It wasn't a real gun

[sarisataka]

does it matter?

(CNN)The man who was killed Wednesday by Nashville police after he allegedly went after moviegoers with a hatchet and pepper spray had been committed to a mental institution four times, police spokesman Don Aaron told reporters.

Vincente David Montano was committed twice in 2004 and twice in 2007, said Aaron, citing officials in Rutherford County.

Montano also had an airsoft pistol, police said in a tweet that showed a gun recovered at the scene. Such a weapon can fire plastic or BB pellets.

http://www.cnn.com/2015/08/05/us/tennessee-theater-shooting/index.html

[madville]

1. So maybe a suicide mission

Who knows what his actual plan was., suicide by cop is certainly possible.

I wonder if he had tried to purchase real firearms before and was turned down by NCIS?

[sarisataka]

2. Good question

If the system did prevent him purchasing an actual firearm

[Nuclear Unicorn]

3. He needed help. He took the only solution he thought he had to end his torment.

It's a heartbreaking story because you can see the meticulous planning he put in place to provoke as deadly a response as possible from the police, particularly choosing a movie theater. But he also made a point of not inflicting any lethal harm.

This was suicide by cop. That's not to find fault with the cops (whom I usually disfavor) but he needed help, not laws and cops.

[sarisataka]

4. Agreed

He had serious issues but unfortunately he set a stage where his death was the only possible outcome.

I have seen at least one comment now that blames the cops and many 'well it was only a hatchet'.

The implicit message is troubling.

[malaise]

5. This poor man was a genuine mental case

He was schizophrenic and had been committed to institutions several times.
His mother had reported him missing since Monday.

He probably could not access a gun given his mental history

[sarisataka]

7. It would be useful to know

If he did try to purchase a firearm. Any attempt should have been blocked but a background check is only as good as the database it uses.

Then there is the issue of follow up on failed checks which is virtually nonexistent.

[kelliekat44]

6. What is important here is that many more could have been killed had it been a real gun.

That's the big point to me. Ok to pat yourself on the back about quick response etc. and hats off to the responders. BUT, had that gun been real or an automatic the responders would have been too late to prevent mass murder.

Guns are the huge problem and this sad story makes the case.

[malaise]

8. Precisely

In fact he is proof that it is the guns that kill

[sarisataka]

10. I find it interesting

How a hatchet is not viewed as a deadly weapon. We went from multiple threads of the usual gun-humping-ammosexuals-make-guns-as-easy-to-buy-as-toilet-paper to

I would like to know- did the system work? We can learn from success as well as when it fails.

I also am disturbed by the lack of concern for non-gun violence. It has reached the point where a person can decapitate someone amd the commentary is 'at least he didn't use a gun'
http://www.azcentral.com/story/ejmontini/2015/08/03/kenneth-dale-wakefield-decapitation-phoenix--mental-health-gun-control/31071007/

[Eleanors38]

11. This seems to be the new MSM and Controller strategy to keep Gunz in the Newz:

When anyone uses another weapon, just say it coulda been worse with a gun, and keep pumping the message of prohibitionism, here and elsewhere. It serves the second functions of diminishing killing by other means, and avoiding the discussion of what to do when CelebroPunks choose other means. Like a bomb.

[Paladin]

12. Get back to us, the next time some psycho uses an axe to murder 20 school kids and their teachers.

(Insert standard gripe about emotionalism HERE:_____________)

[Eleanors38]

13. You heard about the Oklahoma mass murder, same day as the La. Shooting?

I just got back to you.

[MicaelS]

15. 5 people were stabbed to Death in Oklahoma.

And the response here was crickets. If it was a gun people would still be going on about the evil guns and evil NRA.

[LanternWaste]

16. No doubt and by all means... defend the NRA.

No doubt and by all means... defend and rationalize the evil NRA.

[branford]

19. It's possible to defend gun rights without directly supporting the NRA

or having anything to do with them.

