Albuquerque police have announced that they have arrested the man responsible for the killing of Lilly Garcia, 4, in a road rage incident. Tony Torrez, 32, reportedly confessed to the crime and the police hit him with a long list of charges that should guarantee that he remains in jail most if not all of his life. Indeed, even a plea agreement at this point would likely place the sentence near the maximum level but, if Torrez confessed, there is little in terms of a defense to present without striking the confession on some grounds.
Alan Garcia was traveling westbound on Interstate 40 when Torrez cut him off in a Lexus in attempting to exit the freeway. The men exchanged words and Torrez pulled out a gun and fired at Garcia’s truck. He hit the four-year-old girl. With the witnesses and alleged confession, Torrez is toast absent some surprising development.
Torrez is charged with murder, aggravated battery with a deadly weapon, assault with the intent to commit a violent felony, shooting at or from a motor vehicle, child abuse, child abuse resulting in death and tampering with evidence. He was being held on $650,000 bail.
While the actions of Torrez leaves one, again, depressed about our society, it is important to note that Torrez was captured with the help of a tip. Moreover, two nurses stopped and rendered aid to Lilly until she was taken to the hospital. Finally, thousands of people have gone to a gofundme site to contribute to the family.
Just showing the picture below is enough to secure a death penalty.
THall:
“One reason why some states aren’t submitting records is because the officials in those states don’t agree that gun show dealers should be required to do background checks or maintain records of sales, usually on the theory that if the government knows who has weapons or what type, then it’ll make it easier to confiscate them.”
It’s not the background check that is the main source of dispute; it’s the registration. If registration was only used to confiscate guns if someone is reported as having a violent mental illness, it would have more support. But in some cases, people legally buy guns which are later deemed illegal, and the registration is a means for the government to seize them. This is considered an abuse of the system.
Although it’s also true that criminals can obtain guns through the black market, I do agree with background checks being required on all sales, private, gun show, or retail. It will at least make criminals have to put in more effort, and an instant background check is not onerous on law abiding gun owners.
Since no one can physically prevent Bob from selling his gun to his buddy Steve without a background check or registration, or to keep Adam Lanza’s idiot mother from getting her unstable son weapons, another possibility is to do periodic gun searches for the violently mentally ill who are not institutionalized.
I think you will find this study interesting. It analyzed why states are not reporting mental health records to the database. About 12 states have greatly improved their reporting, while those 23 states only reported a measly 100 records or less.
http://www.gao.gov/assets/600/592452.pdf
“DOJ and state officials identified technological, legal, and other challenges that hinder states’ ability to make these records available. DOJ has made several forms of assistance available to help states provide records—including grants, conferences, and training—and the 6 states we met with generally reported finding these helpful. DOJ has begun to have states share their promising practices during regional meetings, but DOJ has not shared these practices nationally.”
I do agree with doing analysis and discussion on how to prevent crime. For instance, I’ve remarked before that a former classmate of a woman I know drove around with a sword in her car for protection from “demons”. She would get into passionate disagreements with framed photographs. When this woman harms herself or someone else, there are going to be hundreds of people saying it was bound to happen. That is not fair to victims or the mentally ill. Our mental health system needs an overhaul.
More fiction? Don’t you mean “heckuva” fact checker?
T.Hall – I am old enough that I don’t have to pad my resume.
But you’re pretty good at writing fiction
The grades you post for the two administrations tell me you were a poor teacher, a sloppy fact checker and you rewrote history.
T.Hall – I was an award winning teacher and a hell of a fact checker. Politics though is subjective. So the grading depends on your criteria. I can defend both my grades, can you?
Karen: Bully for California! I’m not surprised that it’s taking steps to look for practical ways to solve a problem and I’m gladdened to know that closing the gun show loophole is a measure you support. Not everyone agrees with that regulation.
One reason why some states aren’t submitting records is because the officials in those states don’t agree that gun show dealers should be required to do background checks or maintain records of sales, usually on the theory that if the government knows who has weapons or what type, then it’ll make it easier to confiscate them. Of course, this secrecy belies the purpose of keeping firearms for maintaining protection from the government, which is to intimidate the government from taking any action. But then there are the secessionists.
