On Monday, Dec. 24, 2012 a gunman open fire on four firefighters from Webster NY as they arrived on scene of a car and house on fire. Two firefighters were killed, two others were shot. The audio is of the incidents. We are posting to show the true bravery of the firefighter who was shot and pinned down due to the gun fire.
Our thought and prayers go to all affected in this horrible tragedy.
Police say that Spengler spent 17 years in prison for killing his grandmother in 1980. He was found dead of a self-inflicted gunshot wound after the violence at the fire this morning.
Webster Police Chief Gerald Pickering said Spengler set a home on fire on Lake Road and waited for firefighters to arrive, ambushing them with gunfire. His motive is unclear. The shooting killed Lt. Mike Chiapperini, 43, a volunteer firefighter and Webster Police Department’s public information officer, and firefighter Tomasz Kaczowka. Theodore Scardino and Joseph Hofsetter were also shot and are recovering in guarded condition at Strong Memorial Hospital.
In addition a police officer from [nearby] Greece[, New York] who was driving by was hit by shrapnel and injured.
Several weapons were used at the shooting today, including "at least" an assault rifle, Pickering said.
"This is an individual who obviously had a lot of problems," he said, adding that there were "probably some mental health issues."
Pickering said Spengler was arrested in 1980 and convicted of killing his grandmother, serving time until 1998.
The fires are reportedly under control, Webster police officials said at a press conference. Four homes were completely destroyed in the blaze and four more were damaged.
Ambushed NY firemen shot dead; 2 police killed elsewhere
A fire burns on Lake Road after a suspect shot four firefighters responding to the blaze in Webster, New York, December 24, 2012. Credit: Reuters/WHEC/Christine VanTimmeren/Handout
By Chris Francescani NEW YORK | Mon Dec 24, 2012 6:14pm EST
(Reuters) - A gunman who spent 17 years in prison for murder ambushed and killed two volunteer firefighters and wounded two others on Monday near Rochester, New York, as they responded to a house fire he deliberately set, police said.
William Spangler, 62, shot and killed himself after a gunfight with a police officer in Webster, a Rochester suburb, Webster Police Chief Gerald Pickering said.
"It was a trap set by Mr. Spangler, who laid in wait and shot first responders," Pickering told a news conference.
Separately, a police officer in Wisconsin and another in Texas were shot and killed on Monday, according to police and media reports.
The attacks on first responders came 10 days after one of the worst mass shootings in U.S. history that left 20 students and six adults dead at an elementary school in Newtown, Connecticut and intensified the debate about gun control in the United States.
Spangler was convicted of manslaughter in 1981 for beating his 92-year-old grandmother to death with a hammer, according to New York State Department of Corrections records, and after prison he spent eight years on parole.
"We don't have an easy reason" for the attack on the firefighters, Pickering said, "but just looking at the history ... obviously this was an individual with a lot of problems."
Spangler opened fire around 5:45 a.m. after two of the firefighters arrived at the house in a fire truck and two others responded in their own cars, Pickering said.
Pickering appeared to wipe tears from his eyes at a news conference earlier on Monday when he identified the dead firefighters as Lieutenant Michael Chiapperini and Tomasz Kaczowka. Chiapperini was also a police lieutenant.
The injured firefighters, one of whom was in critical condition, were identified as Joseph Hofsetter and Theodore Scardino. Off-duty Police Officer John Ritter was hit by gunfire as he drove past the scene.
Pickering said police had found several types of weapons, including a rifle used to shoot the firefighters. As a convicted felon it was illegal for Spangler to own guns.
Police had not had any contact with Spangler in the "recent past," Pickering said.
Four houses were destroyed by the fire and four were damaged, Pickering said.
COPS TARGETED
Police Officer Jennifer Sebena, 30, was found dead on Monday in the Milwaukee, Wisconsin, suburb of Wauwatosa, police said.
Sebena was on patrol between 3 a.m. and 5 a.m. and wearing body armor when she was shot several times, police said. She was found by another officer after she did not respond to calls from the police dispatcher.
