Gun Control Might Have Prevented Shooting Death of Four Cops
Paul Helmke, President of the Brady Campaign to Prevent Gun Violence, issued the following statement to honor the four Oakland, California police officers whose funeral services are being held today:
“Oakland Police Sergeants Mark Dunakin, Ervin Romans and Daniel Sakai and Officer John Hege will be laid to rest today in California. They paid the ultimate sacrifice in the performance of their duty: to keep the streets safe for the people of Oakland and the Bay area. Our sympathies and prayers go the families and friends of these gun violence victims. We are terribly sorry for their loss.
“It was wrong that a brutal killer and convicted felon was able to arm himself with a military-style semiautomatic assault weapon.? It is wrong that our Nation’s weak and nearly non-existent gun laws make these deadly weapons so easily available to dangerous people. We owe it to these law enforcement officers to do what police leaders across America have been urging and do more to keep these weapons off our streets and out of the hands of dangerous people.”
Read the Opposing Views debate, Does Owning a Gun Make You Safer?
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.....with the criminal mind. Gun control, like door-locks, only effects the honest citizen. It will never stop the criminal. Mexico has some of the toughest gun laws on the planet, but the cartels don't seem to mind.
I get really tired of seeing Paul Helmke rush to the local papers whenever an illegal shooting, with an illegal gun, owned illegally takes place. He rushes in with a pre-written opinion piece telling people, "yeah, he broke a lot of laws, but if we only had more laws maybe your loved ones would still be alive! lets pass more gun control laws!"
This is a disgusting way to promote an agenda that, on its face, would not work. I can't count on both hands how many laws were broken here, but Paul Helmke seems to think one or two more would've made the difference.
Paul Helmke, shame on you, and shame on the brady campaign for exploiting every incident like this in order to further your own political agenda. You care about guns , not about lives. If you looked, you'd see that this shooting occured despite all the "common sense" gun controls you have lobbied for in the past. Gun controls you told us would save us before. When it happened again, you proposed even more controls, which didn't work, and here you are telling us your previous life-saving laws didn't work and we need more. You don't care about the people, Paul, or you would've admitted long ago that your controls don't work. You don't care about the people, Paul, or you would be asking yourself what DOES work since all your previous ideas have failed so terribly.
As near as I can tell, Paul, your ideas for these laws have only managed, over the years, to create more victims in higher numbers.
Thanks for nothing, Paul. Now go away.
This is a typical and predictable response from the Brady Campaign. Mr. Helmke’s "sympathies and prayers" are just an insincere 'front' for his personal hatred (fear) of lawfully armed citizens. When he mentions "dangerous people" he means you and me, and could care less about the convicted felon who committed these murders.
The rifle this scum bag used to mow down two SWAT officers was ALREADY ILLEGAL to possess in California, not to mention this scum bag was a convicted felon, meaning he could not legally possess any firearm in the first place. If anything, this incident is definitive proof that gun control laws have no effect on criminals (who by definition, violate laws) and only result in the disarmament of law-abiding citizens.