While it’s good that California has these reasonable regulations in place, what good does it do if neighboring states have none on dealers. If you’re worried about open borders, like some commenters here are, then why wouldn’t you be concerned about someone crossing the border from Arizona or Nevada with weapons purchased without a background check?
As for as the mentally ill and people with criminal history slipping through the cracks, I think we can both agree that the record keeping can be improved, along with the reporting requirements. Nevertheless, there’s no cynicism in admitting that the system is going to fail in particular instances. That’s no reason to scrap the effort to reduce the number of guns flooding our society.
Besides, you can’t even keep your own comments straight.
Nitpicking, however, is a character flaw. It demonstrates a weakness of mind and is characteristic of a fundamentally unhappy person
T.Hall – I got paid to be a nitpicker and I was pretty good at it. I got paid to fact-check history textbooks. My job was to check every fact in the text and I did. I also worked on teams to write history and literature books.
Schulte: My sympathies to students. But you’re no longer grading papers and you’re in no position to assign grades. You are one the ones most lacking in critical thinking skills in this entire community, you rely chiefly, almost exclusively, on sweeping generalizations, and rarely provide citations to your claims. When you do, it’s often from Wikipedia, so I don’t owe you a thing, bub.
Moreover, I provided solid citations to the constitutional interpretation of the Second Amendment under discussion. That’s all you’re entitled to.
T. Hall. – I rarely use Wikipedia since you only have a 50/50 chance of being correct. I complain about others using Wikipedia though.
Karen: I think we can agree that Fast and Furious/ Wide Receiver were bad ideas all around. No question, members of the Obama administration who approved the operation exercised bad judgement.. That still doesn’t give Team Bush a passing grade.
T.Hall – I would give Obama a 0 for Fast and Furious and Bush a B for Wide Receiver.
For those who forget the recent past, that’s Darrell The Arsonist Issa.
Ignominious? Charges originating from the brilliant Darryll Issa? First cousin to his successor, the gnome, Trey Dowdy? Riiiight. A real moment of shame for Holder.
http://fortune.com/2012/06/27/the-truth-about-the-fast-and-furious-scandal/
Try these facts on for size.
Karen, Then he is in the featherweight division.
Nick- I think he’s just here to fight.
THall:
CA requires background checks at gun shows, which I actually support. It also requires all gun sales to be done via a licensed 3rd party, like a gun store, with the requisite background check. It’s also true that criminals get their guns through illegal means. It’s the law abiding citizens, by definition, who follow gun laws. And there is no magic ATF agent who pops out if Rick sells his gun illegally to Steve. As has been pointed out, it’s the law abiding citizens who follow the law. That’s the conundrum.
My biggest problem with our current laws is that we do not enforce what we currently have. Are you aware that most states do not report mental health disqualifies to the instant background check database, as mandated?
http://www.mcclatchydc.com/news/politics-government/article24746626.html
http://www.nydailynews.com/news/national/mentally-ill-buy-guns-ease-u-s-states-not-forwarding-crucial-mental-health-recods-database-screen-gun-licenses-article-1.977651
23 states submitted fewer than 100 records.
Before we engage in a knee jerk reaction that the answer is more laws, how about we enforce what we already have? These mass shooters are usually mentally ill, with lots of red flags prior. However, our mental health system lets them go free until they hurt someone. That’s not fair to them or us. And then the states fail to report mental health issues to the instant database, so unstable people are able to purchase firearms.
One of the reasons that we need our mental health system to be more proactive for the mentally unstable is so that they can be flagged on the instant database, as well as monitored for escalation of their symptoms.