In Houston, Texas, an officer with the Bellaire Police Department died after a shootout at around 9 a.m. and a bystander was also killed, according to local media reports.
A spokesperson for the Houston Police Department was not immediately available for comment. A police officer answering the telephone confirmed media reports but declined further comment. A suspect was in the hospital, according to reports.
Before Monday's killings, the Washington-based National Law Enforcement Officers Memorial Fund reported that 125 federal, state and local officers had died in the line of duty this year.
Forty-seven deaths were firearms-related, 50 were from traffic-related incidents, and 28 were from other causes, it said.
(Reporting by Chris Francescani; Editing by David Brunnstrom and M.D. Golan)
Asa Hutchinson, Former GOP Rep, Longtime Gun Lobby Ally, To Lead NRA Armed School Guards Plan
Former Rep. Asa Hutchison, R-Ark., speaks during a news conference in response to the Connecticut school shooting on Friday, Dec. 21, 2012 in Washington. (AP Photo/ Evan Vucci)
By Alina Selyukh Posted: 12/21/2012 5:58 pm EST
WASHINGTON, Dec 21 (Reuters) - In 2006, a political ad swept through the state of Arkansas, touting Asa Hutchinson's values as "shaped in rural Arkansas, a half-mile down a dirt road."
In his unsuccessful bid for governor, the former federal prosecutor and U.S. congressman touted his conservative political views and garnered a strong endorsement from the National Rifle Association, a powerful U.S. gun lobby.
On Friday, the NRA announced that Hutchinson - also a former Homeland Security official and now a lawyer predominantly focused on white-collar crime - will spearhead an effort to put armed guards at schools in hopes of preventing mass shootings like the one on Dec. 14 in Connecticut that killed 20 young children and 6 adults.
"School safety is a complex issue with no simple, single solution," Hutchinson said at Friday's news conference. "But I believe trained, qualified, armed security is one key component among many that can provide the first line of deterrence as well as the last line of defense."
His effort, dubbed the National School Shield Program, would have a "budget provided by the NRA of whatever scope the task requires." It will focus on producing a security model, which may rely on local volunteers as armed security guards and would be offered for adoption at every school in America free of charge, NRA officials said.
Opponents of the plan say the United States needs to tighten gun controls rather than introduce more guns into school environments.
NRA has contributed more than $30,000 to Hutchinson's various political campaigns for state and federal offices over more than a decade, becoming one of his top backers, according to the Sunlight Foundation that tracks money in politics.
In a brief stint as a registered lobbyist at Washington law firm Venable LLP Hutchinson in 2007 represented Point Blank Body Armor, a maker of body armor for the U.S. Army, according to another money-tracking group Center for Responsive Politics,.
Hutchinson, now 62, was the youngest U.S. Attorney in the country, when Republican President Ronald Reagan appointed the then-31-year-old to the post in 1982.
In what his political ads later touted as a character-forming experience, Hutchinson at the time put on a flak jacket to negotiate a stand-off between local, state and federal law enforcement and a white supremacist group known as The Covenant, The Sword and The Arm of the Lord.
After unsuccessful bids for Senate and Arkansas state attorney general, Hutchinson became a congressman in 1996, replacing his brother Tim Hutchinson in the U.S. House of Representatives. He later served as one of the managers during the impeachment of Democratic President Bill Clinton.
At the time, he voted for a bill that would have shortened the waiting time for gun buyers for any necessary background checks to 24 hours.
Hutchinson later went on to become the administrator at the Drug Enforcement Administration and the first under-secretary of the newly-formed Department of Homeland Security under Republican President George W. Bush.
In 2006, he returned to Arkansas for his unsuccessful run for governor, during which he briefly came under fire from his Democratic opponent Mike Beebe for airing an attack ad that featured children delivering the anti-Beebe message, according to the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette at the time.
In an interview with the newspaper in October 2006, Hutchinson also shared his enthusiasm for hunting deer and other game and said his favorite hunting firearms were "a Remington 12-gauge shotgun and a Remington bolt-action .308 deer rifle."
