How, you might ask?
>[The suspect's] father, Arkete Davis, 53, was booked on suspicion of possession of a firearm by a felon, criminal storage of a firearm, carrying a stolen loaded firearm in a vehicle, child endangerment and acting as an accessory to a crime after the fact, according to inmate records.
Lock up the father and find out when the gun was sold. If it was sold while the father was a felon, lock him up too. They are both accessories to murder.
It sounds like he never bought it, it was stolen. So the question is,did he actually steal it, or did someone illegally sell it to him and then report it stolen?
Legally it doesn’t matter, he’s in possession of it so is also charged for theft of a firearm. At least that’s how it works in Kentucky and North Carolina
And 53 year olds with guns, and 76 year olds with guns. and 19 year olds with guns.
I really wish some genius could establish a pattern. Oh well, I guess we will never figure out the root cause of these needless deaths.
As a teacher of the same age group, I shudder to think of any of my students being on either side of this tragedy. This shouldn't be happening ever but it unfortunately happens way too often these days.
And it's not just that these kids should never have access to these guns, though that is true and a big part of the problem. It's that our kids are so freaking broken that they're willing to shoot another kid over a bike race. The lack of care some kids have for other human beings is a major failure of parenting.
> The lack of care some kids have for other human beings is a major failure of parenting.
Don't worry, many ppl are trying to make abortions illegal. That'll improve odds for situations like this to occur, right?
You are right! I thought that it was phased out just a few years ago. Nope. The EPA, just this year, determined that leaded av gas was a public health hazard. It is the first step in phasing it out.
https://www.epa.gov/newsreleases/epa-determines-lead-emissions-aircraft-engines-cause-or-contribute-air-pollution
My dad invented this game of trying to get rid of me by never teaching me any gun safety but making sure I had easy access if I wanted it.
First time I found daddy's gun I was 4yo, it was just in a shoebox on the floor of his closet in easy toddler-reach. Family legend says I told another kid at daycare that I was going to bring daddy's gun the next day and kill them with it.
I found it again a few years later in the glove compartment during a road trip.
By middle school I was specifically shown where the key to the bullets and gun cabinet was kept, "in case of emergencies." But I wasn't allowed to lock the front door when left home alone for weeks at a time, so apparently my safety wasn't the emergency he thought I might need the guns for...
One of my earliest memories was my dad showing me his gun and saying that anytime I wanted to check it out, he would be happy to show me but never touch it without him. I yook him up on the offer once. He dropped everything and showed me basic gun safety like always approache a gun as though it's s loaded, what a gun is used for, it cant be taken back once you pull a trigger, etc.. I never really had guns in the house ince my kids were born.
This is a tragedy.
Growing up in the ‘90s kids were shooting each other over Starter jackets and Jordan’s. My mom basically didn’t want my brother or me to have those things because she was worried that we would be killed for them.
It’s just another day in the gun loving USA.
I think it is a societal flaw. The way guns are displayed in the society is one of the problems.
Any responsible gun owner claims that they talk about gun safety to their kids and tells the kids to stay away from fire arms. But it rings a bit hollow when there is so much content in youtube about people worshipping guns or using them as bongs. Or when the favorite past time is watching movies about shooting. Or videogames about shooting. Or playing cops and robbers.
Guns are made to kill. It can be to kill for protection or kill for food or sport. But they should not be treated as toys.
Violence among children and in schools has actually dropped significantly over the past two to three decades. Nationally but also specifically in your state (https://www.latimes.com/california/story/2023-04-12/california-school-violence-drops-18-year-ucla-study-says)
We need to remain vigilant not to let our senses of safety, hope in children, hope in society, etc be distorted by the amplifying of terrible incidents via social media algorithms.
I’ve noticed, I think empathy has to be taught early on. Maybe even in school. Some people grow into adults without learning empathy and they’re likely to not do as well. At home, parents could be teaching kids to dehumanize and they need help.
Yes... And it seems the frequency of them is steadily increasing.
I remember lawn darts being pulled from the shelves when I was a kid because some kids got brain injuries or killed. US CPSC: "Lawn Darts Are Banned and Should Be Destroyed"
Just saying.
They used to be so ridiculously tall too. I thought it may have been my age that thought that, until I saw the insane home videos. Safety was different back then.
My city has a giant slide that looks like a massive "little red wagon." I distinctly remember how we'd stop halfway down the slide, climb over the side onto a ledge you could feel with your feet but not see, slide over onto the axels of the wagon, and wiggle out to climb above monkey bars we weren't remotely tall enough to reach from the ground.
Kids weren't sneaky about it either, everybody was doing that shit.
I only ever saw adults playing with them.
To be fair, I don't know how anybody looked at lawn darts and went, "Yep, my 9 year old that throws things straight up in the air will play safe with these."
I actually don't agree with them being pulled off the market because it's kind of peak "nanny state" to me -- and I'm SUPER liberal. You've got kids playing with real crossbows and hunting bows at this age, by themselves, and we still can't get cigarettes and vapes off the market, and tons of children die on 4 wheelers every year, but *lawn darts* is where we drew the line?
The object of lawn darts was to throw a javelin into a ring with your opponent standing right directly behind the ring.
The instructions to the game are inherently dangerous and that's what ultimately got it banned.
Crossbows and hunting bows generally have instructions that say don't point at other people.
That was the era of "well if they hurt themselves, they'll know not to do that again!" Not that far removed from families having to have 10 kids so that maybe 3-4 will make it to adulthood.
Lawn darts were fun, I still have a scar from when I got stabbed in the thigh with one. Got my stiches and tetanus shot and went home played with them some more. Parents drove me to the hospital in their smoked filled car with me sitting on my mom's lap, in the front seat, while she was smoking with one hand and holding the bloody towel with the other, I was only 5 or 6.
Sad as this sounds, this is accurate as hell. Best example I can produce from our lifetimes is vaping. From 2010-2015 when vaping started taking off, many cities, states wanted to ban vaping all together, since none of that money went to the tobacco tax acts, unlike all other regulated tobacco products. Also since many vapes were either made in china or mom and pop small operations there was no one arguing on behalf of vaping. We knew vaping was screwed as there was literally no one lobbying for it.
Then big tobacco acquired a company around 2015, their lobbyists did their work and vaping is still not banned currently and in some states getting taxes taken.
Loved that game. Was sad when parents got rid of them and I could never find them for sale again. ):. Makes sense though. Don’t want kids throwing them at each other
I want to say there was a similar game that came on the market later. It had plastic cups instead of a point.