THall:
Here is ABC News on Fast and Furious being a different program than the one under Bush:
http://abcnews.go.com/blogs/politics/2012/09/president-obama-falsely-claims-fast-and-furious-program-begun-under-the-previous-administration/
The Bush program was Operation Wide Receiver, which lasted only a year. It had its own set of problems. During an investigation into suspicious gun sales, they tried to trace weapons to drug cartels using RFID chips and aerial surveillance. They coordinated efforts with Mexican officials, which can be problematic due to corruption. Unfortunately, not all the guns got chipped correctly – many were damaged by being shoved inside, rendering them useless. The cartels caught on and started looking for the chips, as well as aerial surveillance. The operation was a failure and was terminated after 300 guns were used.
Operation Fast and Furious started 9 months into the Obama administration. It was an even bigger disaster. Instead of trying to trace guns in transactions they were suspicious of, working with gun stores, they simply made a note of serial numbers and let them walk across the border. When gun stores reported straw buyers, they were told to keep selling to them. No tracing. 2,000 guns or more were used in the program. Mexico was kept completely in the dark, which could be considered either good or bad, given the corruption. They completely failed to either track the weapons, or target the cartel. Then, to make matters worse, Holder et al blamed the gun stores in their gun control agenda, after having told them to make the sale in the first place.
If Obama had learned from the mistakes of Operation Wide Receiver, and successfully fought the cartel violence that crosses our border, that would have been a significant success. Unfortunately, not only was his plan far worse, but, as is par for the course, Holder and Obama lied about it, blamed Bush, and then Holder got the ignominious distinction of being the only sitting AG to be held in contempt of congress.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ATF_gunwalking_scandal
Schulte: My use of grammar on this blog has been exemplary. Everyone makes the occasional error.
Nitpicking, however, is a character flaw. It demonstrates a weakness of mind and is characteristic of a fundamentally unhappy person.
T.Hall – it is not nitpicking, it is called editing. I have corrected a lot of papers in my time. Usually I let it go, but you have been sloppy with your research and critical thinking and you still owe me two citations for sweeping generalizations that you need to back up.
The Obama plan (if you can even call it one) was to abandon 5000 weapons to kill Mexicans.
Yeh, that’s it, sure that was the plan, but it wasn’t to kill Mexicans, it was just to irritate you.
You’re connection to reality could be improved
T.Hall – it’s your not you’re. Grammar counts.
Tom Nash:
“Karen S……The Lanza estate was sued…..I think the judgement was $1.25 million for the plaintiffs.
Small compensation for their losses, but it recognizes the responsibilty and liabilty of Mrs. Lanza”
That’s good. You are right that nothing will lessen the pain, but I can only hope it will send a message to other negligent parents. I wonder if the driver was total denial about her son’s problems.
For those who support a complete ban on firearms, you are talking about removing a Constitutional right. The founders of this country fought a tyrannical government, and a lot of people died to ensure we won those rights.
Recognizing the power of being armed to fight tyranny, slave holding states outlawed firearms for slaves. Even touching one was punishable by death.
When considering removing rights from the Constitution we must consider the implications across time. People only consider the present day, but how would we be positioning our people in a world 500 years from now? 1,000? Where will our shorelines be? What global challenges?
Just in the past few years, we have seen the rise of an uber presidency, discussed here on this very blog. Obama has disregarded the checks and balances of our government. Project this trend outward 500 years, and we can understand how no civilization has ever withstood the test of time. Egypt, Rome, Greece . . . they all failed. No country is too great to fail.
We’re off topic, but the Bush plan ensured the weapons would be lost.
T.Hall – unlike the sloppy Obama plan, the Bush plan was designed to follow the weapons. The Obama plan (if you can even call it one) was to abandon 5000 weapons to kill Mexicans. If I were the Mexican government I would not be very cooperative with the Obama administration.
Schulte: Most felons know they can’t purchase firearms legally, which is why they go to gun shows, where the policy is “No questions asked”.
Or they resort to straw buyers.
The number of guns that change hands at gun shows and straw buyers far outstrips the number of weapons that were lost track of in the “Fast and Furious” program.
That program was dreamed up and put into a state of readiness during the Bush administration, BTW.
T.Hall – during the Bush administration they did not lose track of the weapons.
Nick: Suicide in Japan results from factors of high stress involved in the overworked segment of their society. Most suicides are committed among middle managers. A harbinger of things to come in America.