{"id":40378,"date":"2013-12-10T12:00:43","date_gmt":"2013-12-10T18:00:43","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.shotinthedark.info\/wp\/?p=40378"},"modified":"2013-12-10T16:51:21","modified_gmt":"2013-12-10T22:51:21","slug":"a-memorial-to-remember","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.shotinthedark.info\/wp\/?p=40378","title":{"rendered":"A Memorial To Remember"},"content":{"rendered":"

This coming Saturday,\u00a0Minnesota’s\u00a0self-appointed gun-grabber elite are\u00a0going to try to squeedge some more juice out of waving the bloody shirt of Newtown:\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n

To Remember: A commemoration of the Sandy Hook school victims, and all victims of gun violence — 9:30 a.m. at Westminster Presbyterian Church, 1200 Marquette Ave., Minneapolis. To RSVP, click here. Space is limited. This event is co-sponsored by Moms Demand Action, Mayors Against Illegal Guns and Organizing for Action.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

They’ll then attempt to hold a meeting to promote more laws that would have had no effect on Newtown, or any other real-world gun violence.\u00a0<\/p>\n

But there’s another anniversary this coming week; tomorrow, in fact.\u00a0 And it deserves a memorial – because unlike every single thing <\/em>proposed by “Protect” MN, Moms Want Action and the Felon Mayors, it actually saved lives.\u00a0<\/p>\n

At around 3:25PM on December 11, 2012, Jacob Tyler Roberts walked into the Clackamas Town Center Mall in Portland Oregon.\u00a0 He was wearing a ski mask, and carrying a stolen AR-15-pattern rifle with five magazines, a total of 150 rounds.\u00a0 He donned the ski mask and carried the rifle openly; witnesses apparently thought it was a paintball outfit, and that the rifle was a toy.\u00a0 One woman reportedly told Roberts to take off the mask – it looked “Creepy”.\u00a0 Roberts didn’t respond.\u00a0<\/p>\n

He walked to atrium in the middle of the mall, and started shooting.\u00a0 He fired off his first magazine, killing two – Cindy Yuille, a 54 year old hospice nurse, and Steven Forsythe, a youth sports coach – and hitting15 year old Kristina Shevchenko in the chest (Shevchenko\u00a0managed to walk\u00a0out of the mall, and survived the incident).\u00a0<\/p>\n

Then, as Roberts turned a\u00a0corner and reloaded, he ran into Nick Meli, a citizen with\u00a0a .40 caliber\u00a0Glock 22 and an Oregon carry permit.\u00a0 Meli drew –\u00a0but didn’t shoot.\u00a0 According to some stories, Meli froze; in others, he saw that there\u00a0were civilians in the background that would be in danger if he missed.\u00a0 Either is a fairly normal response under such conditions.\u00a0<\/p>\n

But Roberts ran away.\u00a0\u00a0He ducked into a JC Penney and ran into a storage corridor, where he pointed his rifle at Penneys employee Rok Sang Kim – but turned, ran down a stairwell, and shot himself.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Drawn by reports of a mass shooting, dozens of ambulances turned out – but only Shevchenko was treated for any injuries.<\/p>\n

The Lesson<\/strong>:\u00a0 After the Columbine shooting – where a SWAT team waited outside the school for four hours before moving to engage the shooters – law enforcement went on a crash course of learning how to deal with mass shooters.\u00a0 The lesson learned?\u00a0 Don’t wait.\u00a0 Get in, get at the shooter.\u00a0<\/p>\n

It wasn’t about testosterone; examination of mass shooters showed that most of them are deeply narcissistic and intensely delusional.\u00a0 In almost every case, the shootings were planned to a fine sheen, like a military operation, if the military were run by delusional people.<\/p>\n

And that while the plans were intricate, the shooters’ mental state meant that any serious hiccup to the plan would send them off the rails.\u00a0 And by “serious hiccup”, they meant “someone putting up meaningful resistance”.\u00a0<\/p>\n

And so cops changed their tactics; rather than wait for SWAT, cops are now trained to get in, find the shooter, and put some lead on the target.\u00a0\u00a0 Because nothing disrupts a lunatic’s plan like having lead sailing past your head (to say nothing of through one’s chest).\u00a0<\/p>\n

But here’s the little secret; it doesn’t have to be a cop doing the resisting.\u00a0 History is full of examples of individual citizens putting up armed resistance to mass shooters, and ending the shootings:<\/p>\n