Crime – Page 8 – MILESFORTIS

Okay, update on the Raleigh massacre.
Why the type of gun wasn’t mentioned?
Nailed it: Shotgun. And that doesn’t fit the gun banner’s narrative, so this will be shoved down the memory hole by Monday. And all SloJoe could do is replay he want’s to ban ‘assault weapons’.

Raleigh Active Shooter VIDEO: Multiple Dead

A 15-year-old active shooter, wearing camouflage and wielding a shotgun, randomly shot and killed five people near a trail in Raleigh, North Carolina. Video emerged from the scene, showing a massive law enforcement response.

Alright. so this was something personal and then the kid decides to go out in a blaze of hate.
Also, since no one is commenting on the gun used, we can be pretty confident, it’s not an AR, but a shotgun or rifle the kid stole from his parents.

Raleigh shooting suspect identified as younger brother of slain victim, law enforcement source says

The suspected gunman in Thursday’s deadly mass shooting in Raleigh, North Carolina, has been identified as the younger brother of one of the five people killed in the rampage, a law enforcement source confirmed to CBS News. The suspect, who was identified as a 15-year-old boy, is the brother of 16-year-old James Roger Thompson, CBS News’ Pat Milton reports.

CBS News is not naming the suspect due to his age.

Raleigh Police Chief Estella Patterson said the suspect is in critical condition. According to the law enforcement source, the suspect suffered an apparent self-inflicted wound.

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Suspect, 15, taken into custody after 5 shot dead, 2 injured in Raleigh neighborhood, North Carolina officials say

A 15-year-old suspect was taken into custody after a “long standoff” with police in connection with a shooting that killed five people and left two others injured Thursday evening in Raleigh, North Carolina, officials said.

North Carolina Gov. Roy Cooper called the shooting spree, “the nightmare of every community.”

The shooting unfolded in a neighborhood northeast of central Raleigh and prompted warnings for residents to stay inside. One of the fatally wounded was an off-duty police officer, Mayor Mary-Anne Baldwin said.

In a news conference Friday morning, Raleigh police chief Estella D. Patterson said the suspect was taken into custody after an effort by a coalition of local safety agencies, and he is in critical condition.

He was not identified.

Raleigh shooting spree suspect in critical condition

No information regarding a motive or the suspect’s background were shared as the investigation is ongoing.

Patterson said the victims who were killed ranged in age from 16 to 52.

They were identified as: Nicole Connors, 52, Susan Karnatz, 49, Mary Marshall, 35, off-duty Raleigh police officer Gabriel Torres who was on his way to work, 29, and a 16-year-old white male. NBC affiliate WRAL of Raleigh reported the teen victim was James Roger Thompson.

In addition to the deceased, two people were injured in the shooting: Raleigh Police Officer Casey Clark, 33, who was treated and since released from the hospital, and Marcille Gardner, 59, who remains in critical condition.

An off-duty officer was killed as police responded to a shooting in an east Raleigh, N.C., neighborhood Thursday afternoon.WRAL

“Tonight terror has reached our doorstep,” Cooper told reporters Thursday evening. “The nightmare of every community has come to Raleigh. This is a senseless, horrific and infuriating act of violence that has been committed.”

Baldwin said: “We have to end this mindless gun violence that is happening across our country. There are too many victims. We have to wake up.”

Patterson said Friday morning the crime scene was “expansive” and stretched over two miles.

The police department advised residents in the leafy neighborhood known as Hedingham to remain indoors. Aerial video from NBC affiliate WRAL showed a large police presence.

A witness named Robert Anderson told NBC’s “TODAY” that he saw the gunman from his back deck.

“He had a camouflage shirt, camouflage pants, black boots, he also had a backpack that looked like it was filled to the brim,” he said in an interview aired Friday.

“He was walking, and when I tell you he was walking, it was like nothing had happened,” Anderson explained. “He was just walking looking straight forward, he had his gun on his side and it was pointed downwards and he was just walking.”

Another witness who spotted the apparent gunman told WRAL that she saw neighbors trying to help the off-duty officer, who was inside a car bleeding.

The witness told the station that she saw the gunman run from the scene and disappear into a nearby park. He was wearing black boots and appeared to be a teenager, she said.

“He looked like a baby,” she told WRAL, adding: “I just don’t even have the words to explain. This is not OK.”

