Posted on 06/12/2014 5:48:12 PM PDT by nickcarraway
The teen fatally shot Emilio Hoffman, 14, and injuring a teacher before killing himself. Why he would go on a shooting spree using the same weapon as Sandy Hook mass murderer Adam Lanza is a mystery, cops said Wednesday. All the while, the NRA remains unusually quiet.
The killer carried the murder weapon in a guitar case and used it to score a tragic and all too familiar tune in yet another American school — but there’s been nary a peep from the National Rifle Association.
It’s like Wayne LaPierre, the NRA mouthpiece, has a sudden case of lockjaw.
Never mind that Jared Padgett, the 15-year-old Oregon high school student who killed a fellow freshman and wounded a teacher before offing himself, was armed with an AR-15 rifle.
Never mind that Adam Lanza used the same type of rifle in December 2012 to slaughter 20 first-graders and six staffers at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, Conn.
Never mind that Padgett, like Lanza, got his rifle from “the family home.”
And never mind that like Lanza, Padgett was obsessed with guns and violence and TV shows like “Ultimate Weapons.”
LaPierre stayed silent even though this was the 74th school shooting in the U.S. since the Newtown massacre. Six students at the University of California at Santa Barbara — three shot and three stabbed — were slaughtered last month.
But the gun group tweeted out a link to a post in the right-wing National Review on Wednesday that appeared to sum up their arrogant stance.
It said, in essence, that what happened in Oregon won’t change its policy on gun control “despite all of the chatter from the White House and beyond.”
The NRA has not responded to repeated requests for comment from the Daily News. And contrary to form, it has largely remained silent since the Santa Barbara shootings just over two weeks ago.
While it was not known if the Padgett family belonged to the NRA, they were all hunters, classmate Mackenzie Arellano told the Daily News. “He loved guns,” said Arellano, 15. “He loved to go hunting with his parents. I always assumed he was just hunting animals. Not half of the student body.”
Padgett’s political bent also was in line with the NRA. His Facebook likes include groups like “Conservative American Military Veterans Against Barack Obama” and “We WILL NOT Be Disarmed.”
Also, on the same day as the Sandy Hook massacre, Padgett’s brother-in-law, Andrew Cooper, posted some snarky advice for Obama on Facebook. “SAVE LIVES; advise the states to employ at least 2 specially trained police officers to constantly patrol all school campuses from kindergarden through all colleges. Duh.”
Cooper could not have predicted that on Tuesday, his young brother-in-law would be trading shots with school resource officers Nick Thompson and Kyle Harris in the hallway of Reynolds High School.
Friends said Padgett gave no sign he was about to snap.
“When you hear about other school shootings, you think something’s wrong with them, mentally,” classmate Victoria Cox, 15, said. “I never noticed anything like that with him.”
There were other revelations about the killer:
- Padgett was from a military family and a platoon leader in the high school’s Junior Reserve Officer Training Corps.
- His parents were divorced and he never got over it. “He said his mom left him, didn’t care about him,” said 16-year-old classmate Chava Hernandez.
- Padgett was a deacon at the Mormon church his dad attended.
- In addition to the assault rifle, Padgett was armed with a semiautomatic handgun and a large knife, neither of which he used, police said.
He also had nine magazines stuffed in a duffel bag holding dozens of rounds of ammo — enough to cause even more carnage.
- Padgett might have done just that had it not been for teacher Todd Rispler, who sounded the alarm despite being grazed in the hip. The teen was then chased by Harris and Thompson into a bathroom where he killed himself.
Students mourn Tuesday evening just days before high school graduation and summer vacation.Students mourn Tuesday evening just days before high school graduation and summer vacation.PreviousNextSupporters attend a candlelight vigil after a shooting at Reynolds High School in Troutdale, Oregon June 10, 2014. A gunman walked into the school and fatally shot a student on Tuesday before authorities found him dead a short time later, a day before students were due to finish classes and break for summer vacation.