"I think promoting hunting and shooting sports in general is a strong tradition in Arkansas, and it's a tradition that dies out if it is not passed on to the next generation," he told the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette.
When asked about the connection between hunting weapons and the Second Amendment of the U.S. Constitution, which gives Americans the right to bear arms, he said: "To me, it's a matter of freedom, it's a matter of history and tradition, and it's a matter of self-protection."
"This isn't a counter-protest, it isn't a fight against Westboro," Jude Quinn, the organizer of one of the events, told The Huffington Post. "It is a rally for the police officers. You can use the same law Westboro Baptist Church uses against them."
Quinn and fellow Topeka resident Caitlin Yoho started the events [ http://www.facebook.com/events/136171256539565/ ] through Facebook event pages earlier this week [ http://www.facebook.com/events/457561850946917/ ], and the plans have now gone viral in Kansas and the surrounding area. While the pair started their events separately on the social network, they have since spoken and plan to form one large shield. Both events have over 10,000 outstanding invitations on Facebook.
Quinn is an organizer with SilverbacksKS, a community service group, and Yoho said Take Back Topeka has also been helping to spread word of the events.
"The numbers will be shocking," Quinn said of how many people he anticipates.
The shield participants do not plan to picket or engage with Westboro, a controversial group that has gained notoriety for picketing military funerals in order to promote an anti-gay and anti-abortion rights agenda. The shield organizers said the plan is to protect the families of the two officers from the Westboro picket, while also making it difficult for Westboro to picket in close proximity to the Expocentre. Westboro member Jonathan Phelps tweeted earlier this week [ https://twitter.com/Jacob2895/status/280556714217054208/photo/1 ] that the murders of Gogian and Atherly were in response to police "abuse" of Westboro. Westboro member Margie Phelps has blamed singer Carrie Underwood's [ https://twitter.com/MargieJPhelps/status/279814384153395201 ] support of gay marriage for the Newtown shootings.
"We are telling the people of the world you ought not be mourning the loss of those children or those cops. What you ought to be mourning is our sins," Drain said.
Yoho said that she believes the current Westboro picket plans have galvanized Kansas' capital city.
"We've kind of been desensitized to this; they picket here daily unless they are out of town," Yoho told HuffPost. "People tend to not pay attention. It is hard to ignore when they do something as disgusting as picket a funeral. This is to show people that we are out here and don't agree with this. We will show our support of the city and the nation."
Walmart Sells Out of Guns, Bans 'Dangerous' Products
Published on Dec 23, 2012 by TheYoungTurks
"With President Barack Obama endorsing sweeping gun restrictions in the wake of the school shootings in Newtown, Connecticut, prices for handgun magazines are surging on EBay and semi-automatic rifles are sold out at many Wal-Mart Stores Inc.
Wal-Mart, the world's largest retailer, said yesterday that it would continue to sell guns, including rifles like the one used at Newtown, where 26 people, most of them children, were killed on Dec. 14. By contrast, Dick's Sporting Goods Inc. suspended sales of similar guns at its more than 500 stores."*
In the days following the Sandy Hook massacre, Walmart sold out of guns, including the model used by the gunman. Walmart is fine with selling these instruments, but what have they banned from sale, and why? Cenk Uygur and Ana Kasparian break it down.
Gun Violence And The Irrational Fear Of Home Invasion
By Ta-Nehisi Coates - Dec 23 2012, 4:00 PM ET 402
[ EMBEDDED VIDEO ]
Yesterday I was on Chris Hayes' show discussing gun violence. In the clip above, I talked about the importance of self-defense in my life being the son of Black Panther, a devoted Malcolmite and progeny of the Crack Era.
Professor Harold Pollack, who (among other things) co-directs the University of Chicago's Crime Lab was kind of enough to send along the following note:
~~~~~~ I enjoyed your conversation on Up with Chris Hayes. You mentioned the risk of home invasion, and the realistic fear that the cops just wouldn't get there in time. That's obviously a primeval motive to have a gun by the bedside or whatever.