Police: Two People Dead, Six More Wounded in Stabbing Attack on the Las Vegas Strip

LAS VEGAS (KTNV) — Two people are dead and six more are hospitalized after a mass stabbing on the Las Vegas Strip on Thursday morning.

Three of the victims are in critical condition, said Capt. Dori Koren with the Las Vegas Metropolitan Police Department.

This, after police were called to a casino in the 3100 block of Las Vegas Boulevard at 11:41 a.m. on reports of a stabbing with multiple victims.

The suspect was taken into custody in front of the Venetian, reportedly with a significant amount of blood “on his sleeves.” Police said multiple victims were transported to area hospitals with “unknown extent of injuries.”

Five of the patients were taken to University Medical Center’s trauma center for treatment, a hospital spokesperson confirmed:

“One patient is in critical condition and one patient has passed away. Two of the patients are in serious condition and one is in fair condition. Our team members at the UMC Trauma Center continue to work tirelessly to provide these patients with the highest level of care available.”

Witnesses at the scene tell 13 Action News reporter Joe Moeller the stabbings occurred in multiple locations and some of the victims involved may have been showgirls, who take photos with tourists on the Strip.

Moeller spoke to one woman who said the injured showgirls are her employees. She tells KTNV the suspect told the women he was a chef and asked to pose for a photo with them while holding a knife. When the women declined his offer, he stabbed them, she said.

One witness from Canada shared a photo with 13 Action News of a showgirl being taken away from the scene on a stretcher.

Another witness, Pierre Fandrich of Montreal, Canada, spoke to KTNV through a translator. He says he was walking along the strip when he thought he heard “three or four showgirls laughing,” though it turned out to be screaming. Fandrich says he saw “a lot of blood” as one woman ran across the bridge, one was on the ground and another — with an apparent stab wound on her back — tried to help the woman on the ground. Another person approached them and attempted to help the woman on the ground by doing CPR until the police arrived, Fandrich says.

At first, Fandrich says he “thought a girl fell from the bridge because there was a lot of blood on the ground.” Fandrich did not see the suspect in the aftermath because “everything happened so fast.”

Another witness shared a video of one of the victims, which has been blurred due to its graphic nature.

A witness visiting Las Vegas from Los Angeles recalls seeing one victim “laying on the ground near the shops” and being attended to by one of the security guards. The witness said they were in the Wynn at the time of the attack but came upon the scene after leaving the resort.

Traffic along Spring Mountain at Las Vegas Boulevard will remain shut down while an investigation into the incident is conducted by LVMPD.

Clark County issued the following statement regarding the incident:

The Clark County Coroner identified two victims of the stabbing as Brent Allan Hallett, 47, of Las Vegas, and Maris Mareen Digiovanni, 30, of Las Vegas.

BLM Rioter Who Murdered Retired St. Louis Police Captain Sentenced to Life in Prison Without Parole

The 26-year-old man convicted of killing retired St. Louis Police Captain David Dorn was sentenced to life in prison without parole on Wednesday.

Stephan Cannon’s sentencing comes after a jury convicted him in July of fatally shooting Dorn in June 2020. The 77-year-old was responding to a burglary alarm at a friend’s pawn shop during a night of Black Lives Matter rioting when Cannon shot him.

Cannon was convicted in July on all of felony charges he faced, including first-degree murder, first-degree robbery, first-degree burglary, stealing $750 or more, unlawful possession of a firearm, and three counts of armed criminal action…..

Update: Man Who Ran Over Republican Teen in North Dakota Now Charged With Felony Murder

Charges have been upgraded for Shannon Brandt, the suspect who allegedly ran over 18-year-old Cayler Ellingson on September 18 for being a Republican in McHenry, North Dakota.

According to local news, Foster County State’s Attorney Kara Brinster filed new criminal charges against Brandt including Murder, which is a Class AA Felony, and Duty in Accident Involving Death or Injury, a Class B Felony. The charges of vehicular homicide were dropped in lieu of the upgrade.

Early on the morning of Sunday, September 18, Brandt is accused of running down Ellingson, of Grace City, North Dakota, after a street dance held at a local bar. Brandt told State Radio that the young man was part of a “Republican extremist group” and that his targeting of Ellingson was politically motivated.

There is “no evidence” Ellingson was part of any such group, according to North Dakota police. Witnesses have said that the two did not engage in a verbal dispute.

New details emerged from the new filings, as Brandt called 911 and spoke with dispatcher, or State Radio, and said, “I just wanna ask you a question, am I going to go to prison?”

