Another blog about kid shootings

We have learned that other people are now blogging about shootings of and by kids. It's great to have company with this effort because it's very hard to keep track of all of the shootings involving children. Sad, but true. So here is a link to the Gun Crisis Reporting Project. Below are just a few of the entries:

• A 12-year-old girl was killed and three more people were wounded in Providence, RI, early this morning, according to wpri.com 

• According to the New York Post,  a nine-year-old girl -- shot Friday night in the Bronx -- was the third child struck by a stray bullet in the city during the past month 

• A 14-year-old boy was shot in the chest in Staten Island, according to silive.com 

• A child was shot while sleeping in the same bed with his mother in Kansas early Thursday, according to KSN.com 

You get the idea. There are more entries in this blog. We would also like to point out that New York Times writer and blogger Joe Nocera is writing a regular column called The Gun Report in which he is reporting gun incidents in America. Most often his report includes the deaths and injuries of children.

There is also the American Gun Victims Wall Facebook Page, the Ohh Shoot! blog, and the Today's Accidental Shootings blog.

We are thankful to these folks because it's important that we are reporting the factual information about such an important issue.

Gun industry targets younger children to sell more guns

The gun industry is trying to appeal to younger and younger children to get them interested in shooting sports. From an article:

Threatened by long-term declining participation in shooting sports, the firearms industry has poured millions of dollars into a campaign to ensure its future by getting guns into the hands of more, and younger, children.

The industry's strategies include giving firearms, ammunition and cash to youth groups; weakening state restrictions on hunting by young children; marketing an affordable military-style rifle for "junior shooters" and sponsoring semiautomatic-handgun competitions for youths; and developing a target-shooting video game that promotes brand-name weapons, with links to the websites of their makers.

The pages of Junior Shooters, an industry-supported magazine that seeks to get children involved in the recreational use of firearms, once featured a smiling 15-year-old girl clutching a semiautomatic rifle. At the end of an accompanying article that extolled target shooting with a Bushmaster AR-15 -- an advertisement elsewhere in the magazine directed readers to a coupon for buying one -- the author encouraged youngsters to share the article with a parent. "Who knows?" it said. "Maybe you'll find a Bushmaster AR-15 under your tree some frosty Christmas morning!" (...) 

Firearms manufacturers and their two primary surrogates, the National Rifle Association of America and the National Shooting Sports Foundation, have long been associated with high-profile battles to fend off efforts at gun control and to widen access to firearms. The public debate over the mass shootings in Newtown, Conn., and elsewhere has focused largely on the availability of guns, along with mental illness and the influence of violent video games.

Little attention has been paid, though, to the industry's youth-marketing initiatives. Proponents argue that introducing children to guns can provide a safe and healthy pastime, and critics counter that it is potentially dangerous.

The NRA has for decades given grants for youth shooting programs, mostly to Boy Scout councils and 4-H groups. Newer initiatives by other organizations go further, seeking to introduce children to high-powered rifles and handguns while invoking the same rationale of those older programs: that firearms can teach "life skills" like responsibility, ethics and citizenship.

Still, some experts in child psychiatry say that encouraging youthful exposure to guns is asking for trouble. Dr. Jess Shatkin, the director of undergraduate studies in child and adolescent mental health at New York University, said that young people's brains "are engineered to take risks," making them ill suited for handling guns. "There are lots of ways to teach responsibility to a kid," Shatkin said. "You don't need a gun to do it."

Steve Sanetti, the president of the National Shooting Sports Foundation, said it was better to instruct children in the safe use of a firearm through hunting and target shooting. The shooting sports foundation, the tax-exempt trade association for the gun industry, is a driving force behind many of the newest youth initiatives. Its national headquarters is in Newtown, just a few miles from Sandy Hook Elementary School, where Adam Lanza, 20, used his mother's Bushmaster AR-15 to kill 20 children and six adults last month. Its $26 million budget is financed mostly by gun companies, associated businesses and the industry's annual trade show, said its latest tax return.

Every gun in the hands of a child must first pass through the hands of an adult.

Video released of 14 year old Florida boy who shot his parents

Photo of Alex Crain from linked article

In 2010, a 14 year old Florida boy shot both of his parents to death. The police have now released a disturbing video of the boy exclaiming and yelling in the squad car after he was picked up. From the article:

A teenager who was sentenced to 20 years in prison for shooting dead both his parents regretted his actions immediately after and said he 'didn't even mean to hurt them'.

Alex Crain, now 15, from Naples, Florida, was arrested at his home in December 2010 for the slayings and has never spoken publicly or given any reason as to why he killed them.

Now a video has been released of a 14-year-old Crain sitting in the back of a police cruiser, wailing and crying to himself and shouting things like 'I swear I didn't mean to kill them', 'I'm sorry' and 'I didn't mean to hurt them'.

Crain's admissions, recorded on a dashboard camera tape, are the first - and only - insights into the former Palmetto Ridge High School student's state of mind after he shot his parents, Thomas and Kelly, in their bed in December 2010.

If you can stand to watch this video you will see a young boy who has no explanation for why he shot his parents crying and carrying on. More from the article:

In the video, Crain can be seen banging his head against the car window and shouting: 'I shouldn't have done it. What the f*** is wrong with me? I shot my own parents for no f***ing reason.'

He twice shouts at the police who are standing outside the vehicle before lying down and remaining silent for a prolonged period of time.

Crain is now serving his 20 year sentence and his parents are dead. One wonders where he got the gun in the first place? From this related article:

In a 911 tape obtained Monday by NBC-2, the then-14-year-old wails and tells a dispatcher he has no recollection of the shooting. He said he did not know where he got the weapon.

“I was sleeping and the next thing I know I had a gun in my hand and my parents were on the ground,” he said.

Every gun in the hands of a child or teen must first pass through the hands of an adult.

Texas gun range offers birthday parties for young children

How young should children be before going to a gun range to shoot guns? This Texas gun range is offering fun for the family. Children as young as 8 can shoot guns while celebrating with their young friends. From the article:

"The age limit is eight years old. You have to be tall enough to get above the shooting table,” Prince told WFAA. “They're not gonna be left unattended. Parents are gonna be one-on-one, or if there's not enough parents, we'll have range safety officers here to show them how to do it safely."

The "Range Rules" on Eagle's website include the provision, "Young shooters (under 18 years of age) are ONLY allowed to shoot on the range with their parent or guardian; one young shooter per adult. No children are allowed on the range nor are they to be left unaccompanied in the showroom while adults shoot."

Yahoo News noted that birthday parties aren't the only gun-themed events aimed at children. Last Christmas, toddlers in Arizona were allowed to pose for pictures with Santa Clause while holding high-powered firearms.

If you read this blog, you know how many incidents of children finding loaded guns and shooting either themselves or someone else are reported. Kids and guns just do not go together. For adults to encourage young children to shoot guns does not make sense. Adults are responsible for allowing guns to fall into the hands of young children. Learning to shoot a gun does not necessarily equate with safe use of a gun. Even adults are not always safe with their guns. This we know from the many accidental gun discharges of law abiding adults. So Happy Birthday everyone. Be safe.