Tearful plea from victim's dad in deadly rampage (More gun laws, nothing about knives)

Yahoo ^ | 5/24/2014 | Yahoo

[Dallas59]

GOLETA, Calif. (AP) — A man whose son was among the victims killed in a shooting rampage near a California university quaked with grief and rage Saturday as he described his "lost and broken" family and the proliferation of guns he believes led to his son's death.
"Our son Christopher and six others are dead," Richard Martinez told reporters gathered outside a sheriff's station for a news conference the day after the shootings near the University of California, Santa Barbara, where the 20-year-old son was a sophomore. "You don't think it'll happen to your child until it does."

[FES0844]

Yeah, he has to blame someone or something. So sad.

[LibWhacker]

Swim back across the Rio Grande to Messyco where gun laws are more to your liking, a**hole. Our 2nd Amendment rights are set in stone. If you don’t like it, leave.

Just another liberal POS exploiting a tragedy to attack our constitutional rights. Hey, I got the hershey squirts once after eating a burrito in Mexico. Maybe I should start advocating tearfully that Messycans adopt an American diet. A**holes.

[Oldexpat]

I wonder if the father or his Doc knew he had guns?
If you had a 22 year old son within 100 miles that was threatening himself and others wouldn’t you go and confront him? This father had the means to get him at least temporarily committed. Then he could have searched his place and taken his car etc.

[livius]

He was actually crazy, so dysfunctional he had to be in a special residence. His parents obviously paid for his “therapy.” I don’t know if this was a private residence or if he had gotten into the state mental health system at that point.

In any case, there is a problem here, which people on this forum are ignoring: he bought these guns legally. In other words, the gun dealer - who would always check the records - saw nothing that indicated he could not sell these guns to this lunatic. And like many people with that type of illness (supposedly a form of autism), Rodgers was obviously fine when he knew he needed to keep it together, as when he was talking to the police. So the gun dealer is not at fault.

The problem is the way we deal with the mentally ill. They can only be committed after the bodies are lying on the ground, and mental health treatment, even for seriously violent disorders, is never indicated so the gun dealers never can get a real idea of the person to whom they’re selling the weapon. This all comes out of the 1970s idea that mental illness was the result of capitalism, and only the mad were truly sane and thus should not be institutionalized...well, you get the general drift.

But unfortunately, it has resulted not only in millions of “homeless” (aka, mentally ill) filling our streets, but mass killings everywhere. And that’s the problem. The mentally ill can kill with anything because they’re very determined - because they’re crazy.

[Georgia Girl 2]

Mr. GG2 just commented that if it was his kid he would have gone over there and taken the guns away from him and had a real life talk about serious psychiastric counseling.

[Boowhoknew]

Every day, in America, there are dozen, perhaps hundreds killed by gunfire. These are not the focus of the people who CARE. They are victims of a drive by shooting, or innocents caught in the line of fire when turf wars erupt, perceived disrespect retribution, or robbery, as what happened in my town in the very recent past. Yet these caring individuals don't mark these as victims because the shooter is more than likely using a illegally obtained gun, and there is no nationwide call to disarm the criminal.
I guess I am saying the intellectual at the D Beast is using the tragedy to drive a agenda, which can only be established by outlawing lawful gun owners. At that point, the cities will become very dangerous places to live ( or,even more dangerous).
A 3 year old boy was shot in his father's arms as they lay sleeping in Jackson Mississippi last week. I suppose his dad thought he could protect his son by sleeping with him.The murderer shot into the house for no known reason. The horror and pain of that loss is not lost on me.My neighborhood is plagued with gunfire, that is NOT dealt with. Perhaps Kirsten could come stay in a normal town in a less that affluent neighborhood. Then she could realize the lack of action by police, the directives from the justice department, are all designed to allow a armed semi-civil force, able to follow directions without qualms, to kill anyone when the time is right. And there is NO enforcement of law that would jail the organized illegal gun users that kill every day in this country, without any national press coverage or moral outrage.
And I feel very sad and as much loss as the privileged news service types, who do not live with the daily possibility of being shot. The loss the families of the young victims, whose children once had a future full of possibilities, is tremendous when you think of it. I ache for them as much as I ache for the family of a old man killed at a Grocery store in what used to be the affluent part of town (meridianms) a week ago. He had survived WW2,and a life with personal loss in it in also to die buying flowers for his wife at the hand of a 16 year old punk trying to get his credibility, (let the reader understand). Not the first,in a list of killing in a small town in America. No national outrage for the dozens killed every day in our country.