Brandt also said “he [Ellingson] wasn’t going to let me go, I hit him” and “he’s subdued.”

“He can’t do anything to me now,” Brandt told the dispatcher.

An autopsy showed that there were no acceleration marks or skid marks near the location of the 18-year-old victim’s body, indicating no rushed or threatened vehicle acceleration.

Further, the autopsy indicates that Ellingson’s primary injuries were caused from the SUV running over him, not from an initial impact.

The 18-year-old called his mother as Brandt chased him in his SUV to ask if she knew Brandt. She told her son she was on her way to get him directly before Brandt allegedly murdered the young man by running him down.

Liberal Networks Avoid North Dakota Teen Killed by Man Who Dubbed Victim a ‘Republican Extremist’

The liberal media has long decried the threat of violent right-wing extremism, but when the violence allegedly targets the right, news organizations largely turn a blind eye.

Eighteen-year-old North Dakotan Cayler Ellingson was allegedly targeted and killed by drunken 41-year-old motorist Shannon Brandt following a “political argument,” according to court documents that revealed Brandt’s account of what transpired.

Brandt, who initially fled the scene after hitting the teen with his SUV, told police that Ellingson had belonged to a “Republican extremist group.” Brandt was released on $50,000 bond.

None of the five major news networks — ABC, CBS, NBC, CNN and MSNBC — have offered any on-air coverage to the attack on Wednesday and Thursday, according to Grabien transcripts………

North Dakota Official Says ‘No Evidence’ Supports Suspect’s Claim

A North Dakota official said that there’s “no evidence” supporting Shannon Brandt’s claim that 18-year-old Cayler Ellingson was part of a “Republican extremist group” before he allegedly used his car to hit the teenager, who later died.

Brandt, 41, is being charged with criminal vehicular homicide, as well as leaving the scene of a crash involving a death after the incident in the early Sunday morning hours. He was held in the Stutsman County Jail until Tuesday, when he posted a $50,000 bond and was released.

The incident happened after a “street dance” in McHenry, North Dakota and Brandt told state first responders’ radio that he struck the pedestrian with an SUV because the pedestrian was threatening him,” a probable-cause affidavit states. The document also states that Brandt fled the scene, but later returned and called 911.

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“Crisis of Crimes”: New Orleans Becomes Murder Capital of America

Progressives in top city leadership positions have helped transform New Orleans into the murder capital of America.

WSJ reported the Louisiana city on the Mississippi River, near the Gulf of Mexico, recorded the highest homicide rate of any major city so far this year, with 41 homicides per 100,000 residents.

Metropolitan Crime Commission Inc., a nonprofit that works on crime-reducing strategies in the city, said the homicide rate is up 141% compared with the same period in 2019. It pointed out carjackings are up 210%, shootings 100%, and armed robberies up 25%.

“The homicide rate is on pace to surpass last year’s rate, which was the worst since Hurricane Katrina in 2005,” WSJ noted.

The city’s alarming spike in the homicide rate comes at the same time as “progressive prosecutor” Jason Williams became the district attorney of the metro area in early 2021. He promised a “more selective” approach to prosecutions that goes “beyond punishment.”

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Demand for private security is booming in Minneapolis.

In June 2020, the Minneapolis city council famously vowed to defund the police department. Though their plans fell through, the fully funded MPD is nonetheless struggling. More than 250 officers have resigned or retired since then. Earlier this year, the Minneapolis supreme court ruled that the city has a duty to staff the MPD with a minimum of 731 sworn officers, but the department is at least 100 officers short of that target. Meantime, crime has spiked, with 96 homicides in 2021—doubling the number in 2019 and tying a 1995 record.

Private security has stepped into the breach. The number of licenses approved for new private providers rose from 14 in 2019 to 27 in 2021, according to data from Minnesota’s Board of Private Detective and Protective Agent Services. Demand is exploding as businesses increasingly opt for private guards over off-duty cops.

Christopher Forest started his private security firm, Unparalleled Security, after the rioting of 2020. Today, he has 175 employees. Forest did not set out to start a private security firm, having previously worked as CEO of Minnesota’s largest valet-parking company. But after June 2020, his clients began approaching him with requests for security guards. These clients had once hired off-duty police officers for their security needs, but the MPD’s image after the George Floyd killing made that more difficult.

“I think it just had to do with the temperature in the room when you have a police officer in a venue versus an unarmed security guard,” Forest says.