Members of the community attend a candlelight vigil Tuesday night after a shooting at Reynolds High School in Troutdale, Ore. Supporters attend a candlelight vigil after a shooting at Reynolds High School in Troutdale, Oregon June 10, 2014. A gunman walked into the high school gym with a rifle and shot a student to death on Tuesday before he was found dead in a bathroom stall, in the third outbreak of gun violence to shake a U.S. high school or college campus in less than three weeks.
But the cops arrived too late to save Emilio Hoffman, 14, who was in the locker room when Padgett opened fire and killed him.
“We have not established any link between the shooter and the victim,” Troutdale Police Chief Scott Anderson said.
In a statement, Hoffman’s mother, Jennifer, said “anyone who has ever met Emilio laughed with him.” Hoffman will be remembered at a memorial that will take place during Thursday’s graduation ceremony. Adam Lanza used the Bushmaster version of the AR-15 in December 2012 to slaughter 20 children and six staffers at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, Conn.
Todd Rispler, a teacher and coach at Reynolds High School, was injured in the shooting and treated at the scene.PreviousNextTodd Rispler Police officers stand on the sidewalk after a shooting at Reynolds High School in Troutdale, Oregon June 10, 2014. A gunman walked into the Oregon high school with a rifle and shot a student to death on Tuesday before he was later found dead, in the third outbreak of gun violence to shake a U.S. high school or college campus in less than three weeks.
Rispler, who sparked the lightning quick lockdown of the school and its 2,800 students, was home recovering with his wife and two kids.
“They just stitched him up,” brother-in-law Jeff Nelson told The Oregonian. “I don’t think any bones were hit. It’s a blessing.”
Meanwhile, police revealed that a gun-toting man found near the high school after the shooting was 21-year-old Joseph Powell. He told cops he had raced to the school to protect his sister, who is a freshman. Powell was charged with unlawful possession of a firearm.
Git a chunder bucket.
Waiting for the media to demand that CAIR apologize for the slaughter of innocent people at the Afghan Airport and for 9/11..oh wait I forgot..not “All” Muslims are terrorists according to the media, yet all gun owners are bad because of the act of a few whackos
That 74th shooting nonsense has been debunked and the reason they all use the same weapon is because the media makes sure everyone gets a good look at it.
The three doofi ...
Translation: The MSM is ecstatic that an AR was finally used in a mass shooting again.
Again...a stupid article.
Padgett shot himself only after being confronted with guns.
LaPierre doesn’t have to speak out. He was proven right again. Bad guys with guns are stopped by good guys with guns.
Liberal Logic, where was the CEO of GM when a guy killed a Pedestrian in a Hit and Run Accident?
And never mind that our communist indoctrination centers (govt schools) teach kids to hate God, hate their parents and that mass murder of innocent unborn children is perfectly ok.
Not mine, but I like it:
If guns kill people then;
Pencils misspell words
cars make people drive drunk
& spoons made Rosie O’Donnell fat!
Exactly. Why would LaPierre need to say anything?
That a provable lie.
It took three people to write this? When will they start writing about underlying causes of this apparent rash of teen violence rather than the tools used?
We don’t need facts, just play on the heartstrings.
“Cooper could not have predicted that on Tuesday, his young brother-in-law would be trading shots with school resource officers Nick Thompson and Kyle Harris in the hallway of Reynolds High School.”
After Sandy hook Lapierre suggested armed guards for schools to prevent mass shootings and the Daily News responded by putting his picture on the front page calling him the craziest man in America. Looks like LaPierre was right.
The common sense solution is to ban guitar cases.
This anti-2nd Amendment screed took THREE “journalists” to compose?
Pretty weak.
+1
It took three Nazi libs to write this garbage? No wonder employers don’t want to hire these jackasses anymore. They’re all retarded.
The liberal standard for conservatives is we must all be perfect in all ways at all times - or they can condemn us.
The liberal standard for themselves is that anything they do is acceptable or has an ‘excuse’ they’ll collectively ‘buy’.
I’m sooooooooo tired of these people.
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