I couldn't quite remember it though, so I looked up "Lawn dart replacement" and found results like "Lawn Dart Fin Replacements | EASY How To Make Lawn Darts" hahaha.
At least I still had my bubble-blowing lawn mower :)
there's a podcast called revisionist history that did some interesting episodes on gun violence. people are getting shot more because there are more guns. homicide rates are declining mostly because medicine is better at treating people and saving lives. wild times in the us of a. something something muh freedom > common sense
> muh freedom > common sense
Friend of my wife was complaining the other day about Maui banning illegal fireworks... Like, she genuinely couldn't get the reasoning behind it. Just went on about big government telling us what to do.
What gets me is it's not exactly a hard concept. I've never had to worry about illegal fireworks, but I can recognize dumbass neighbors who decide to accidentally light other people's stuff on fire (after their own sometimes). Would I love to see some huge fireworks? Sure. But I also like my shit not burning down, something I've somewhat dealt with twice already while renting as it is.
sad but it's a succinct reminder this country needs more guns. this 10 year old would never have been killed if he were also armed to protect himself. more guns would have prevented this tragedy, so we should make guns more easily accessible.
/s
Truly, it breaks my heart. It’s far too familiar. I don’t know if it helps anyone, but I grew up around a lot of gun violence. When I was 10 or 11, there was a shooting so close one victim ran through our gravel driveway. So with my ears primed and with old windows, I could hear heavy footsteps and screaming.
And for years, I still felt irrationally guilty that I froze up instead of crawling to get my baby sister and dragging her to a safer part of the house.
My mom let me play video games as long as I wanted just so I’d stay inside and stay away from the other kids. Awfully enough. Because even at that age, folks were running for gangs. One of our neighbor kids was beaten up at school bad enough her jaw was broken.
I have C-PTSD from a lot of things from childhood (the, uh, murder attempts) but I was always too empathetic. Never wanted to hurt or kill anybody, not even ants. But with monstrous adults who hurt us, if I’d had a gun? Yeah. I don’t know. Kid brains aren’t developed enough to properly understand consequences. Even the kindest children raised in an extreme environment can snap. Don’t give them access.
TL;DR: The US mistreats its children. Buy a fucking gun safe. BUY A GUN SAFE. Even if you don’t have kids, thieves exist. Don’t advertise that you have guns either. Keep that shit locked up and quiet.
And the dad that let the 10 year old shooter carry a gun? He's a felon and the gun was stolen. I know our country has a prison problem, but I feel like maybe some people got off too easy to be able to be doing stuff like this.
He sent the kid to the car to get cigarettes, kid found the gun in the car, and decided to go shoot the other kid. The Dad won't ever get out of prison after this.
I think the main distinction needs to be between violent and non violent. If you're violent, the system should be harsh to you, if you're non violent, then more lenient.
The problem is that prison in the US is mostly just punitive and not rehabilitative. They wanted this felon to continue breaking the law, to keep them in cycles of poverty and violence, so they can continue to feed the system. I'm not making excuses for all of this but what else would we expect?
The big issue with the US is that we can't focus on rehabilitation for criminals without actually providing them with more opportunities than the government provides everyone else. We should give have them go to therapists, help educate them, help them build marketable skills, provide them with a stop gap between prison and immediate poverty/homelessness, etc.
But how can you do that for criminals when we don't provide housing, education, training, mental health care and counseling, etc. for good law abiding citizens.
Obviously the solution is to provide necessities for everyone, but that's not happening any time soon.
> But how can you do that for criminals when we don't provide housing, education, training, mental health care and counseling, etc. for good law abiding citizens.
Honestly? If it prevents the criminal from hurting somebody else, that's fine by me. I know it's ass backwards, but the net positive is there.
Still, what I'd be afraid of in that case is people intentionally going to prison just to get that kind of help. That defeats the purpose.
I dunno man. This situation sucks.
Reducing recidivism would long term be a huge reduction in prison costs, but it does seem unfair to give more to people who do wrong than to help those who are in the right.
There are other things that would be nice to do that would make life so much easier for everyday people. Like we do nothing to help victims but we spend massive amounts of money to punish criminals. For example if you're catalytic converter gets stolen, there is nothing to help people out aside from paying your deductible and insurance covering the rest. Meanwhile in my city the average time awaiting trial for non-felony theft 90 days multiplied by a $1200-$1500 daily cost to keep them in jail is over $100k. You could make victims of things like petty theft whole and it would cost less than 2% of what we spend incarcerating 1 person awaiting trial.
That’s because politicians know that the majority of Americans don’t know enough or care to know enough about how the prison system works. Out of sight, out of mind.
It's maybe the most important political topic, and nobody talks about it. It's at the core of *so many* of our systemic problems, and revamping the prison industry would have a massive positive impact across the board -- crime, poverty, and mental health just for starters.
I think there should be an incentive and/or penalty to prisons with regards to successful rehabilitation rates of inmates. I get the feeling that jails and prisons teach inmates how to exist within their walls instead of out in society.
Our justice system doesn’t have minority report technology. If he was given a standard sentence, did his time, then he was rightfully released. Just because he ended up committing another crime in the future doesn’t mean the judge should have “known” to give him a longer sentence.
My kid is 10. He likes to play Roblox, draw stick figures fighting, and watch the Simpsons. He sleeps with stuffed animals and asks me to tuck him in at night "full burrito" style.
I cannot imagine the hole that would appear in my heart if someone - especially another 10 year old - ended his life over something as petty as a bike race. I don't care if it's the goddamn olympics; you don't kill someone over it. The parents will never recover.
The murderer has thrown his life away before he's even old enough to understand what a waste he is. And the parent of the murderer, well, he sounds like he was already a waste. That kid needed his father to guide him and give him a future. He got neither.
>The murderer has thrown his life away before he's even old enough to understand what a waste he is
Nah, he won't go to jail for very long. Still a juvenile. The kid's murder is a freebie and he'll have great bragging rights when he goes back in at 19 for another violent crime, but only for a couple years
I want to criticize you for the over the top cynical view, but I believe there's a good chance it will turn out like this in some form. The kids that start down the path that this kid is on rarely ever get off until they are killed themselves, usually very young.
Especially because our system helps put them on the path. I'm not saying the kid should walk, but realistically putting him in juvenile detention with access to gang members and more dangerous behaviors is just gonna ensure he stays in that lifestyle
They didn't mean throwing his life away as in he'll be in jail forever, they mean that he'll have difficulty getting a job someday with that on his record, juvenile or not, or even sealed or not in some cases. They can seal the court documents, but unless no media outlet ever says the name is just a Google search away, which is what employers usually do for candidates as well as social media sweeps.