Michael MacDonald, who runs a smaller private security firm called JomsVikings Protection and Security, agrees. “Stores do not want cops out in front because of the negative attention it can bring to their facilities,” says MacDonald. His license to operate was issued July 31, 2020. Today, he has 18 full-time and ten part-time employees.

High crime means that new clients, such as movie theaters, are entering the market for private security, says Richard Hodson, the chairman of Minnesota’s Board of Private Detective and Protective Agent Services. Hodson says he knows of a retired police officer who recently got a license to run his own private security firm but has had to turn down contracts because he cannot hire enough guards to staff them. Demand exceeds supply.

Businesses still fear negative publicity from taking an aggressive enforcement stance. Forest says retail clients instruct his guards not to confront shoplifters. “Retail is in a place where they do not want you to even address the person,” he says. “You are not to talk to them. You are not to approach them. You are not to ask to see the items in their bag. If they are purchasing something, you are asked to not look at the receipt. You are 100 percent visual deterrent, and that is all.”

That approach isn’t universal. MacDonald says that his guards sometimes confront shoplifters, but never aggressively. “When we zone in on the individual who is stealing, we go over there and we say, ‘Hey, man, we know you stole. Can you just put it back and then leave?’ We start with that approach. We don’t go right to the top,” he says. “I will only take a contract for a store if there is a clear understanding that we are strictly there for employee safety. We are not loss prevention.”

Should guards call police to stop crimes in progress? MacDonald’s personnel tend not to do so for shoplifting. Forest says that some of his guards who work for hotels do intervene if guests are engaging in illegal activities; in theory, they should call the police, but they usually don’t. “If it is not a life threatening situation, the police do not show up,” Forest says. “They let my guards de-escalate on their own.”

Even a nonconfrontational approach can escalate. MacDonald describes an incident that occurred in July: “A guy stole a bag of chips and shoved it down his pants. Our guy made an approach and was like, ‘You can keep the chips, but you still got to go.’ Well, the guy brandished a firearm out of his bag. So our guy pulled his firearm. And then the guy took off running. But our employee had the level of training to remember that he could still re-holster it, and he does not have to engage any further.” That incident merited a rare call to the MPD. “If it gets higher than a theft, like what happened with my employee, then the cops will actually come, because otherwise they are not coming,” says MacDonald.

Some Minneapolis residents still prefer to hire off-duty cops, whom the department makes available through what it calls the “buyback program.” The upscale Lowry neighborhood established the Minneapolis Safety Initiative for off-duty police to conduct patrols. Residents are trying to raise $210,000, suggesting a recurring contribution from their neighbors of $220/month for at least six months. The Minneapolis Safety Initiative attracted significant coverage, including criticism from some who argue that wealthier neighborhoods are purchasing scarce police hours.

Nevertheless, demand for private security is growing. MacDonald and Forest expect to see significant expansion in the year ahead. High crime and police shortages are changing the public-safety landscape in Minneapolis.

Say Her Name

fletcher

Some victims are more equal than others.

If I were a real MAGA extremist, I’d be able to tell you about a specific murder trend happening in America right now, but I don’t want to get on the FBI terror watch list.

What I can tell you is this: we are living in a real-life version of The Purge. Murders are up at least 44 percent in two years.

For over two years, we heard a long list of murder victims shouted on TV every day. I know by heart the names and murder circumstances of Breonna Taylor, Trayvon Martin, Ahmaud Arbury, George Floyd, Tamir Rice, Eric Garner, and many others.

This new trend is a little different. In fact, I couldn’t help noticing that some particularly gruesome recent killings have been met with a strangely subdued reaction by the mainstream media. Which is weird, because silence is violence.

Crime itself is nothing new. Like many of you, I’ve already been a victim of lots of crimes. Multiple cars broken into overnight, wallets pickpocketed at bars, that sort of thing.

I have also been the victim of a few much scarier crimes. Once, I was robbed at gunpoint. I was alone, walking home just after dusk on a prestigious East Coast college campus. The robber demanded my wallet as he jabbed his handgun into me. He snatched the $20 I gave him and ran away.

Last year, I arrived at a public park to retrieve one of my children from sports practice. As I pulled into the lot, I noticed a group of men hanging around a parked car. My inner systemic racist noticed that they were young, black, dressed like gangbangers, and smoking weed. My inner white privilege told me I should find a different place to park, immediately.

But I convinced myself that there was no way anything bad could happen here, in full daylight, in view of a playground full of kids, so I dismissed my inner “racist” and pulled into the lot.