But the fear is also easily out of proportion to the threat. I had the Chicago police run the number on homicides. In 2011, precisely one homicide listed "burglary" as the motive. Nationwide, there are about 100 burglary-homicides every year. When you compare that to more than 18,000 gun suicides, the conclusions seem pretty obvious. ~~~~~~
~~~~~~ Home protection provides a common, all-too-understandable motive to buy a gun. Few things are scarier than the possibility that some violent intruder will break in when you and your loved-ones are home. This risk happens to be especially vivid for me. My gentle disabled cousin was beaten to death by two teenage burglars in his New York apartment thirty years ago.
Yet having guns around bring risks, too. Practically speaking, it's not the incredibly rare risk of mass homicide, but the everyday risks of injury, accident, domestic altercations, and suicide. The relative risks matter. And the fact is: lethal home invasions and burglaries are incredibly rare. You might not think so, since dramatic cases stick in your mind and tend to receive disproportionate press coverage. These cases are rare nonetheless. ~~~~~~
Let me straight about this--from a public health perspective, does the evidence here argue for a total ban on handguns? I don't know if Harold would argue for that, but New York City effectively has such a policy in place.
I've spent this week arguing for gun control and more regulation, but for some reason I can't get myself to endorse the idea of banning handguns. Maybe I'll feel different in the week. It's just so contrary to everything I've felt all my life. Part of this is being black and having in your actual family history--and in the history of your immediate community--several instances of people (white, black, whatever) invading the home.
Is looking at homicide too small? Should we include assault? Burglary is, in of itself, an intensely traumatic experience. Is the mere fact of invading someone's home an act of aggression that justifies lethal force? I don't know.
S.W.A.T. Magazine publisher Rich Lucibella as a guest panelist on the MSNBC show "Up With Chris Hayes", discussing the realities of gun control in the wake of the Connecticut shooting. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lBvrBTdNlWA
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Lisa Graves Joins MSNBC's Up with Chris Hayes to Discuss the "Stand Your Ground" Law
It’s true that the 1994 assault weapons ban was not very effective, even before it expired (partly because it had trouble defining assault weapons, and partly because handguns kill more people than assault rifles). But if that law’s ban on the sale of high-capacity magazines had still been in effect, Adam Lanza, the gunman in Newtown, might have had to reload three times as often. http://investorshub.advfn.com/boards/read_msg.aspx?message_id=82654887
It's been just over eight years since the assault weapons ban expired, and in that time new gun control bills have been scarce. There are a variety of reasons for the deafening legislative silence, including a cowardly lack of political will and a river of gun industry cash that flows into campaign war chests every day. But it's also because radical gun fetishists led by the NRA have been supremely effective with clever marketing and misinformation campaigns intended to undermine the brutal realities of the American gun culture.
You've probably seen many of their finest agitprop slogans plastered all over Facebook, Twitter and the right-wing blogosphere these days. They're artfully designed to be digested by people who desperately want them to be true -- in this case, kneejerk gun enthusiasts starved for solid, airtight, easy-to-remember trump cards that are capable of defeating liberal gun control arguments with swift precision. Unfortunately for them, the slogans are about as thin as the bumpers stickers they're printed on.
PROPAGANDA: Guns don't kill people, people kill people.
REALITY: This is probably the most prevalent, yet silliest line. No, an inanimate object can't spring to life and kill anyone. But a gun's intrinsic purpose is to kill, wound and threaten living beings. It's why they exist. Period. The firearms used at Aurora, Tucson, Sandy Hook and so many other mass shootings are specifically categorized as "assault rifles." The intention is, by definition, to assault. They're aggressive weapons intended to physically attack and do harm. Otherwise they'd be called "defense weapons" or "protection weapons." So, no, guns don't kill people, but people with guns and bullets kill lots of people. Around 30,000-plus per year in America.
PROPAGANDA: But cars kill a lot of people and no one wants to ban them!