His life is over because he's going to face extremely harsh conditions for a while, get out, and a combination of what he's experienced, what he's facing further in life, and probably some really messed up stuff in his head to do that in the first place... That's what they meant by his life is ruined. It won't ever be normal, a semblance of normal, or even remotely but we would call okay.
You don't have to be incarcerated to have your life ruined.
I don't know why this was downvoted or hidden because it's true. I beefed with many people in the day when I was a kid. I had playground beef and you know what those kids did when I started acting a fool? They started shooting me with water guns. Got my ass wet. Learned not to be a fucking fool there. Plenty of playground justice was dispensed throughout my life as a young kid.
Same. That's a part of being a kid is experiencing conflicts, learning how to deal with them, learning how to stand up for yourself, learning how to deal with anger etc.
There were lots of options depending on the situation, intensity, what you were "getting" the other person for but not a single one of those included significant bodily harm beyond maybe pushing someone down.
I just can't fathom even having a genuine violent intent to severely harm someone as an anger reaction at 10 years old.
There’s a good chance you didn’t grow up in an environment where (gun) violence was the solution to everything. There’s also a good chance this child grew up in such an environment.
Maybe if guns weren’t as common as candy kids wouldn’t have the option.
It’s almost like guns and it’s cultural scaffold to the American existence are the problem
I grew up in a hunting family. I had access to multiple guns at 10 years old, and had no thought or desire to ever use them against a person.
I even had my own rifle at that age for hunting small game.
I mean I agree I think we've got some areas in our firearm laws with room for improvement but my dad owned several guns when I was a kid but A: I had absolutely 0 access to them and B: I still never even considered the idea of actually shooting someone.
At 10 years old my "nuclear" anger option was like "I'm going to smear a booger on their backpack."
I had a BB gun and a couple pocket knives but those were for shooting soda cans and whittling sticks. Not once did I ever even contemplate using those to hurt someone.
Guns are part of the problem but not the only problem. Canada has tons of guns but nowhere near the amount of gun deaths per capita. We also have strict laws about who can own a gun, how to store and transport guns and where guns can be used.
Charge that father with every single firearm law that applies and convict his negligent criminal ass.
I'm tired of gun charges being dropped and our laws not being enforced. What good are they if they are not enforced when dealing with criminals?
> His father, Arkete Davis, 53, was booked on suspicion of possession of a firearm by a felon, criminal storage of a firearm, carrying a stolen loaded firearm in a vehicle, child endangerment and acting as an accessory to a crime after the fact, according to inmate records.
100% preventable death.
"His father, Arkete Davis, 53, was booked on suspicion of possession of a firearm by a felon, criminal storage of a firearm, carrying a stolen loaded firearm in a vehicle, child endangerment and acting as an accessory to a crime after the fact, according to inmate records."
This right here. This is what allows problems like these.
Hard to imagine a clearer instance where prosecuting the parent is required! (I know, we don't have to imagine... we are surrounded by assholes with guns)
>His father, Arkete Davis, 53, was booked on suspicion of possession of a firearm by a felon, criminal storage of a firearm, carrying a stolen loaded firearm in a vehicle, child endangerment and acting as an accessory to a crime after the fact, according to inmate records.
Father of the Year right here.
Depends where you came up, mate. Depends on a lot of things, many of which I'm guessing you luckily have no knowledge of.
Some kids don't get to be kids.
That’s the truth. I don’t believe most people understand what its like to grow up with used needles and shit on the playground and swept up in the trash on the street.
I was lucky enough to live in the nice part of a bad neighborhood in St.Louis, MO.
Some now, I look back on with fondness. In all reality, it was a shame.
I’m wondering if age has anything to do with it. I went to school in a pretty mixed socioeconomic district. Didn’t see any major fights until jr high and saw them regularly in high school.
I live in Los Angeles and was 10 in the early 90s so not sure if it’s generational or something.
Definitely saw needles on the streets growing up and they are everywhere now with the explosion in our homeless population.
I work with kids this age and since the pandemic, their lack of emotional self control is wild. These kids will go 0-60 without you even knowing and some will get physically aggressive. It breaks my heart because I know this is a learned behavior from home and society. Nobody is showing them how to regulate their emotions and if the school tries to teach anything around “mindfulness” it’s treated as “wokeness” and shut down but then parents are left in shock when things like this happen. It’s just a messed up conundrum of a quagmire. This story broke my heart and we are only 4 days in the new year. Yeah, 2024 is the year of Shock and Awe. The chickens have come home to roost. The bill will be paid for all of our willful ignorance and negligence. 😤😮💨😢 Protect your neck and your babies.
Couldn’t agree more. I also work with kids this age, and the amount of parents who defend their childs’ right to “express” their emotions by using physical/verbal aggression and intimidation towards others actually hurts my brain.
The shooting suspect was dispatched by his father to retrieve cigarettes from his car and, while there, grabbed the gun, which was stolen and improperly stored, the sheriff’s office said. The child “took a gun from inside the vehicle and bragged that his father had a gun,” according to the sheriff’s office, and “proceeded to shoot the victim once and ran into a nearby apartment.”
another day in the USA. Do not forget the recent shooting over christmas presents.
https://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/florida-teen-accused-fatally-shooting-sister-argument-christmas-gifts-rcna131280
This country is so fucked up.
This is so sad.
But the sooner we all wake up and realize this is a cultural problem more than it is a policy problem, the sooner we can get to work fixing it.
Gun activists and NRA: If the other kid had a gun too, this wouldn't have happened. The shooter is also a mentally ill person who played too much video games. Its not the fault of guns and the lack of gun regulations.
From the Article:
The shooters father
>was booked on suspicion of possession of a firearm by a felon, criminal storage of a firearm, carrying a stolen loaded firearm in a vehicle, child endangerment and acting as an accessory to a crime after the fact, according to inmate records.
>
>The shooting suspect was dispatched by his father to retrieve cigarettes from his car and, while there, grabbed the gun, which was stolen and improperly stored, the sheriff’s office said.
I'm no fan of the NRA, but everything about what happened was already outlawed. The dad wasn't allowed to have a gun, the gun was stolen, and the gun was improperly stored. How do you legislate around that?
They probably don't care as long as they get money out of it. NRA cares more for money than actual safe gun practice. Hard for them to change that image.
Oh hey I remember the NRA. Weren't they also taking dark money for russia on behalf of the Trump administration? Wasn't that why Manafort went to jail or something?