I called my husband and told him, “I think I just interrupted a gang meetup. These guys look like they have guns.”

He told me to ignore my inner racist. “It’s broad daylight, you’ll be fine.”

Thirty seconds after hanging up with him, I heard the unmistakable sound of gunfire close by. At first I thought I was dreaming. How could my inner racist have been so right? And then I thought, oh no, I was correct in my assumption that these guys were sketchy, and now I’m going to die a “racist.”

The shots were very loud, because they were being fired three feet behind my car. The shooter was crouched down and aiming at the guys who had been standing around the parking lot and were now running for their lives. I watched him shoot one man in the stomach. The victim clutched his guts, screaming, and fell to the ground.

I tried to make myself as small as I could. I learned that you can’t get down very far when you’re stuck in the front seat of a minivan. The shooter kept blasting away, and I called my husband back, this time to say goodbye. He was an hour away, totally unable to help me, and I just managed to tell him what was happening. Then I braced myself in case a stray bullet came through my car, and like the racist that I am, I prayed and waited for death.

When the shooting stopped, there was absolute silence. That was the moment I was most afraid, since I assumed the shooter would be searching for a getaway car, and I was the perfect carjacking prospect, since I’d been the only other person dumb enough to park in the lot. Take another car, I silently begged. Please don’t take this one, with the toddler car seats in it. Do you know how expensive those are?

I heard sirens in the distance. I waited on the floor of my car until a cop tapped on my window. As he took my witness statement he told me, “This parking lot is a gang hangout for the Bloods. What in the world are you doing here?” “Trying not to be racist!” I almost said.

Ah, the Bloods, of course. That would explain why the guys running away had been wearing red, and why the shooter wore a blue baseball cap. (The Bloods are one of the two big L.A. gangs; the other is the Crips. In the 1980s, even white kids from the westside couldn’t go out wearing red or blue, since the Bloods wear red, and Crips wear blue. It is as stupid as it sounds, and if you don’t believe me, go watch the Sean Penn movie Colors.)

My “racism” had tried to warn me, but I didn’t listen. The cop then beckoned for me to get out and look at something behind my car. There were bullet casings all around my car, inches from my tires. “Your car is in the crime scene so we can’t let you leave,” he told me, as another cop strung yellow investigation tape around my parking spot.

My son emerged from the gym with his team. I stared at him and realized that if they had walked out five minutes earlier, it might have been a bloodbath. Rounds had gone through at least two nearby cars, including one containing the parent of a boy on the team, but by some miracle no other innocent people were hurt.

The cop, a Latino guy, advised me to stay away from the park, since it’s near the projects that “the gang controls.” He was telling me to listen to my inner racist! What if I’d pulled up to the parking lot, taken a look at the group of men, and decided not to go in? Would that have been the right thing to do—or the racist thing to do?

As the police officer talked to me, furious people from the neighborhood stood on the other side of the police tape and yelled things like, “Fuck you! Get the fuck out, this is our neighborhood!” Looking back, I probably should have apologized to the polite young man who screamed “white bitch,” since my “racism” is certainly what drew the police to his park that afternoon—it may have even instigated the shooting.

Common Sense is “Racism”

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Political Cartoons by AF Branco

Full-auto switches popping up in gun-controlled Connecticut

Full-auto switches take a regular Glock semi-automatic pistol and converts them into a machine gun. I don’t mean that in the sense that bump stocks supposedly do, where they really just allow you to pull the trigger stupidly fast. No, they actually turn the pistols into full-auto weapons.

As a result, they’re illegal in the US. There’s no state in which they’re OK because they fall under federal law. They shouldn’t, but they do.

Anyway, they’ve been turning up more and more in different places. It seems gun-controlled Connecticut is having an issue with them.

A tiny device capable of transforming a handgun into a mini machine gun is showing up in Connecticut, according to police reports.

The device, known colloquially as Glock “switches” or “chips,” can be quickly attached to a handgun, converting the weapon from shooting just one bullet each time the trigger is squeezed to having the capability of firing until the trigger is lifted.

A handful of the devices have been recovered by police in Connecticut in recent years, according to police reports, though it’s unclear how many of the devices are present in the state. Advocates say they pose a danger to the public because they increase the risk of bystanders being shot, and because of the apparent ease criminals are able to obtain them.

Ease criminals are able to obtain these things? Seriously?

