • I wrote that because a majority of the comments seemed more concerned on making the aforementioned (and as I said valid) points about assault weapons and gun free zones and completely ignoring the point that this is yet another school shooting.
        I read the article and it said that a student was the shooter and assumed that a student would be a minor, I stand duly corrected on the victim being in ICU.

    • “Is the new norm to turn schools into fortresses with armed guards”

      You sound like you’re using the same illogic as the antis – present the most ludicrous extreme as the only possible alternative. Of COURSE your fantasy is nowhere near what anyone’s advocating. Simply remove the insane unconstitutional practice of disarming everyone leaving them defenseless. Simply toss out those insane “gun-free zone” infringements, so that a responsible concealed carrier could actually protect the children in her charge.

      And, FWIW, “have shootouts between armed teachers and these kids now?” sounds exactly like the paranoid rantings of the hoplophobiacs. And even if something like that did take place, isn’t it better that the kids and their protectors have a fighting chance than be guaranteed to die?

      • I am not using any extreme here, the only proposed “solutions” to this problem that I have heard of are to post armed guards at the schools or permit teachers to carry. Nice in theory but the first is a bit Orwellian and the second is what I consider a hale Mary at best.
        Fortress, was stretching the argument agreed, however armed guards posted to a school to respond to an active shooter is very creepy (maybe it’s just me)
        Yes armed teachers would have a fighting chance I am not disagreeing with that! However, I don’t consider it good enough. A fighting chance is better than nothing but surely not anywhere near a good solution to what appears to be a recurring problem.
        The point I am trying to make is that while the shooting does validate many of the arguments made in support of gun rights it does so by means of another school shooting. That’s a bit like shooting yourself in the foot to make a point.

        • “permit teachers to carry”

          You’re still stuck in the mindset that any adult needs anyone else’s “permission” to do anything that harms no one.

          That is fundamentally wrong.

          • This is a horse long dead that you are flogging. There are things that you need permission for even as an adult, from the mundane like getting a drivers license( “permission” if you will) to drive to the exotic like a pilot license fly a plane or a special license for handling explosives. Not because you are harming someone but because of the potential to cause harm.
            This argument should be self evident by now

            • The Second Amendment outlines a fundamental RIGHT, and does not speak at all about having to beg “permission” from one’s government to defend life and limb.

              The Bill of Rights does not address permits; it only speaks to rights. The framers of the Constitution did not anticipate motor vehicles, and they never conceived of someone having to ask permission to operate a horse or horse and buggy. Or a mule, or a camel. As far as I am aware, permits to ride horses, mules or camels are not required anywhere on the planet. STRAW MAN argument. Apples and oranges, too.

              If you actually have a valid point, you have yet to present it.

        • Yes armed teachers would have a fighting chance I am not disagreeing with that! However, I don’t consider it good enough. A fighting chance is better than nothing but surely not anywhere near a good solution to what appears to be a recurring problem.

          Given an individual:
          * with no reported history of physical violence or mental illness (presumed, might be revised)
          * who has knowledge of and access to the buildings
          * who can lawfully purchase and carry a firearm, even with a background check
          * who, one day, “snaps” and decides he needs revenge for some perceived wrong

          What is a “good enough” solution? The only solutions I see are a) limit and fortify entrances to minimize the chance that someone can bring a weapon into the buildings and/or b) allow people the means to defend themselves and others.

          Note that this is in no way limited to schools. It applies to any public or quasi-public place. The fact that it happened in a school yesterday is irrelevant (apart from the fact that CO law deprives people of the means of defending themselves in K-12 schools).

          • The scenario you describe is one that can’t be avoided.
            However how many perfectly OK people just snap and go on a killing spree?
            Maybe not this one but a large number of shootings could have been prevented by increased support for those with mental health issues or by limiting access to firearms by minors making background checks more effective. I’m not saying this will solve everything, however perfect should not be the enemy of better.

            • If it “won’t solve anything”, it won’t… uhhh… SOLVE anything. In which case you indulging in masturbatory wishful thinking.

        • by limiting access to firearms by minors making background checks more effective

          What do minors (apart from victims) or background checks have to do with this or any other sensationalized shooting (school or otherwise) in recent memory?

    • I don’t understand whatever it is that you’re saying. There IS no “new norm”; the “old norm”, which prevails, is GUN-FREE ZONES.

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