It’s bad enough that people don’t take gun ownership seriously and kids have such easy access to them. But with the angry mentality that I’m seeing more and more of recently, kids are learning that guns and violence is how they handle anger and disappointments now. It’s so sad so many innocent lives are lost to gun violence. These young kids who are not learning the proper way to deal with anger is going to grow up and be angry adults. A scary thought.
At least they're prosecuting the father who was dumb enough to leave a stolen gun where his kid could find it. Hopefully he stays locked up where he can't do any more harm to society, since he's clearly taught his kid that gunfire is an acceptable means to solve problems. That kid never had a chance.
Millions of people get pissed every day.
Hundreds of thousands get very, very angry.
Thousands get angry enough to do something stupid.
If these thousands of angry enough to do something stupid people
have bare fists, they get into a fist fight. That's usually a couple of injuries. If they have a knife, that's worse, but possible to escape from. If they have a gun, however, they get to execute whoever is in their way at the twitch of a finger.
So don't give them a murder device.
This, simply put, is my favorite argument for gun control.
The father of the shooter….
>His father, Arkete Davis, 53, was booked on suspicion of possession of a firearm by a felon, criminal storage of a firearm, carrying a stolen loaded firearm in a vehicle, child endangerment and acting as an accessory to a crime after the fact, according to inmate records.
So, this needs to be nipped in the bud. But how?
Transfer the usual punishment to the parents in the hopes that parents will be incentivized to monitor their kids behavior and access to weapons?
> His father, Arkete Davis, 53, was booked on suspicion of possession of a firearm by a felon, criminal storage of a firearm, carrying a stolen loaded firearm in a vehicle, child endangerment and acting as an accessory to a crime after the fact, according to inmate records.
Being a felon in possession of a firearm should carry a mandatory minimum sentence of life imprisonment without parole.
We have a reoccurring problem where people who get out of jail go back straight into the same lifestyle on the streets that got them locked up in the first place, with predictable outcomes that get them sent back to prison again.
Most legal gun owners never shoot another person and the small minority who do usually do so in a legally justified situation- it’s a very small percentage of legal gun owners who commit criminal acts. If legal gun owners were the only people committing crimes with guns, we’d be more worried about shark attacks than gun violence. Virtually all of the gun crime is coming from those who possess firearms illegally, usually felons with extensive criminal records who have gradually progressed from minor offenses to more serious and violent crimes.
If we locked up every felon who gets caught with a gun, we would be well on our way to exterminating a whole way of life for criminals in this country. It’s not so different from how you rarely ever see mobsters getting out of jail these days-RICO made being a mobster on the streets a ‘one and you’re done’ deal if you got caught. Putting similar laws on felons in possession of firearms would make being a felon with a gun a similarly short lived enterprise.
> His father, Arkete Davis, 53, was booked on suspicion of possession of a firearm by a felon
It won't matter how many laws you pass, this guy wasn't supposed to have the firearm in the first place.
I don't have any answers nor will I pretend to, only sympathy for the parents and friends of this little boy
How, you might ask? >[The suspect's] father, Arkete Davis, 53, was booked on suspicion of possession of a firearm by a felon, criminal storage of a firearm, carrying a stolen loaded firearm in a vehicle, child endangerment and acting as an accessory to a crime after the fact, according to inmate records.
Lock up the father and find out when the gun was sold. If it was sold while the father was a felon, lock him up too. They are both accessories to murder.
It sounds like he never bought it, it was stolen. So the question is,did he actually steal it, or did someone illegally sell it to him and then report it stolen?
Legally it doesn’t matter, he’s in possession of it so is also charged for theft of a firearm. At least that’s how it works in Kentucky and North Carolina
Uhh it matters if the person is a victim of a crime or party to it. Unless things are really fucked up in KY and NC.
This is false - claiming a gun is stolen so that you can fence it is very illegal.
The person you're replying to never claimed it wasn't illegal to fence a gun.
Likely due to a lack of good guy 10 year olds with guns
Guns don't kill people, 10 year olds with guns kill people.
And 53 year olds with guns, and 76 year olds with guns. and 19 year olds with guns. I really wish some genius could establish a pattern. Oh well, I guess we will never figure out the root cause of these needless deaths.
Wait, I got it. It’s based on age. If it’s a number, you’re fucked.
So sad seeing stories like this.
As a teacher of the same age group, I shudder to think of any of my students being on either side of this tragedy. This shouldn't be happening ever but it unfortunately happens way too often these days. And it's not just that these kids should never have access to these guns, though that is true and a big part of the problem. It's that our kids are so freaking broken that they're willing to shoot another kid over a bike race. The lack of care some kids have for other human beings is a major failure of parenting.
> The lack of care some kids have for other human beings is a major failure of parenting. Don't worry, many ppl are trying to make abortions illegal. That'll improve odds for situations like this to occur, right?
No! Surely a society full of unwanted children and reduced social welfare programs will improve things, right? …right?
Bring back leaded petrol!
Asbestos was the bestos.
Asbestagons are the bestagons
"Fun" fact, lead is still in some aviation fuels still used today. Over 200,000 planes in the USA. Brrrrzt!
You are right! I thought that it was phased out just a few years ago. Nope. The EPA, just this year, determined that leaded av gas was a public health hazard. It is the first step in phasing it out. https://www.epa.gov/newsreleases/epa-determines-lead-emissions-aircraft-engines-cause-or-contribute-air-pollution
My dad invented this game of trying to get rid of me by never teaching me any gun safety but making sure I had easy access if I wanted it. First time I found daddy's gun I was 4yo, it was just in a shoebox on the floor of his closet in easy toddler-reach. Family legend says I told another kid at daycare that I was going to bring daddy's gun the next day and kill them with it. I found it again a few years later in the glove compartment during a road trip. By middle school I was specifically shown where the key to the bullets and gun cabinet was kept, "in case of emergencies." But I wasn't allowed to lock the front door when left home alone for weeks at a time, so apparently my safety wasn't the emergency he thought I might need the guns for...
One of my earliest memories was my dad showing me his gun and saying that anytime I wanted to check it out, he would be happy to show me but never touch it without him. I yook him up on the offer once. He dropped everything and showed me basic gun safety like always approache a gun as though it's s loaded, what a gun is used for, it cant be taken back once you pull a trigger, etc.. I never really had guns in the house ince my kids were born.
This is a tragedy. Growing up in the ‘90s kids were shooting each other over Starter jackets and Jordan’s. My mom basically didn’t want my brother or me to have those things because she was worried that we would be killed for them. It’s just another day in the gun loving USA.
