."End of Watch, April 4, 2009" read the flashing sign above the Parkway as I headed home from work today. Was this a novel way of signalling some accident had created congestion ahead?
"Fallen Hero, PO Stephen Mahyle", flashed the sign.
Three police officers, Stephen Mahyle, Eric Kelly and Paul Sciullo II fell in the line of duty as they responded to a domestic call and were felled by bullets fired by Richard Andrew Poplawski of Stanton Heights.
The analyses of the gunman's motives have begun, ranging from insanity(favored by his relatives) to the hatred-filled inspiration of local right-wing talk hosts to his purported fear of having guns taken away by the Obama administration and Survivalist memes peddled by the likes of Alex Jones, 9-11 conspiracy theorist par excellence and Stormfront, an extremist website.
Three police officers lie in state at the City Hall, roads closed to contain the swelling crowds expected to pay their last respects to them.
For Poplawski, life will drag out into a series of trials, for the wheels of justice always grind much slower than the speeding bullets. If he's lucky and gets a very good lawyer, he may even escape the fate of another similar conspiracy-loving survivalist type who rampaged 8 years ago and now still sits on death row: Richard Baumhammers.
End of Watch, caused by someone enamored of the End Times Watch.
"Fallen Hero, PO Stephen Mahyle", flashed the sign.
Three police officers, Stephen Mahyle, Eric Kelly and Paul Sciullo II fell in the line of duty as they responded to a domestic call and were felled by bullets fired by Richard Andrew Poplawski of Stanton Heights.
The analyses of the gunman's motives have begun, ranging from insanity(favored by his relatives) to the hatred-filled inspiration of local right-wing talk hosts to his purported fear of having guns taken away by the Obama administration and Survivalist memes peddled by the likes of Alex Jones, 9-11 conspiracy theorist par excellence and Stormfront, an extremist website.
Three police officers lie in state at the City Hall, roads closed to contain the swelling crowds expected to pay their last respects to them.
For Poplawski, life will drag out into a series of trials, for the wheels of justice always grind much slower than the speeding bullets. If he's lucky and gets a very good lawyer, he may even escape the fate of another similar conspiracy-loving survivalist type who rampaged 8 years ago and now still sits on death row: Richard Baumhammers.
End of Watch, caused by someone enamored of the End Times Watch.
Sujatha,
This is indeed very sad and scary. I am not sure if the American public, politicians and law enforcement have the stomach to face the reality of gun violence and its relation to the easy availability of guns.
Just two days ago, the only child of a good friend of ours was gunned down and died. The 27 year old young man made the mistake of confronting a pair of thieves who were in the process of stealing his belongings. He didn't know that one of them had a gun.
Posted by: Ruchira | April 08, 2009 at 06:32 PM
This 'gun culture' is something that I will never get used to seeing, being propagated from one generation to the next, even at the cost of 'accidents', like the one in my own township, where a kid in the elementary school shot his brother while playing with a gun that their father had not secured from them. It's not that other weapons like knives can't harm, just that guns make it too easy for miscreants to cause harm.
Posted by: Sujatha | April 08, 2009 at 08:10 PM