At least 20+ dead students in Virginia Tech; shooter dead

Who cares what the English Common Law says. We go by the Constitution.

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Paaskynen wrote:

In my opinion the problem is a cultural one and therefore quite hard to tackle. The only practical solution is banning gun ownership for the majority of the population (so as to make the likelihood of a deranged person obtaining a gun smaller),

Destroying American freedom is a nonstarter.

And if you made it harder for them to get guns they would just make bombs.

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msolga wrote:

I've read through most of the posts here & have come to the conclusion that it's a frustrating, exclusively American thing, this issue about gun ownership & rights & "freedom". For most of what I'd call the enlightened/civilized world, people generally do not need to protect themselves with weapons against other citizens. But in the US the right to own weapons is considered a necessecity by many. And the reasons for this appear to be something like this: if the bad guys have weapons (most likely legally bought) then surely the good guys should be allowed to own a gun too, to protect themselves? I cannot tell you how primitive this attitude seems to people in far less powerful, even less "civilized" & developed countries than the US!

I don't think you understand the pro-gun position exactly.

It has nothing to do with "we need these weapons".

It has everything to do with "we have the right to have these weapons so question of 'need' is irrelevant".

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BumbleBeeBoogie wrote:

Paaskynen wrote:
Not bragging, but I just read that in the US there are more registered arms merchants than petrol stations. Can that be true? If so it indicates the scope of the issue.

I get so tired of gun advocates mantra that it's their right to bear arms ala the NRA. In fact, its not about gun freedom. It's about the right to sell guns. As usual, it all comes down to money. The NRA is a front for the gun industry.

BBB

That is incorrect. The position of the gun industry is even more moderate than the NRA's.

The industry doesn't care if some types of guns are banned so long as there are other types that they are still allowed to manufacture.

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Setanta wrote:

oralloy wrote:
Unless I am mistaken and your legal system is not in fact based on English Common Law..... (a reference to Miss Wabbit's comments on gun control in Australia)

The English common law has never guaranteed anyone's right to own a handgun.

I agree.

And it is also my view that the scope and boundaries of English common law gun rights define the scope and boundaries of our own Constitutional gun rights.

But I have to go take a cat to the vet. Will come back later today or tomorrow.

There are people who would prefer that this thread not be about gun rights, but instead be a source of breaking news on the shooting anyway.

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Setanta wrote:

maporsche wrote:
I have yet to see a gun control advocate who had a rational, detailed plan for disarming the "criminals," either. Your plan of removing ALL guns is not rational and is not detailed, and worse than all it would not be effective.

I didn't say ALL guns. I specified handguns. Handguns can only have two purpose--target shooting, and you don't need a .44 magnum for that, and killing people, which is the only thing a .44 magnum is good for. As long as people make reference to vague things like disarming "criminals," while claiming that armed "law-abiding citizens" can protect us from crazy shooters, you're not advocating anything practical, either.

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That being said, I'm curious about what strict handgun controls you'd like to be enforced. I've had to register with the state here in IL. I have to have this FOID card on me at all times. I've had to pass a background check each and every time I've bought a gun (even at a gun show). What else do you have in mind?

No handguns, period. If only the police and the military are allowed to have handguns, anyone found in possession of a handgun is automatically "a criminal," and no longer "a law abiding citizen." The standard response is that you need handguns to protect yourself from the "criminals," which means that handguns remain readily available, and big business. You and O'Bill can sneer at me to your heart's content for having no immediate solution, but i don't hear anything constructive being offered by either of you.

My cousin owns a pharmaceutical delivery service. For obvious reasons he carries a hand gun. I do believe in strict gun controls, but what would he do if he was no longer allowed to legally carry a hand gun? He and his business would be dead in a matter of days.

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Linkat wrote:

My cousin owns a pharmaceutical delivery service. For obvious reasons he carries a hand gun.