Nah, can’t be. Gun control works, we’re told, and these things are seriously illegal. Due to the date of manufacture on these, no one can legally have one except for a handful of exceptions. How can gun-controlled Connecticut have an issue with easy access to one of the most controlled devices out there?

The report goes on to discuss the ease with which these can be obtained, such as from China or via a 3D printer.

Now, there are only a few that have been recovered, but that’s all it takes to create a panic. However, in this case, there are lessons that can be learned despite the limited numbers recovered.

You see, you can’t keep bad guys from doing bad things. If they want full-auto switches, they’ll get them, especially in this day and age.

Thankfully, there’s no mention of Connecticut lawmakers trying to pass laws banning things that are already illegal. Yeah, I know, will wonders never cease and all that, but it’s still worth mentioning.

However, there was this bit I wanted to talk about:

“I’ve heard law enforcement officers in other parts of the country refer to this as … ‘the scariest thing that has hit the streets in a long time,’” said Jeremy Stein, executive director of Connecticut Against Gun Violence, a group that supports stronger gun laws.

Stein said the device works by essentially “bypassing” the firearms trigger mechanism, similar to a bump-stock, a device designed to make a semi-automatic weapon mimic a fully automatic rate of fire.

“There’s no legitimate civilian purpose — there is no good reason to have one of these things,” he added.

Well, yeah, there is.

You see, when the bad guys can throw down a whole lot of fire, it might be warranted for law-abiding citizens to have the means to lay down a similar amount of fire.

As it stands, we’re on an unequal footing with our adversaries should we find ourselves up against a criminal armed with a gun possessing a full-auto switch. We simply don’t have the firepower to meet that kind of force.

So having a similar full-auto switch would be a “legitimate civilian purpose.”

Now, with that said, no law-abiding citizen is likely to have one of these. I mean, by definition, if you have one you’re not likely to be law-abiding, now are you?

However, this also shows that what we need isn’t more gun control laws. This is as tightly controlled as they come under the law, and yet for less than the price of a tank of gas–OK, bad example in this day and age, but bear with me–you can get something that will turn your standard Glock into a machine pistol.

Or, you can find the files and make them yourself with a 3D printer.

Look, while I know that Connecticut hasn’t gotten the memo, gun control is dead. It doesn’t work, is unconstitutional, and is just a general waste of time.

If you can’t keep a full-auto switch out of criminal hands, how are you going to keep guns out of them?

Just to point out, as has been pointed out before, each one of these cities is run by a demoncrap administration. If that doesn’t tell you something, nothing will.

Per Capita Murder Rate

Which city has the highest per capita murder rate? Chicago? New York? Not even close.

A new study of cities over 200,000 people shows a surprising list of cities. Here is the top 10.

New Orleans. Louisiana’s very own third-world hell hole. The current city administration seems bent on making New Orleans the most dysfunctional city on the North American continent. Before hurricane Katrina, I enjoyed going to New Orleans for a weekend away. Great food, good culture. Nowadays I wouldn’t go to New Orleans on a bet.

California Had the Most Active Shooter Incidents in 2021: FBI

In a report issued by the FBI, California ranked first for the most active shooter incidents in 2021. The state has been in the top spot in three of the past five years.

According to the study, a total of 61 active shooter incidents occurred across 30 states last year with 103 people killed and 140 wounded. This is up from 40 incidents and 38 killed in 2020.

California had 6 incidents that claimed the lives of 19 people with 9 wounded. Texas and Georgia each had 5.

California, which has some of the strictest gun laws, saw 0.015 shootings per 100,000 people. Texas, which has very unrestrictive state gun laws, had nearly the same at 0.0167 per 100,000 people. Georgia had 0.045 per 100,000 people.

Criminal attorney Arash Hashemi told NTD, a sister outlet of The Epoch Times, that in his opinion there’s no easy answer to how gun laws should be handled.

“We need both sides to sit down and listen to what’s going on. I know one side says we need to ban guns, one side said there would be no regulation. But there needs to be a meeting of the minds in the middle,” Hashemi said.

California is moving ahead to implement more gun restrictions. The new state Senate Bill 918, which is currently on its way through the legislature, would ban the carrying of guns in most public areas, regardless of whether someone has a carry license or not.

However Hashemi suggested a slightly different approach. He said the Second Amendment can’t be violated, but he thinks certain people should be restricted from owning a firearm.

“I think California needs to implement these background checks but at the same time make sure they don’t infringe on people’s rights to bear arms,” Hashemi said.

