Posted on 04/20/2012 12:30:18 AM PDT by South40
Students at a vocational school who just wanted to learn how to weld were afraid for their lives when their teacher lined them up, pulled a gun from his waistband and started firing blanks at them.
(Excerpt) Read more at now.msn.com ...
Terrible thing. Yet, as a former high school teacher, there were those days.....
Shop teachers are weird people.
Wow. I just can’t believe teachers now a days. I mean be for 2nd Amendment of course, but this was just stupid.
in other words he shot a cap gun at the kids...? Well then if he only lined my kid up and pretended to shoot him with a cap gun then I guess I wouldn’t shoot him.
But I will admit that I’d like to hold an empty gun in his mouth and pull the trigger..... since it’s empty and harmless.
Bump
There are 10 shot .22 revolvers from S & W. Model 617.
This was apparently a blank only pistol, though.
I have an old German .22 blank only pistol. It’s entirely safe. Nothing exits the front at all. The only danger is to your ears.
But this guy was nuts to do this.
He’s lucky none of the students was carrying...
Some of them surely deserved shooting.
They wanted to put in their time, get a certificate and claim to be qualified. I wouldn't buy into that, although the school administration had a policy of retaining students no matter what, standards be damned.
They were possibly going to work for people I know while claiming I taught them mechanics, no way Jose!
Must have been one of them newfangled double-barrel over/under revolvers.
FOOLISH??? What a silly choice of a word. Sick, Disgusting, and a MENACE TO SOCIETY is what they SHOULD have said. I’m very happy to read he’s facing 12 felonies. And, the reporter’s choice of the word “stunt” is just as bad. They (journalists) go crazy over possible racism and fan the flames of discontent, but a teacher lining up a group of students, and firing a gun at them is a “stunt”?
UGH... can’t even think of the proper words myself, but they wouldn’t be benign words like “foolish”, or a “stunt”.
Let’s put it this way, if a police officer had happened upon the scene that teacher would be dead right now (or at least in the hospital with a bullet wound). This article is all kinds of disturbing in the way it’s described by the author who clearly doesn’t see the graveness of this act.
I am well aware of the Brandon Lee (shot by "blank")tragic incident. I in no way meant to minimize the seriousness of this dolt's offense. When I said jail time but not 60 years, that did not exclude a life sentence. I just think his crime was short of equating to 1st degree murder.
Lots of people have been killed or injured by "blanks". I would have beaten the crap out of him.
Google Jon Eric Hexum to learn more about “ blanks”
For us showbizzy types, there was a fairly notorious incident when Audie Murphy shot blanks at close range at Tony Curtis on a film set. The impact caused Curtis to collapse and Murphy thought he had killed him. He was extremely apologetic but Curtis never got over it.
This “teacher” belongs in jail.
How about reckless endangerment then?
He knew they couldn't shoot back, or otherwise effectively defend themselves.
Accordingly, he should get the 60 years. The Principal and school superintendent should get the maximum federal time:
United States Code, Title 18, U.S. Criminal Code, §ection 241
Conspiracy against rights
If two or more persons conspire to injure, oppress, threaten, or intimidate any person in any State, Territory, Commonwealth, Possession, or District in the free exercise or enjoyment of any right or privilege secured to him by the Constitution or laws of the United States, or because of his having so exercised the same; or If two or more persons go in disguise on the highway, or on the premises of another, with intent to prevent or hinder his free exercise or enjoyment of any right or privilege so secured—
They shall be fined under this title or imprisoned not more than ten years, or both; and if death results from the acts committed in violation of this section or if such acts include kidnapping or an attempt to kidnap, aggravated sexual abuse or an attempt to commit aggravated sexual abuse, or an attempt to kill, they shall be fined under this title or imprisoned for any term of years or for life, or both, or may be sentenced to death.
How can it be endangerment if what the teacher did didn’t put anyone’s life at risk? Emotional distress is not endangerment.
You bring aa blank pistol into a bank and attempt to rob it, you will be charged with armed robbery! It’s not the fact it wasn’t a real firearm, it is the fact he wanted everyone there to believe it was.
Essentially yes...
The kids in question here didn’t know that it was fake and harmless so it scared the crap out of them and gave them a new perspective on life...which is likely the reaction the teacher was looking for in the first place. Isn’t that the whole reason for such programs as ‘Scared Straight’?
While I disagree with his methods the teacher most likely has a very real and valid point...that many kids these days are so pampered, protected and ignorant that they have no concept of ‘the real’ and make light of things, make fun of and mock people, situations and seriousness where people are injured or killed by violence.
Case in point…When ‘Saving Private Ryan’ came out in theaters, a buddy and I went to see it. The opening sequence of the beach landing tore my heart out and left me with my jaw on the floor. The movie wrecked me. After the movie I witnessed scores of grown men weeping in the bathroom. It was one of the most profound moments of my life. However, during the movie, a few rows in front of us, two teen aged kids sat there and laughed at, ridiculed and mocked the horror portrayed and the people getting blown to bits. I tell you that I wanted to strangle the little twerps for their callousness, disrespect and colossal stupidity. Put those two kids in that very real situation and they would have died from shock without even being hit.
The point I’m making is while there is no question that what the teacher did was wrong, I can certainly empathize with why he did what he did. And more importantly, if people here on this forum and everywhere stopped to ponder the incident a while before jumping to conclusions and calling for the guy’s head (George Zimmerman?), then maybe they would recognize the dangerous indicators that this case reveals about the state of our society and culture.
Don’t be the frog that lets itself boil to death…
You are engaging in the logical fallacy of denying the correlative. Robbing a Bank with a gun or a banana is irrelevant to the actual crime.
The case in question is not related to your statement. The teacher used questionable methods to scare his students for whatever reason (most likely a valid one). The kids were never in any physical danger. Federal law prohibits him with being charged for firearms since federal law says that what he used cannot be described as one.
While I don’t agree with his methods, how the teacher is reprimanded is the choice of the school district...not by public opinion. The police have no authority here since no laws were broken. Nor is jail time fitting of his actions since no crime was committed.
Next I suppose you will be calling the police on your neighborhood kids for playing cops and robbers while firing cap guns or airsoft weapons.
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