[maxwellsmart_agent]

Did anybody see any tears in his eyes?

[GrandJediMasterYoda]

You should see his Facebook page, the guy was completely self absorbed, just filled with one photo after another of himself. You have to have a Facebook account though to see it.....

https://www.facebook.com/elliot.rodger.3

[lapsus calami]

 

So we have this guy crying for gun control and totally neglecting his role in this tragedy.

 

That's exactly right - I noticed how fast he threw the blame out so there's got to be stink on him, just how much is yet to be revealed so he's trying to deflect attention off of him onto an inanimate object. Lame, but the political climate is presenting him with a convenient scapegoat. It's gonna be a short respite when the details are dug up and come out.

 

[jocon307]

Yeah, I’m not so sure about that special residence thing. This is the only place I’ve heard that and I skimmed that long daily mail piece and I don’t think it said anything about that.

There was a picture of the building and it looked like an ordinary apartment building.

I’m not saying it’s not true, but as of now I have to class it as unverified.

I too wonder why the videos, etc. were not sufficient. I can understand why the cops would feel they had no grounds to arrest him, but it seems you might take it before a judge and try and get some order for confinement or something.

But, as we are saying, it really is almost impossible to get any legal or medical help for crazy people.

Remember Billie Boggs? She was a crazy, homeless woman living in NYC. I remember seeing her tearful sister and brother in law on TV lamenting that they were unable to get any help to help their sister. Why this actually became a news story I don’t remember. But it was pathetic. The woman’s sister was pretty much living like an animal, she wanted to help her, and society said: no, you can’t help her, she, you and we all must continue to suffer.

Why, because a person who is demonstrably insane thinks it’s OK? Who really are the crazy people in this?

[GOPJ]

NOT ONE SON OF AN NRA MEMBER HAS EVER BEEN A MASS MURDERER.

NOT ONE.

NOT EVER.

[VRWC For Truth]

If his son was armed, he might not be dead. Another worthless gun grabber. Ted Kennedy 1, responsible gun owners 0.

[SgtHooper]

Why don’t you move away from it? What could possibly compel you to stay?

[livius]

It was a regular apartment. Agencies and private institutions rent apartments (I think they get special government perks) as residences for the “homeless,” the supposedly functionally mentally ill, etc. This may be under Section 8, or it may be a special state or local program.

In any case, there’s minimal supervision and the people either work outside or pay their rent from private funds, which is what I would assume he was doing.

I don’t know what program he was in or who got him this room in the apartment. He killed his roommates as well, in this case, three guys with similar problems whom he stabbed to death.

I read somewhere that he was diagnosed as autistic or Aspergers, but this is generally an upper middle class ailment so their advocacy groups have a powerful lobby that prevents people with these disorders from getting into the no-gun databases, which I assume is why the gun dealer sold him the guns. He wasn’t in the databases.

The killer had already done a “citizen’s arrest” on one of his roommates, claiming that the guy had stolen $22 worth of candles from him. I think the roommate had probably just found them and lit them. Strangely enough, the police actually arrested the roommate. The killer apparently was a regular 911 caller, very convincing because nutcases are convincing, and always complaining about neighbors, etc. He was what the cops and EMS call a frequent flier.

Is there no communication? Nobody noticed that he was nuts? The supposed “therapists” didn’t get involved at any point?

I want to know what the organization was, how they were supervising this guy, and what their standards were.

[jocon307]

“I want to know what the organization was, how they were supervising this guy, and what their standards were.”

Me too.

And I’m not sure I think housing 2 or 3 or 4 mentally ill young men together is such a great idea.

Of course, there’s a little speculation there, but if the situation is how I surmise it, well, I’m sorry but that seems kind of dumb.

As it certainly proved in this case as those 3 fellows are murdered by their roommate.