He said vetting gun buyers for red flags like mental illness or psychiatric medication is important.

He added that the importance of the Second Amendment is to give the civilians of the United States a check on the government.

The greatest number of casualties and injuries at an active shooter incident in 2021 was 15, at both a FedEx center in Indiana and a Kroger grocery store in Tennessee.

June had the most with 12, and December had the least with 1.

The FBI defines an active shooter as one or more people engaged in killing or attempting to kill people in a populated area. The 2021 report is limited to these incidents and does not include other gun-related situations like self-defense, drug violence, or gang violence.

‘They Got No Clue’: 80-Year-Old Store Owner Who Stopped Armed Robbery Slams California Politicians, Bail Reform

An 80-year-old store owner in Norco, California, who thwarted an armed robbery over the weekend is taking California politicians to task after the traumatic encounter.

Convenience store owner Craig Cope slammed politicians for being clueless about the escalating crime wave in California, referencing so-called bail reform, which has been criticized for allowing career criminals back on the streets to do more damage against innocent civilians.

“I’ll probably get on the wrong side of some people here, but, uh, the politicians,” Cope told FOX 11 on Tuesday, when asked what he would tell Californians fed up with the crime wave. “There’s people out there that are not the best of people … these people that continually get let out now — it’s been really bad the last year — those people, the majority of them, go right back to what they used to do. So the crime rate is escalating, and it’s gonna continue to escalate until they start putting the people away that are doing the bad things.”

To business owners similarly frustrated, Cope said the answer is not really to “do what I did,” but to “put some pressure on the politicians.”

“You can do what I did, but what you really need to do is put some pressure on the politicians, because they got no clue what’s really going on out here in the real world,” he explained. “I could start naming names, but there are a whole lot of them that are creating major problems for business owners, but for local law enforcement, they’re creating problems for them. I’m sure they’re risking their lives, taking people into custody to see them get let out with no bail. A lot of these guys are career criminals … they need to be locked up.”

The 80-year-old hero also had a blunt message for the “bad guys.”

“This isn’t a good place to pick,” he told FOX 11.

The Daily Wire detailed Monday that Cope reacted incredibly quickly when he realized his store was being targeted in an armed robbery. Surveillance footage shows that Cope fired at the first armed suspect who entered the store before anything else could happen, sending the would-be robber and the other men fleeing.

“He shot my arm off!” one of the armed suspects is heard yelling on obtained surveillance footage.

“He saw on the surveillance — he saw them coming out of the vehicle with weapons,” said Marnie Tapia, one of Cope’s employees.

“I’m proud to call him my boss,” Tapia said. “He makes us feel better about being here, you know.”

New Report ‘Crime in Washington 2021’ Damning Proof of Gun Control Failure

In the midst of a continuing pattern of rising crime in Washington State, a new report released by the Washington Association of Sheriffs and Police Chiefs (WASPC) does two things, one of them completely unintentional.

The report says there were 325 murders last year in the state, “an increase of 5.9 percent since 2020.” It is the highest number of murders recorded since WASPC began collecting data in 1980.

What the data also demonstrates is that restrictive gun control initiatives pushed through by a billionaire-backed gun prohibition lobbying group based in Seattle have failed to make communities safer, essentially putting the lie to any promises or predictions made by their proponents.

Translation: Gun control advocates misled Evergreen State voters. Their forecasts and arguments were wrong, just as Northwest gun rights leaders said they would be.

According to the Crime in Washington 2021 report, “In 2021, Violent Crimes showed an increase of 12.3% with 29,238 offenses reported; compared to 26,036 offenses reported in 2020. There were 325 murders in 2021; this is an increase of 5.9% compared to 307 murders in 2020.”

That’s even more homicides than the annual FBI Uniform Crime Report listed for 2020, the most recent year for which FBI data is available. The Crime Report is released in late September each year. For 2020, the FBI listed 298 homicides, of which 177 were committed with firearms. That was up from the 209 murders, including 141 involving guns, posted in the 2015 Crime Report.

The new WASPC report “compiles data from 232 state, county, municipal and tribal agencies,” according to KOMO News. It “is designed to give residents information on what is happening in their communities. It covers a wide variety of crime, an issue people living in Seattle say is getting out of hand.”

The report came as news from neighboring Oregon confirmed Initiative Petition 17, which seeks to ban so-called “large capacity magazines” and require Oregonians to get a permit before they can purchase a firearm, has qualified to appear on the November ballot.