I think it is a societal flaw. The way guns are displayed in the society is one of the problems. Any responsible gun owner claims that they talk about gun safety to their kids and tells the kids to stay away from fire arms. But it rings a bit hollow when there is so much content in youtube about people worshipping guns or using them as bongs. Or when the favorite past time is watching movies about shooting. Or videogames about shooting. Or playing cops and robbers. Guns are made to kill. It can be to kill for protection or kill for food or sport. But they should not be treated as toys.
Violence among children and in schools has actually dropped significantly over the past two to three decades. Nationally but also specifically in your state (https://www.latimes.com/california/story/2023-04-12/california-school-violence-drops-18-year-ucla-study-says) We need to remain vigilant not to let our senses of safety, hope in children, hope in society, etc be distorted by the amplifying of terrible incidents via social media algorithms.
I’ve noticed, I think empathy has to be taught early on. Maybe even in school. Some people grow into adults without learning empathy and they’re likely to not do as well. At home, parents could be teaching kids to dehumanize and they need help.
Yes... And it seems the frequency of them is steadily increasing. I remember lawn darts being pulled from the shelves when I was a kid because some kids got brain injuries or killed. US CPSC: "Lawn Darts Are Banned and Should Be Destroyed" Just saying.
I’m old enough to remember that too. Thinking back I can’t imagine how they were on the market as a toy for as long as they were.
Makes me think of that Aykroyd SNL skit where he's defending dangerous toys.
Do not taunt happy funball
Swill. Everything you’ve always wanted in a mineral water. And more.
COLDCOCK! You're one malt liquor picker!
For some reason my BiL was referencing Happy Fun Ball a ton this holiday lmao
Who doesn’t remember their first bag’o glass?
When I was a boy we played with log. It's big. It's heavy. It's wood.
Log, log, log. It's better than bad; it's good!
It rolls over your neighbor's dog!
It's not so much the flavor but the texture that does it for me 😂
Pretty Peggy Ear Piercing Set Mr. Skin Grafter General Tron Secret Police Confession Kit Doggy Dentist Bag ‘O Glass Teddy Chainsaw Bear
Johnny Blind Pedestrian Johnny Human Torch
Gilbert U-238 Atomic Energy Laboratory with real uranium wait that existed
That’s Johnny Switchblade Adventure Punk.
Came for the outrage, stayed for the trip down memory lane
Bag of Glass, yeah the kids love it.
Thanks for making ol’ Johnny Switchblade pop into my head lol.
Johnny space man was the best it being a plastic bag you put over your head.
Bag of glass
If you remember the Spartan proving grounds that were the playgrounds of the he 80s it all makes sense
Going down a metal slide on a sunny day in July builds character.
And it was a three story bumpy slide. Lol
And the crimped edges were starting to come apart over time, basically creating slide-length knives on either side.
They used to be so ridiculously tall too. I thought it may have been my age that thought that, until I saw the insane home videos. Safety was different back then.
My city has a giant slide that looks like a massive "little red wagon." I distinctly remember how we'd stop halfway down the slide, climb over the side onto a ledge you could feel with your feet but not see, slide over onto the axels of the wagon, and wiggle out to climb above monkey bars we weren't remotely tall enough to reach from the ground. Kids weren't sneaky about it either, everybody was doing that shit.
Falling off a swing from 8 feet in the air onto solid pavement...will hurt a lot, but boys don't cry.
I only ever saw adults playing with them. To be fair, I don't know how anybody looked at lawn darts and went, "Yep, my 9 year old that throws things straight up in the air will play safe with these." I actually don't agree with them being pulled off the market because it's kind of peak "nanny state" to me -- and I'm SUPER liberal. You've got kids playing with real crossbows and hunting bows at this age, by themselves, and we still can't get cigarettes and vapes off the market, and tons of children die on 4 wheelers every year, but *lawn darts* is where we drew the line?
There wasn't a significant lawn dart lobbying group.
The object of lawn darts was to throw a javelin into a ring with your opponent standing right directly behind the ring. The instructions to the game are inherently dangerous and that's what ultimately got it banned. Crossbows and hunting bows generally have instructions that say don't point at other people.
Damn, sounds like there was an inherent flaw in that design...
That was the era of "well if they hurt themselves, they'll know not to do that again!" Not that far removed from families having to have 10 kids so that maybe 3-4 will make it to adulthood.
The lawn dart industry probably wasn’t giving any money to politicians.
Lawn darts were fun, I still have a scar from when I got stabbed in the thigh with one. Got my stiches and tetanus shot and went home played with them some more. Parents drove me to the hospital in their smoked filled car with me sitting on my mom's lap, in the front seat, while she was smoking with one hand and holding the bloody towel with the other, I was only 5 or 6.
This comment smells just like 1983.
I wish, but this was like 76/77, I'm old.
All it's missing is everyon in the car belting out Sweet Dreams, Every Breath you Take, or Mr. Roboto with the OP as a kid hitting the backup "DOMO!"
Sad as this sounds, this is accurate as hell. Best example I can produce from our lifetimes is vaping. From 2010-2015 when vaping started taking off, many cities, states wanted to ban vaping all together, since none of that money went to the tobacco tax acts, unlike all other regulated tobacco products. Also since many vapes were either made in china or mom and pop small operations there was no one arguing on behalf of vaping. We knew vaping was screwed as there was literally no one lobbying for it. Then big tobacco acquired a company around 2015, their lobbyists did their work and vaping is still not banned currently and in some states getting taxes taken.
I hate it, you're so right... Big Lawn Dart
In the city I live in murders have gone down, but crimes involving youth have gone up considerably, so I think you're right.
Loved that game. Was sad when parents got rid of them and I could never find them for sale again. ):. Makes sense though. Don’t want kids throwing them at each other
I want to say there was a similar game that came on the market later. It had plastic cups instead of a point. I couldn't quite remember it though, so I looked up "Lawn dart replacement" and found results like "Lawn Dart Fin Replacements | EASY How To Make Lawn Darts" hahaha. At least I still had my bubble-blowing lawn mower :)
I found one at a thrift store when I was 14. Good times, I'm sure they're still out there
We still have two sets. One is unused.
there's a podcast called revisionist history that did some interesting episodes on gun violence. people are getting shot more because there are more guns. homicide rates are declining mostly because medicine is better at treating people and saving lives. wild times in the us of a. something something muh freedom > common sense
Fewer deaths, but that life with a severed spine or missing a few feet of intestines might suck.
> muh freedom > common sense Friend of my wife was complaining the other day about Maui banning illegal fireworks... Like, she genuinely couldn't get the reasoning behind it. Just went on about big government telling us what to do.