In fact, about a third of American owns guns, and others, such as myself, who do not own guns still support such rights, while the NRA only has about five million members. That's over 80+ million people in the USA who don't need the NRA to be positively disposed toward firearm rights! Whining about the purported evils of the NRA in every discussion about firearms does not constitute a substantive, no less persuasive, argument, and is little more than an attack on the messenger when you've lost the message, i.e., American support gun rights, and such support is steadily increasing.

In any event, organizations you disagree with are constitutionally entitled to advocate their views and lobby our representatives just as any other. The same rights that protect groups like Planned Parenthood protect the NRA. Rather than complaining about the NRA, try convincing people they're wrong about gun rights. This should theoretically prove easy since you have numerous gun control organizations, sympathetic elected representatives, ample funds and and supportive billionaires, and even Hollywood celebrity spokespeople...

[Whiskeytide]

18. It's unfair for you to conflate...

... not making an issue of the political fallout relevant to the stabbings with not caring about the victims. That's a false equivalency.

This is a political discussion board, and gun regulation is a political issue. Thus, gun related deaths gets attention here. Stabbings - no less tragic for those affected - don't give rise to political discussion (except sometimes possibly in the realm of mental health care), so I would not expect such an occurrence to be a hot topic here.

I'm saddened by the OK tragedy, as I suspect most DUers are. But it's not a political topic.

[branford]

20. Theoretically true, but

a ubiquitous complaint after shootings is that gun rights supporters don't care about the victims, or even that they're little more than murderers themselves. It's patently untrue, inexcusable and tiresome. Whether killed by a gun, knife, bomb, hands, or anything else, the victim is just as dead. The usual double standard hypocrisy concerning gun crime victims compared to all victims of violent crime is certainly political and worthy of note.

I hope when such allegations against gun rights supporters arise after the next shooting, you'll post again about how political disagreements don't imply apathy towards crime victims.

[Whiskeytide]

21. You've sort of changed the subject, but I see your point and...

... agree with you. Blaming ALL gun rights supporters for gun violence, calling them murderers or saying they don't care about victims is, indeed, patently untrue, inexcusable and tiresome. It's also counterproductive to the discussion of reasonable gun regulation. But most here on DU don't really feel that way. Many democrats hunt, and many own guns for home protection. Most don't own 30+ guns, or own assault weapons. There is a stark difference there. (We'll be shit outta luck when the zombie apocalypse hits, but that's the price we pay, I guess).

But -- I was just observing that you can't get upset that non-gun violence doesn't get a lot of airtime here since it just doesn't easily lend itself to political discussion. For that reason, you also can't draw logical conclusions about the level of empathy DUers might have for victims of non-gun violence. There's just not a relationship or a connection there. Just like there's not really a connection between someone who reasonably and thoughtfully believes in responsible gun ownership and the Yosemite Sam assholes who are prepping for Armageddon, toting their AR15s to Starbucks, and threatening to repel the invading US military from Texas.

[hamsterjill]

9. No. At this point, it does not matter.

The police were reacting in a way trying to save as many people as they could in a difficult situation. They did not have the foreknowledge that the man had mental issues and they did not have the time to analyze that he had only a pellet gun.

This is a horrible situation all the way around, but I don't think, given the emergency and the necessary response, that the police could have handled this any differently.

[Eleanors38]

14. Noted suspect had "hoax explosive device." Just think how many would die...nt

[Rex]

17. We can thank Ronald Reagan for much of the massive murder sprees committed today.

He was so happy to defund social projects like helping those in need of mental help. My what a shock...the GOP took something and fucked it all up and now we are paying for it decades later.

SSDD.

[Whiskeytide]

22. I have never understood why ...

... that incredibly clear cause and effect doesn't resonate with more Americans. ??? I guess the simultaneous defunding of public education really has made us "stoopider as a hole" too.

[Lizzie Poppet]

23. "Police-assisted suicide"

This is genuinely tragic. It's tragic that this man, despite being committed twice, never got effective treatment. It's tragic that there seems to have been no one to help him "step back from the brink." And it's tragic that a cop has to deal with this now. Sure, some cops are conscience-less monsters who won't lose a wink of sleep over this sort of thing...but I have no doubt most react just like any normal person. Even when completely justified by the circumstances, a normal person is traumatized by the act of taking the life of another human being.