Well, no. Not obvious. Plenty of pharmaceutical deliveries happen in Canada every day. No hand guns allowed, or apparently required.

~~~

There seems to be some big cultural divide that isn't obvious on the surface - people keep saying how similar the U.S. and Canada are - but there seem to be more differences than we (I)'d realized.

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I would like to take the opportunity which Woiyo's post affords to point out once again that my objection is to handguns, and not firearms in general. I've hunted, but it would not be appropriate to describe me as a hunter. I don't see any problem with people keeping weapons for hunting, or even on the rather fanciful basis that they would participate in the militia. The Dick Act of 1903, which created the National Guard, makes a distinction between the organized militia (i.e, the National Guard) and the unorganized militia. All of those gun owners who allege a constitutional right to their firearms who are not members of the National Guard would qualify as unorganized militia.

The Second Amendment (which i do not complain about) does not guarantee the right to keep any arms the individual wants to own. It does not specify what arms people may bear, and Article One, Section 8 of the Constitution grants Congress the power to arm the militia. In Presser versus Illinois, 1886, the Supreme Court held that the Second Amendment applies to the Federal government, and does not bind the states. In The United States versus Miller, 1939, the Supreme Court's majority opinion noted:

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In the absence of any evidence tending to show that possession or use of a 'shotgun having a barrel of less than eighteen inches in length' at this time has some reasonable relationship to the preservation or efficiency of a well regulated militia, we cannot say that the Second Amendment guarantees the right to keep and bear such an instrument.

It is clear to me, whether or not it is clear to handgun ownership proponents, that it is the sense of the Supreme Court that both the Congress and the States may regulate the militia, up to and including legislation on the nature of the arms which the unorganized militia may bear.

In no way can it reasonably be stated that the Second Amendment guarantees the right to bear any arms which an individual wishes to own.

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realjohnboy wrote:

farmerman wrote:
One thing , when his teacher put out a call for help from the authorities and the VT counselors, she was rebuffed. I think that police have got to rethink their missions from what they are now, which is merely the guys who show up and draw the chalk lines around the bodies

I truncated Farmerman's response. Go back and read the whole thing.

Farmerman, what are you suggesting? This guy wrote (apparently, the professor will not release any of that) stuff that she found "troubling." She notified "authorities." The claim seems to be made that no action was taken.

What action could have/should have been taken?

Should the police have gotten involved? Only, it seems to me if a threat was made in the writing. If not, I wouldn't want my writing or your writing subjected to approval or disapproval by the police.

Could VT, based on the writing have steered him towards counseling? Um, I guess so. But whether he went that way would have been up to him.

I agree - I think this is much too difficult to assess - who is writing such a thing for creative reasons (I did read his writings and they were horrible) and who is likely to go off the deep end. Of course now it seems obvious to us after the fact.

If we were to jail or investigate anyone who wrote a distributing story, then people like Alfred Hitchcock and Steven King would no longer be writing novels.

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fishin wrote:

realjohnboy wrote:
farmerman wrote:
One thing , when his teacher put out a call for help from the authorities and the VT counselors, she was rebuffed. I think that police have got to rethink their missions from what they are now, which is merely the guys who show up and draw the chalk lines around the bodies

I truncated Farmerman's response. Go back and read the whole thing.

Farmerman, what are you suggesting? This guy wrote (apparently, the professor will not release any of that) stuff that she found "troubling." She notified "authorities." The claim seems to be made that no action was taken.

What action could have/should have been taken?

Should the police have gotten involved? Only, it seems to me if a threat was made in the writing. If not, I wouldn't want my writing or your writing subjected to approval or disapproval by the police.

Could VT, based on the writing have steered him towards counseling? Um, I guess so. But whether he went that way would have been up to him.

In addition to a professor being alarmed at this kid's writing we know also know (based on press reports) that he was given prescription drugs for depression last year - which should have been reported through the state and automatically disqualified him from purchasing any firearms - and that there were 2 bomb threat letters sent to the school within the last two weeks and a third similar bomb threat letter was found in this kids's dorm room.

This kid has been a ticking time bomb for years and the one and only person that tried to intervene was ignored. The school can do more than just point him to counseling. They could have reported him to the state which could have mandated a pysch eval on him.

This is the stuff that we send educators to seminars to learn to look for. If everyone is going to ignore educators when they do what they've been trained to do then what the h*ll are we training them for?

It definately seems if you add up all the things that should have warned authorities, it should have been more apparent. However, not just one alone would do it - but all combined. How many people stated when I heard about the shootings, I knew it was Cho or I would have been surprised if it wasn't Cho.

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Setanta wrote:

oralloy wrote:
Some handguns are also good for hunting. The .44 magnum is one of those handguns.

A handgun is not necessary for hunting, and handguns were never designed for hunting. Running deer down with a pickup truck can be very effective, too--that doesn't mean that a pickup truck is or ought to be the weapon of choice for deer hunting.

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I am not sure that a .44 magnum is particularly good for anti-personnel use. Something with less recoil for more rapid shooting would seem better suited to that task.

That doesn't alter the fact that the weapon was designed for shooting people, and not for hunting or for target shootin.

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Also, guns designed to kill people have a legitimate place in the hands of civilians, because in some cases (like self defense) lethal force is a legitimate civilian activity.

That is a matter of opinion, and another matter of opinion is my opinion with regard to the opinion you have just expressed. Attitudes such as you have expressed are exemplary of why the problem cannot be solved.

Not sure what kind of hand gun he carries, but a friend of mine who goes shark hunting always has a hand gun on the boat when he goes. He doesn't use to "hunt" the shark, but once caught and brought to the boat, it can be quite dangerous - he has the hand gun just in case there is still alot fight left in the shark.

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ehBeth wrote:

Linkat wrote:
My cousin owns a pharmaceutical delivery service. For obvious reasons he carries a hand gun.

Well, no. Not obvious. Plenty of pharmaceutical deliveries happen in Canada every day. No hand guns allowed, or apparently required.