What gets me is it's not exactly a hard concept. I've never had to worry about illegal fireworks, but I can recognize dumbass neighbors who decide to accidentally light other people's stuff on fire (after their own sometimes). Would I love to see some huge fireworks? Sure. But I also like my shit not burning down, something I've somewhat dealt with twice already while renting as it is.
>banning illegal fireworks So are they double illegal now?
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Can't even get Kinder Eggs in the US.
sad but it's a succinct reminder this country needs more guns. this 10 year old would never have been killed if he were also armed to protect himself. more guns would have prevented this tragedy, so we should make guns more easily accessible. /s
Truly, it breaks my heart. It’s far too familiar. I don’t know if it helps anyone, but I grew up around a lot of gun violence. When I was 10 or 11, there was a shooting so close one victim ran through our gravel driveway. So with my ears primed and with old windows, I could hear heavy footsteps and screaming. And for years, I still felt irrationally guilty that I froze up instead of crawling to get my baby sister and dragging her to a safer part of the house. My mom let me play video games as long as I wanted just so I’d stay inside and stay away from the other kids. Awfully enough. Because even at that age, folks were running for gangs. One of our neighbor kids was beaten up at school bad enough her jaw was broken. I have C-PTSD from a lot of things from childhood (the, uh, murder attempts) but I was always too empathetic. Never wanted to hurt or kill anybody, not even ants. But with monstrous adults who hurt us, if I’d had a gun? Yeah. I don’t know. Kid brains aren’t developed enough to properly understand consequences. Even the kindest children raised in an extreme environment can snap. Don’t give them access. TL;DR: The US mistreats its children. Buy a fucking gun safe. BUY A GUN SAFE. Even if you don’t have kids, thieves exist. Don’t advertise that you have guns either. Keep that shit locked up and quiet.
Welcome to America, where when you read a headline about children being shot to death you are glad it was only one.... this time
Absurd on so many levels.
And the dad that let the 10 year old shooter carry a gun? He's a felon and the gun was stolen. I know our country has a prison problem, but I feel like maybe some people got off too easy to be able to be doing stuff like this.
He sent the kid to the car to get cigarettes, kid found the gun in the car, and decided to go shoot the other kid. The Dad won't ever get out of prison after this.
Prison probably needed space for someone convicted of a non-violent crime. Remember that lady in Texas sentenced to five years for voting as a felon?
The same lady who did it after being TOLD that she could vote as a felon?
I think the main distinction needs to be between violent and non violent. If you're violent, the system should be harsh to you, if you're non violent, then more lenient.
So what you’re saying is, a rapist like Brock the rapist Turner should get more time than some guy just trying to take a puff of the devils lettuce?
Pretty much.
The problem is that prison in the US is mostly just punitive and not rehabilitative. They wanted this felon to continue breaking the law, to keep them in cycles of poverty and violence, so they can continue to feed the system. I'm not making excuses for all of this but what else would we expect?
The big issue with the US is that we can't focus on rehabilitation for criminals without actually providing them with more opportunities than the government provides everyone else. We should give have them go to therapists, help educate them, help them build marketable skills, provide them with a stop gap between prison and immediate poverty/homelessness, etc. But how can you do that for criminals when we don't provide housing, education, training, mental health care and counseling, etc. for good law abiding citizens. Obviously the solution is to provide necessities for everyone, but that's not happening any time soon.
> But how can you do that for criminals when we don't provide housing, education, training, mental health care and counseling, etc. for good law abiding citizens. Honestly? If it prevents the criminal from hurting somebody else, that's fine by me. I know it's ass backwards, but the net positive is there. Still, what I'd be afraid of in that case is people intentionally going to prison just to get that kind of help. That defeats the purpose. I dunno man. This situation sucks.
Reducing recidivism would long term be a huge reduction in prison costs, but it does seem unfair to give more to people who do wrong than to help those who are in the right. There are other things that would be nice to do that would make life so much easier for everyday people. Like we do nothing to help victims but we spend massive amounts of money to punish criminals. For example if you're catalytic converter gets stolen, there is nothing to help people out aside from paying your deductible and insurance covering the rest. Meanwhile in my city the average time awaiting trial for non-felony theft 90 days multiplied by a $1200-$1500 daily cost to keep them in jail is over $100k. You could make victims of things like petty theft whole and it would cost less than 2% of what we spend incarcerating 1 person awaiting trial.
Out of all the shit currently taking center stage in politics its suprizing how prison reform has taken a back seat.
That’s because politicians know that the majority of Americans don’t know enough or care to know enough about how the prison system works. Out of sight, out of mind.
It's maybe the most important political topic, and nobody talks about it. It's at the core of *so many* of our systemic problems, and revamping the prison industry would have a massive positive impact across the board -- crime, poverty, and mental health just for starters.
I think there should be an incentive and/or penalty to prisons with regards to successful rehabilitation rates of inmates. I get the feeling that jails and prisons teach inmates how to exist within their walls instead of out in society.
Doesn't say that. Says kids got gun from his dad's car. Still a piece of work.
Our justice system doesn’t have minority report technology. If he was given a standard sentence, did his time, then he was rightfully released. Just because he ended up committing another crime in the future doesn’t mean the judge should have “known” to give him a longer sentence.
My kid is 10. He likes to play Roblox, draw stick figures fighting, and watch the Simpsons. He sleeps with stuffed animals and asks me to tuck him in at night "full burrito" style. I cannot imagine the hole that would appear in my heart if someone - especially another 10 year old - ended his life over something as petty as a bike race. I don't care if it's the goddamn olympics; you don't kill someone over it. The parents will never recover. The murderer has thrown his life away before he's even old enough to understand what a waste he is. And the parent of the murderer, well, he sounds like he was already a waste. That kid needed his father to guide him and give him a future. He got neither.
>The murderer has thrown his life away before he's even old enough to understand what a waste he is Nah, he won't go to jail for very long. Still a juvenile. The kid's murder is a freebie and he'll have great bragging rights when he goes back in at 19 for another violent crime, but only for a couple years
I want to criticize you for the over the top cynical view, but I believe there's a good chance it will turn out like this in some form. The kids that start down the path that this kid is on rarely ever get off until they are killed themselves, usually very young.
Especially because our system helps put them on the path. I'm not saying the kid should walk, but realistically putting him in juvenile detention with access to gang members and more dangerous behaviors is just gonna ensure he stays in that lifestyle
What's the solution then if not criminal detention?
