Doing the Drill with Gun Control:

 

Apparently, that power drill from your toolbox may be illegal to carry under New York City's firearm restriction ordinance:

http://www.courts.state.ny.us/REPORTER/3dseries/2013/2013_50242.htm

If drills are made illegal, then only criminals will have drills!

An Unsafe Haven

The big front-page story in Suffolk County, NY is now the quadruple homicide at Haven Drugs in Medford. It is too early to come down with too much in the way of definitive statements as to the motivation behind the crime, inasmuch as more and more facts seem to surface with time. It is the worst multiple homicide in Suffolk County since the now infamous six-victim Amityville Horror in 1974.

It seems that the alleged perpetuator, David Laffer, may well have had some accessory aid and abetment from his wife.

It is very disconcerting to me for all sorts of reasons, not the least of which is that my after-school job during senior year of high school was at a local pharmacy. In those days -- well before HIPAA and the big deal that is now quite appropriately made over health care information confidentiality -- the Old Man told me in no uncertain terms that he would chew me out if I came in late or had a fender-bender with the delivery station wagon (which he did to me for the former, and to my successor for the latter), but that there would be no second chance if I were to disclose anything regarding what prescriptions were being dispensed to a customer.

In the big drug chains today, the pharmacy operation is basically separate and apart from the other retail business. Without in any way denigrating any of the pharmacists who are employed by a big chain pharmacy (the ones at the local big chain outlet where my wife and I have our prescriptions filled have, with few exceptions, proven to be quite knowledgeable), it takes a certain kind of person to be in the independent pharmacy business.

My observations:

1. The brutality of this crime should give opponents of the death penalty pause.

2. Would the incident have been quite as tragic if the perpetuator had tried to pull off something similar at the independent pharmacy establishment of Jerome Ersland?

Two Virginia College Massacres

Just over 5 years before the 16 April 2007 Virginia Tech massacre in Blacksburg, Virginia, there was another shooting massacre less than 100 miles away. On 16 January 16, 2002, Peter Odighizuwa, a student at the Appalachian School of Law in Grundy, VA, killed the Dean, Anthony Sutin, along with Professor Thomas Blackwell and student Angela Dales.


There are many parallels between the two incidents. The shooter in each case was a foreign-born person legally in the United States who had severe emotional issues, who took out their frustrations with handguns.


But there is also a contrasting distinction between the two incidents, a distinction which seems to have been lost in the news media feeding frenzy. In the Appalachian School of Law incident, the killer only murdered three victims, as compared to the 32 victims at Virginia Tech. And at ASL, the killer's rampage was stopped because another student was able to go to his car and access his firearm, which he used to subdue the killer.


Regardless of your opinions regarding the regulation of firearms, there is no denying the facts.


Disclosure Number 1: Less than 3 months before the ASL massacre, I had met with several ASL faculty members for the purpose of discussing my prospective employment there. Considerations of family and geography dictated that I not pursue the matter any further at that time.


Disclosure Number 2: My wife has two cousins who are enrolled at Virginia Tech. We were, of course relieved to learn that they are safe and sound. But it wasn't really good news that they were not victims, because someone else's family instead of ours got the bad news.


May the victims of both masssacres rest in peace, and may their families be comforted!