~~~

There seems to be some big cultural divide that isn't obvious on the surface - people keep saying how similar the U.S. and Canada are - but there seem to be more differences than we (I)'d realized.

If you ever read of the robberies for oxycotin it be obvious. If hand guns would be outlawed for everyone, then drug addicts would know these deliveries (which many happen in the middle of the night), would not be armed and would be open for attack. Drug Addicts are unpredicable and dangerous in their behavior.

I would suggest that individuals would need a legit reason to own a hand gun - like the type of work they have. I would imagine even in Canada that the amoured trucks picking up/ delivering money have hand guns, for example.

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oralloy wrote:

Setanta wrote:
oralloy wrote:
Unless I am mistaken and your legal system is not in fact based on English Common Law..... (a reference to Miss Wabbit's comments on gun control in Australia)

The English common law has never guaranteed anyone's right to own a handgun.

I agree.

And it is also my view that the scope and boundaries of English common law gun rights define the scope and boundaries of our own Constitutional gun rights.

Perhaps you could provide a source for your remarks on the English common law and gun rights. I've been searching the web ever since i made that post, and can find no evidence that Blackstone included any comments on firearms in his watershed Commentaries on the Laws of England (1765-69). In fact, all that i could find was the following:

In the three preceding articles we have taken a short view of the principal absolute rights [personal security, personal liberty, private property] which appertain to every Englishman. But in vain would these rights be declared, ascertained, and protected by the dead letter of the laws, if the constitution had provided no other method to secure their actual enjoyment. It has therefore established certain other auxiliary subordinate rights of the subject, which serve principally as outworks or barriers to protect and maintain inviolate the three great and primary rights, of personal security, personal liberty, and private property.

1. The constitution, powers, and privileges of parliament . . . .

2. The limitation of the king's prerogative . . . .

3. . . . [A]pplying to the courts of justice for redress of injuries.

4. . . . [T]he right of petitioning the king, or either house of parliament, for the redress of grievances.

5. The fifth and last auxiliary right of the subject, that I shall at present mention, is that of having arms for their defence, suitable to their condition and degree, and such as are allowed by law. Which is also declared by the same statute . . . and is indeed a public allowance, under due restrictions, of the natural right of resistance and self-preservation, when the sanctions of society and laws are found insufficient to restrain the violence of oppression.

. . . [T]o vindicate [the three primary rights], when actually violated or attacked, the subjects of England are entitled, in the first place, to the regular administration and free course of justice in the courts of law; next, to the right of petitioning the king and parliament for redress of grievances; and, lastly, to the right of having and using arms for self-preservation and defence. (emphasis has been added)

Source at the UCLA School of Law. On that same page, one can see in St. George Tucker's review of Blackstone's Commentaries (1803) that the effect of the cumulative common law and Parliamentary Acts of England was: ". . . that the right of keeping arms is effectually taken away from the people of England."

I hardly think you have any basis to refer to "English common law gun rights," and in fact, Mr. Tucker completely disagrees with your contention that English common law "define[s] the scope and boundaries of our own Constitutional gun rights."

It is obvious that Blackstone held that the common law allows the subject the right to have arms for their defense, but he doesn't mention firearms at all, and he does mention arms "such as are allowed by law." Therefore, there is no good reason to assume that the English common law either stipulates anything about guns, or that it finds anything inimical in the formulation of laws to restrict firearms ownership.