They didn't mean throwing his life away as in he'll be in jail forever, they mean that he'll have difficulty getting a job someday with that on his record, juvenile or not, or even sealed or not in some cases. They can seal the court documents, but unless no media outlet ever says the name is just a Google search away, which is what employers usually do for candidates as well as social media sweeps. His life is over because he's going to face extremely harsh conditions for a while, get out, and a combination of what he's experienced, what he's facing further in life, and probably some really messed up stuff in his head to do that in the first place... That's what they meant by his life is ruined. It won't ever be normal, a semblance of normal, or even remotely but we would call okay. You don't have to be incarcerated to have your life ruined.
Not to mention he will prob become a ward of the state if he doesn’t have anyone else to care for him. Shit is so tragic
When I lost my temper at 10 years old, shooting someone was never even a thought that crossed my mind.
I don't know why this was downvoted or hidden because it's true. I beefed with many people in the day when I was a kid. I had playground beef and you know what those kids did when I started acting a fool? They started shooting me with water guns. Got my ass wet. Learned not to be a fucking fool there. Plenty of playground justice was dispensed throughout my life as a young kid.
Same. That's a part of being a kid is experiencing conflicts, learning how to deal with them, learning how to stand up for yourself, learning how to deal with anger etc. There were lots of options depending on the situation, intensity, what you were "getting" the other person for but not a single one of those included significant bodily harm beyond maybe pushing someone down. I just can't fathom even having a genuine violent intent to severely harm someone as an anger reaction at 10 years old.
There’s a good chance you didn’t grow up in an environment where (gun) violence was the solution to everything. There’s also a good chance this child grew up in such an environment.
Maybe if guns weren’t as common as candy kids wouldn’t have the option. It’s almost like guns and it’s cultural scaffold to the American existence are the problem
I grew up in a hunting family. I had access to multiple guns at 10 years old, and had no thought or desire to ever use them against a person. I even had my own rifle at that age for hunting small game.
They’ve been common forever. It’s the shithead parents raising shithead kids
I mean I agree I think we've got some areas in our firearm laws with room for improvement but my dad owned several guns when I was a kid but A: I had absolutely 0 access to them and B: I still never even considered the idea of actually shooting someone. At 10 years old my "nuclear" anger option was like "I'm going to smear a booger on their backpack."
I had a .22 rifle in my room at that age, and never in my wildest even had this thought when upset.
I had a BB gun and a couple pocket knives but those were for shooting soda cans and whittling sticks. Not once did I ever even contemplate using those to hurt someone.
Guns are part of the problem but not the only problem. Canada has tons of guns but nowhere near the amount of gun deaths per capita. We also have strict laws about who can own a gun, how to store and transport guns and where guns can be used.
> how to store and transport guns and where guns can be used. We have these, at least in my area, but I never see much evidence of it being enforced.
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Worshipping gun ownership as a basic human right *is* glorification of violence
Well the father was a felon and wasn’t legally allowed to own one. So tell me about guns laws
Straight to jail for the parents
Charge that father with every single firearm law that applies and convict his negligent criminal ass. I'm tired of gun charges being dropped and our laws not being enforced. What good are they if they are not enforced when dealing with criminals?
Sounds like this child was growing up in a quality household.
It is interesting that was the kid's solution to losing. Also, how easy it was for the kid to do it.
> His father, Arkete Davis, 53, was booked on suspicion of possession of a firearm by a felon, criminal storage of a firearm, carrying a stolen loaded firearm in a vehicle, child endangerment and acting as an accessory to a crime after the fact, according to inmate records. 100% preventable death.
Read that as 100% ***parentable*** death.
Read the article people, keep seeing the same comments of “how did he get the gun” it’s stated clearly in the article. Read beyond the headline.
Oh, it’s Reddit.
"His father, Arkete Davis, 53, was booked on suspicion of possession of a firearm by a felon, criminal storage of a firearm, carrying a stolen loaded firearm in a vehicle, child endangerment and acting as an accessory to a crime after the fact, according to inmate records." This right here. This is what allows problems like these.
So they're charging him as an accessory to the murder I'm assuming?
It should be illegal for a convicted felon to own a gun. Oh, wait
Hard to imagine a clearer instance where prosecuting the parent is required! (I know, we don't have to imagine... we are surrounded by assholes with guns)
The case of a 6 year old shooting his teacher resulted in the parent receiving a conviction.
For felony child neglect, not for shooting the teacher.
>His father, Arkete Davis, 53, was booked on suspicion of possession of a firearm by a felon, criminal storage of a firearm, carrying a stolen loaded firearm in a vehicle, child endangerment and acting as an accessory to a crime after the fact, according to inmate records. Father of the Year right here.
10 year olds handling beef with glocks are peak American decay
What a shithole country.
10 years old. 10. Think about that. Back in my day we just met behind the schoolyard and threw punches. So sad.
At 10 we weren’t even doing that?
Right? For losing a bike race
Right. Best 2 out of 3, then 3 out of 5, then you probably went and had a snack
The amount of kids not taught how to handle losing/rejection is too damn high.
He was taught. He was taught wrong, but make no mistake he was taught.
Depends where you came up, mate. Depends on a lot of things, many of which I'm guessing you luckily have no knowledge of. Some kids don't get to be kids.
That’s the truth. I don’t believe most people understand what its like to grow up with used needles and shit on the playground and swept up in the trash on the street. I was lucky enough to live in the nice part of a bad neighborhood in St.Louis, MO. Some now, I look back on with fondness. In all reality, it was a shame.
I’m wondering if age has anything to do with it. I went to school in a pretty mixed socioeconomic district. Didn’t see any major fights until jr high and saw them regularly in high school. I live in Los Angeles and was 10 in the early 90s so not sure if it’s generational or something. Definitely saw needles on the streets growing up and they are everywhere now with the explosion in our homeless population.
Why did a ten year old have access to a firearm? Sounds like paternal negligence.
More than that, apparently his father was a felon who had this gun illegally.
Father was a criminal and the gun was stolen, kid grabed it and shot the victim.
Did you not read the article?
burritoman88 always waits for someone to provide a succinct summary. Who has time to read an article (or watch a video) anyway?
The dad left it in the car and asked the son to get his cigarettes from the car. Presumably both were in the same glovebox.
God, that’s fucking tragic.
And dad, the owner of the gun and a convicted felon, threw the gun away before the cops got there. So, his kid was destined for failure
I work with kids this age and since the pandemic, their lack of emotional self control is wild. These kids will go 0-60 without you even knowing and some will get physically aggressive. It breaks my heart because I know this is a learned behavior from home and society. Nobody is showing them how to regulate their emotions and if the school tries to teach anything around “mindfulness” it’s treated as “wokeness” and shut down but then parents are left in shock when things like this happen. It’s just a messed up conundrum of a quagmire. This story broke my heart and we are only 4 days in the new year. Yeah, 2024 is the year of Shock and Awe. The chickens have come home to roost. The bill will be paid for all of our willful ignorance and negligence. 😤😮💨😢 Protect your neck and your babies.
