A 14-year-old boy allegedly fatally shot his older sister in Florida after a family argument over Christmas presents, officials said Tuesday.
The teen had been out shopping on Christmas Eve with Abrielle Baldwin, his 23-year-old sister, as well as his mother, 15-year-old brother and sister’s children, Pinellas County Sheriff Bob Gualtieri said during a news conference.
The teenage brothers got into an argument about who was getting more Christmas presents.
“They had this family spat about who was getting what and what money was being spent on who, and they were having this big thing going on in this store,” Gualtieri said.
Strict liability for whoever was the legal owner of the gun(s), I say.
Whoever let these children get their hands on the firearm is absolutely a murderer. Even if it someone who let their gun get stolen from their car. Definitely if it was a family member or friend.
Oh, I remember that event with an actor killing a camera operator with a prop gun (jokingly pointing it at her) or something.
The person responsible for props was a complete dumb baboon and guilty of murder, yes.
However, I was shocked by the fact that so many people think that pointing a real gun, even if it’s a prop, at somebody without checking that it’s not loaded is normal and thus that actor was innocent. They were defending that action as if they themselves would really have taken a gun and squeezed the trigger while pointing at someone without checking.
So maybe it’s about responsibility and education, not ownership of guns.
Because, say, Moldova (off the top of my mind), hardly a rich country or even with a healthy society, has gun laws more liberal than in USA, and doesn’t have school shootings and such events.
Switzerland and Austria have very liberal gun laws, again possibly more so than in USA, and don’t have such a problem.
Can’t speak for Moldova or Austria, but I would not call Switzerland’s gun laws liberal.
They are VERY strict. Gun ownership rates are high, but there are tons of restrictions and licensing requirements on ownership and sale of guns there. The country is proof that having a strong regulatory structure does not necessarily prevent gun ownership and should absolutely be considered a model for where the US regulator environment should be moving (universal registration including 2nd hand sales, full license checks for all purchases including ammo, effective bans on large categories of weapons, mandatory training, and the like).
People who love “gun rights” always cite Switzerland without even doing the most basic Wikipedia-level research on it.
People winning arguments in their heads shouldn’t come to real ones.
Austria has relatively relaxed gun laws for Europe. but it’s still fairly strict compared to the USA.
Oh, OK, OK. I’ve literally had something in my memory and did only quick reading on laws in those 2 countries before writing that comment, and evaluated strictness on my own.
Correct me if I’m wrong, but aren’t those places where you’re required to take some kind of classes to be able to qualify to own a gun? Isn’t it also pretty easy for anyone from the police to be able to take them from you within reason if they find you to be violating some laws?
Yeah. If “taking some kind of classes” is not obligatory in the US, then we have the main reason for all the accidental shootings and kids takings their parents’ guns right here.
Depends on the state if it’s required. Not required in Kansas, but required in Minnesota as an example
You can’t put the responsibility on the actor who never chose to own a gun, so they have no reason to educate themselves about gun safety.
All responsibility lies with their employer (I guess that’s the producer and/or director), who made them handle a gun as part of their job and should have given them the required training, as well as the prop guy whose job it was to check the gun.
He chose to take it, point it at a person and squeeze the trigger, so yes he had that reason and yes I can.
Jokingly, I should add, he wasn’t instructed by anyone to take that gun and wave it around.
The only people not having a reason to educate themselves about gun safety are people who don’t touch guns.
Yeah, they probably managed to make only the prop guy responsible too, just like that actor. But I don’t remember the details.
… and about that person I’ve already said what I wanted.
No.