Clayton Cramer links to this ThisisLondon report on the sentencing of an 18 year-old who shot a 13 year-old boy in the head:
Dean Davis was accidentally killed as he watched DVDs with his friends when one put a gun to his head and pulled the trigger as a “prank”, believing it could not fire.
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Dean’s killer, Renelle Coke, 18, was sentenced to two years in prison after the judge accepted his genuine ” distress and remorse” over the shooting.
Coke pleaded guilty to manslaughter and possessing the weapon, which was brought to the house in Walthamstow by another teenager.
He loaded the Valtro 8000FS pistol with four bullets, pointed it at Dean’s head, then played with the hammer mechanism.
The gun fired at point-blank range, leaving Dean with severe head injuries from which he died in hospital.
This is a Brocock Valtro 8000FS
It’s a blank pistol, not sold legally in England.
It’s quite possible for a blank pistol – held close to the skull – to kill. Actor Jon-Erik Hexum managed to kill himself with a .44 Magnum loaded with blanks. The concussion is quite real. But note that Coke had the weapon, loaded the weapon, pointed the weapon at his victim’s head, and pulled the trigger.
But the gun was at fault.
Jailing Coke, Judge Hubert Dunn said: “It is an appallingly sad case. It illustrates the great danger of guns and ammunition.
—My children come and visit our house but they don’t want to stay here any more, because the whole place just reminds them of what has happened to little Dean. That is what guns have done to our family.”
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Detective Chief Superintendent John Coles, head of the Met’s Operation Trident, said: “Guns are the fashion accessory of the new millennium – once upon a time it was flick knives and knuckledusters; now youngsters seem to think that it’s cool to be seen with a gun in your hand.”
AFTER the ban. AFTER they disarmed the people who represented the good “gun culture” – the ones who understand that guns are dangerous if mishandled. The ones who teach safe gun handling.
He added: “We are doing very strong work with the community and targeting kids as young as six and seven so that they are being talked away from thinking like this.
“The message should be clear – guns are not cool, they are stupid and they do kill.”
No, people who view them as fashion accessories are stupid and do kill. Deliberate criminals kill. But the gun is just a magic talisman that the philosophy has made it in the minds of the criminal class.
Until the people in the UK accept that the philosophy that blames the gun is wrong and a failure, the problem is going to continue. Turning up the power on gun bans has failed and will continue to fail. We’ve got teenagers playing with blank guns that have no idea what any kind of gun can actually do, and a system that ensures that they’ll never have a chance to learn while also ensuring that they really want that magic talisman that gives them power over others.
It has been said that repeating the same behavior while expecting a different result is one definition of insanity. The UK’s decades-long war on guns is certainly a good example of this.