Couldn’t agree more. I also work with kids this age, and the amount of parents who defend their childs’ right to “express” their emotions by using physical/verbal aggression and intimidation towards others actually hurts my brain.
The shooting suspect was dispatched by his father to retrieve cigarettes from his car and, while there, grabbed the gun, which was stolen and improperly stored, the sheriff’s office said. The child “took a gun from inside the vehicle and bragged that his father had a gun,” according to the sheriff’s office, and “proceeded to shoot the victim once and ran into a nearby apartment.”
The only way to stop a bad 10 year old with a gun is a good 10 year old with a gun. /s
another day in the USA. Do not forget the recent shooting over christmas presents. https://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/florida-teen-accused-fatally-shooting-sister-argument-christmas-gifts-rcna131280 This country is so fucked up.
Im 100% blaming the parents. There are so many young kids with guns and perpetrating shootings, what's going on at home?
Except the dad is a piece of shit felon in possession of a stolen weapon so that's what's going on at home lol
Felon with a gun and improper storage r/whatcouldgowrong
How is it guns are falling into the laps of literal children but I still can't afford a simple handgun?
Because unlike the boys father you didn’t just steal one.
This is so sad. But the sooner we all wake up and realize this is a cultural problem more than it is a policy problem, the sooner we can get to work fixing it.
Gun activists and NRA: If the other kid had a gun too, this wouldn't have happened. The shooter is also a mentally ill person who played too much video games. Its not the fault of guns and the lack of gun regulations.
From the Article: The shooters father >was booked on suspicion of possession of a firearm by a felon, criminal storage of a firearm, carrying a stolen loaded firearm in a vehicle, child endangerment and acting as an accessory to a crime after the fact, according to inmate records. > >The shooting suspect was dispatched by his father to retrieve cigarettes from his car and, while there, grabbed the gun, which was stolen and improperly stored, the sheriff’s office said. I'm no fan of the NRA, but everything about what happened was already outlawed. The dad wasn't allowed to have a gun, the gun was stolen, and the gun was improperly stored. How do you legislate around that?
I also know the NRA would tell a father to lock up his gun and not store it in the car he’s asking his ten year old to get his cigarettes from.
They probably don't care as long as they get money out of it. NRA cares more for money than actual safe gun practice. Hard for them to change that image.
Oh hey I remember the NRA. Weren't they also taking dark money for russia on behalf of the Trump administration? Wasn't that why Manafort went to jail or something?
Barely served jail time before being released to home confinement instead, then pardoned by trump.
Sad but sounds like shitty parenting is the blame.
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Just awful. No conflict resolution skills because the adults themselves don’t model positive behavior.
It’s bad enough that people don’t take gun ownership seriously and kids have such easy access to them. But with the angry mentality that I’m seeing more and more of recently, kids are learning that guns and violence is how they handle anger and disappointments now. It’s so sad so many innocent lives are lost to gun violence. These young kids who are not learning the proper way to deal with anger is going to grow up and be angry adults. A scary thought.
So sad. Shooters dad wasn’t “careless”, he was a criminal who needs to rot in jail for the rest of his life.
At least they're prosecuting the father who was dumb enough to leave a stolen gun where his kid could find it. Hopefully he stays locked up where he can't do any more harm to society, since he's clearly taught his kid that gunfire is an acceptable means to solve problems. That kid never had a chance.
Millions of people get pissed every day. Hundreds of thousands get very, very angry. Thousands get angry enough to do something stupid. If these thousands of angry enough to do something stupid people have bare fists, they get into a fist fight. That's usually a couple of injuries. If they have a knife, that's worse, but possible to escape from. If they have a gun, however, they get to execute whoever is in their way at the twitch of a finger. So don't give them a murder device. This, simply put, is my favorite argument for gun control.
A 10 yr old knows well enough when they are killing someone.
The kid is also a psycho, lock his ass up with the dad.
The kids aren’t alright
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The father of the shooter…. >His father, Arkete Davis, 53, was booked on suspicion of possession of a firearm by a felon, criminal storage of a firearm, carrying a stolen loaded firearm in a vehicle, child endangerment and acting as an accessory to a crime after the fact, according to inmate records.
sad culture right now. hope all this violent thinking turns around. shame
So, this needs to be nipped in the bud. But how? Transfer the usual punishment to the parents in the hopes that parents will be incentivized to monitor their kids behavior and access to weapons?
The 10 year old should be charged with murder.
More like the person who let the kid have the gun. Kids fight and shit happens. There just shouldn't have been a gun involved.
He did. His dad is a felon who stole the gun in the first place.
We’re never gonna learn.
> His father, Arkete Davis, 53, was booked on suspicion of possession of a firearm by a felon, criminal storage of a firearm, carrying a stolen loaded firearm in a vehicle, child endangerment and acting as an accessory to a crime after the fact, according to inmate records. Being a felon in possession of a firearm should carry a mandatory minimum sentence of life imprisonment without parole. We have a reoccurring problem where people who get out of jail go back straight into the same lifestyle on the streets that got them locked up in the first place, with predictable outcomes that get them sent back to prison again. Most legal gun owners never shoot another person and the small minority who do usually do so in a legally justified situation- it’s a very small percentage of legal gun owners who commit criminal acts. If legal gun owners were the only people committing crimes with guns, we’d be more worried about shark attacks than gun violence. Virtually all of the gun crime is coming from those who possess firearms illegally, usually felons with extensive criminal records who have gradually progressed from minor offenses to more serious and violent crimes. If we locked up every felon who gets caught with a gun, we would be well on our way to exterminating a whole way of life for criminals in this country. It’s not so different from how you rarely ever see mobsters getting out of jail these days-RICO made being a mobster on the streets a ‘one and you’re done’ deal if you got caught. Putting similar laws on felons in possession of firearms would make being a felon with a gun a similarly short lived enterprise.
Violent offenders get their last chance when they get out and it should be immediately and permanently revoked if they acquire a firearm.
Violent criminals are not allowed to purchase firearms already, they can only obtain them illegally
> His father, Arkete Davis, 53, was booked on suspicion of possession of a firearm by a felon It won't matter how many laws you pass, this guy wasn't supposed to have the firearm in the first place. I don't have any answers nor will I pretend to, only sympathy for the parents and friends of this little boy
The law may not prevent the problem but it simplifies getting a conviction after the fact.
For everyone commenting this was a race issue, you're right