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There are people who would prefer that this thread not be about gun rights, but instead be a source of breaking news on the shooting anyway.

That's a nice cop out . . . you make comments on other peoples' posts, but then bow out on continuing the discussion because of a tender regard for the feelings of others which you ignored while making your previous replies.

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parados wrote:

fishin wrote:
parados wrote:
I don't think being put under observation over a weekend for threatening to commit suicide really counts as an involuntarily commitment.

No? What would you call it when the police show up at your door and force you to go stay in a mental health facility for ~48 hours for evaluation?

It may be a forced observation period but no court ordered commitment occurred. There is a legal procedure in place for commitments. I am not going to look up VA's but I doubt any state allows for commitment without a court ruling if the person objects. If they don't object than it isn't involuntary.

Well, apparently it is a moot point. According to the latest update by CNN there was a commitment order.

"After speaking with Cho "at length," the officers asked him to see a counselor, and he agreed to be evaluated by Access, an independent mental health facility in the area, the chief said.

"A temporary detention order was obtained and Cho was taken to a mental health facility" on December 13, 2005, he said."

http://www.cnn.com/2007/US/04/18/vtech.shooting/index.html

Now, why didn't that order cause a flag in the NCIC system? That's the question I want answered.

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Me too.

Do we know that it didn't cause a flag? Is there any possibility that the guy who sold the gun (the one we know about anyway, haven't seen much reference to the second except that it was apparently also legal) saw the flag and chose to ignore it?

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woiyo wrote:

Guns are "violent". Violence is an emotion. Guns have no emotion. Therefore, your opinion must be ignored as you are NUTS.

Now THAT is funny. Violence is an emotion?

And you call me NUTS.

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fishin wrote:

Well, apparently it is a moot point. According to the latest update by CNN there was a commitment order.

"After speaking with Cho "at length," the officers asked him to see a counselor, and he agreed to be evaluated by Access, an independent mental health facility in the area, the chief said.

"A temporary detention order was obtained and Cho was taken to a mental health facility" on December 13, 2005, he said."

http://www.cnn.com/2007/US/04/18/vtech.shooting/index.html

Now, why didn't that order cause a flag in the NCIC system? That's the question I want answered.

It isn't involuntary if you agree to it.

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Why did they need the detention order then...?

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sozobe wrote:

Me too.

Do we know that it didn't cause a flag? Is there any possibility that the guy who sold the gun (the one we know about anyway, haven't seen much reference to the second except that it was apparently also legal) saw the flag and chose to ignore it?

They don't see the flag and they can't ignore it.

They call the info into the NCIC instant check center and give them all the buyer's info. Name, address (all addresses used in the last 3 years), SSAN, Driver's license #, make model & serial number of the firearm the person is trying to buy, etc...

The people that work for the FBI that man the NCIC center are the only one's that see the flag(s). If there is no flag they give the dealer a control number to document on the sale records. If there is a flag they just tell the dealer that the sale is denied - they don't give them a reason (and IMO, they shouldn't. It's none of the dealer's business.). They are also supposed to record in the NCIC system that a purchase attempt was made and denied.

The local press in VA seem to have checked at the dealer's and determined that everything was legit so I can only conclude that the dealers did everything the way they were supposed to and had the NCIC issued control numbers.

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I see. Thanks.

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sozobe wrote:

Why did they need the detention order then...?

I would guess its all about the paperwork.

In a lock down facility people can be there voluntarily or involuntarily but both need paperwork.

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parados wrote:

fishin wrote:

Well, apparently it is a moot point. According to the latest update by CNN there was a commitment order.

"After speaking with Cho "at length," the officers asked him to see a counselor, and he agreed to be evaluated by Access, an independent mental health facility in the area, the chief said.

"A temporary detention order was obtained and Cho was taken to a mental health facility" on December 13, 2005, he said."

http://www.cnn.com/2007/US/04/18/vtech.shooting/index.html

Now, why didn't that order cause a flag in the NCIC system? That's the question I want answered.

It isn't involuntary if you agree to it.

He volunteered to be evaluated by ACCESS. The detention order to was issued based on that evaluation and he was committed to the mental health facility.

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At least 20+ dead students in Virginia Tech; shooter dead

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