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Man shoots, kills robbery suspect during ‘violent crime spree’ in St. Charles

ST. CHARLES — A St. Louis man on a bathroom break at a QuikTrip here shot and killed an armed robber early Saturday.

Police said the robber was on a “violent crime spree” across three St. Charles gas stations.

The QuikTrip customer, identified only as a 26-year-old man from St. Louis, stopped around 3:20 a.m. at the gas station at 2260 First Capitol Drive to use the restroom and make a purchase, St. Charles police said in a release. The man was on his way back to his vehicle in front of the store when he saw a black SUV pull up abruptly.

St. Charles police on Sunday identified the deceased man as Lance M. Bush, 26, of St. Louis. Police said Bush was homeless.

Police would not release the name of the customer who killed Bush, saying St. Charles County prosecutors will review the case first to determine if the killing was justified.

The customer watched Bush get out of the SUV, run into the QuikTrip carrying a backpack, and approach a clerk by the coffee pots, police said. Bush then grabbed the clerk and dragged her to the front of the store while she was screaming.

The customer saw Bush inside the station holding a knife to the clerk’s throat. The customer got his 9 mm handgun from his vehicle, entered the store, and confronted the suspect, police said.

Bush grabbed his backpack, told the man, “I have something for you,” and walked toward him, police said.

The customer then fired several times. Bush fell to the floor. The customer and the clerk, who were uninjured, both called 911, police said.

Bush was taken to a local hospital, where he was pronounced dead, police said.

Police said they believed Bush was responsible for two other crimes just prior to the QuikTrip incident.

Just before 3 a.m. Saturday a suspect entered an On The Run convenience store at a Mobil gas station at 1401 South Fifth Street and announced a robbery. He held a knife to the throat of a clerk, 43, while she opened the cash register, according to police.

The suspect then pushed the clerk to the floor, stole money from the cash register and dragged the clerk toward the rear of the store asking where the safe was. When the clerk couldn’t open the safe, he dragged her back to the front counter to open a second register. This suspect also fled in a black SUV.

The clerk had knife cuts on her left wrist, right hand and neck, and was taken to a hospital for non-life-threatening injuries.

Around 3:15 a.m., with officers en route to the On The Run, a call came in for an alarm at Midtown Phillips 66, 524 First Capitol Drive. Officers found broken glass and began investigating it as a burglary.

Investigators determined the black SUV was a 2013 Toyota Highlander, reported stolen in an armed robbery on July 15 from the 13500 block of Riverport Drive in Maryland Heights.

Items believed to have been stolen from the burglary at Midtown Phillips 66 were located in the vehicle, police said.

Police declined to release surveillance video from the three gas stations.

Bush’s criminal history includes a pending felony property damage charge in St. Louis County. Charges said Bush was a former employee of the Applebee’s restaurant at 11077 New Halls Ferry Road and that on March 30, he began smashing several stacks of dishes and tossing frozen food when the restaurant’s manager told him his final paycheck wouldn’t be available for several days. Police said he caused an estimated $6,000 in damages.

Bush also had citations in St. Charles municipal court earlier this year for driving on a revoked license, trespassing and stealing. The address listed on the trespassing and stealing tickets is for the Ameristar Casino. In addition, Bush had a March 2 larceny citation in St. Louis County at a convenience store in Earth City.

It’s not guns. It’s the hands the guns are in.

Countries with strict gun control hit by recent mass shootings and gun violence
Denmark, South Africa, and Sweden have all attempted to combat gun violence despite strict restrictions

South Africa, Denmark, and Sweden have been combating a wave of gun violence and mass shootings despite strict gun control laws in all three countries.

South Africa was the latest to see a mass shooting, with at least 19 people being killed in two separate shootings last week in Johannesburg and Pietermaritzburg. In Johannesburg, 15 people were killed and many more injured when a gunman opened fire on patrons in a bar. A similar scene played out the same night in Pietermaritzburg, where two men entered an area bar and opened fire on patrons there, killing four people an injuring eight.

The two shootings happened despite tight gun regulations in the country, with GunPolicy.org rating South Africa’s firearms regulations as “restrictive.” Civilians in the country are not allowed to possess semi-automatic weapons without a special endorsement, while handgun ownership is permitted but only after obtaining a license under specific circumstances.

South Africa’s strict restrictions have led to a large black market for guns in the country, with almost 13,000 people being arrested in the country for illegal possession of firearms in 2020/2021, according to the Associated Press.

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