REALITY: How do we deal with cars in America, compared with how we deal with guns in America? Cars and drivers are heavily regulated by the government, from emissions standards to annual inspections to safety features, and so forth. You can't legally drive a car that doesn't feature seatbelts, or a car that spews too much exhaust into the air. You have to take both a written and a behind-the-wheel test to get a license to operate a car. You often have to renew that license at regular intervals and, if you're older, you have to prove that you're physically capable of driving a car. You can't drive a car while drinking alcohol or impaired by other chemicals. There are thousands of police officers patrolling our roads and, as most of us have experienced at one time or another, they will penalize or arrest you for improper handling of a car -- with literally hundreds of laws to abide, and considerable penalties, ranging from fines to imprisonment to the government stripping you of your right to drive a car at all. So if gun fetishists are going to keep using this car analogy, then let's talk about regulating guns and gun owners the same way we regulate cars and drivers.
PROPAGANDA: You can kill someone just as easily with a knife as you can with a gun!
REALITY: Outrageously wrong. Ask any average soldier whether they'd prefer to attack an enemy with knife or with their rifle. After they laugh in your face, they'll obviously tell you they prefer their rifle. During the American Civil War, soldiers would rarely if ever use their bayonets in combat because the experience of stabbing someone was much more offensively visceral and gruesome than simply shooting them from a relative distance. Furthermore, how many mass stabbings (including meat cleavers) have there been in America? Two that we know of .. http://www.spartancops.com/edged-weapon-mass-murder/ . The number of mass stabbings in world? Eleven. On the other hand, how many mass shootings have there been in America? Twenty-six since Columbine and not including any prior massacres. Some gun fetishists have noted that a mass stabbing occurred in China last week .. http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2248054/China-stabbing-22-children-elderly-woman-stabbed-outside-primary-school-Chinese-knifeman.html , with 22 victims. However, what they won't tell you, perhaps because they don't know, is that not one of those victims died.
PROPAGANDA: It's safer to have a gun in the house, or concealed on your person.
~~~~~~ In a first-of its-kind study, epidemiologists at the University of Pennsylvania School of Medicine found that, on average, guns did not protect those who possessed them from being shot in an assault. The study estimated that people with a gun were 4.5 times more likely to be shot in an assault than those not possessing a gun. ~~~~~~
~~~~~~ Author David Hemenway studied the various risks of having a gun in the home, including accidents, suicide, homicide, and intimidation. Additionally, the benefits of having a firearm in a household were also examined and those benefits included deterrence, and thwarting crimes (self-defense). From this in-depth look, it was concluded that homes with guns were not safer or deter more crime than those that do not. In fact, it was found that in homes with children or women, the health risks were even greater. "Whereas most men are murdered away from home," wrote Hemenway. "Most children, older adults, and women are murdered at home. A gun in the home is a particularly strong risk factor for female homicide victimization." ~~~~~~
One more...
PROPAGANDA: Banning guns won't stop mass shootings because of the outlaws, blah blah blah.
REALITY: Once again, totally not true. Australia, May 1996, a lone gunman killed 35 people and wounded an additional 23. Subsequently, Australia passed a very strict gun control law that included a buy-back program that managed to recover 600,000 assault rifles and other arms -- 20 percent of all the known firearms in Australia. There were no more private sales of firearms, there were stringent registration laws, and, as with other nations, you had to prove to authorities that you had a specific reason for purchasing a firearm. And no, according to Slate .. http://www.slate.com/blogs/crime/2012/12/16/gun_control_after_connecticut_shooting_could_australia_s_laws_provide_a.html , self-defense wasn't a valid excuse. What happened after that?
~~~~~~ Violent crime and gun-related deaths did not come to an end in Australia, of course. But as the Washington Post's Wonkblog pointed out in August, homicides by firearm plunged 59 percent between 1995 and 2006, with no corresponding increase in non-firearm-related homicides. The drop in suicides by gun was even steeper: 65 percent. Studies found a close correlation between the sharp declines and the gun buybacks. Robberies involving a firearm also dropped significantly. Meanwhile, home invasions did not increase, contrary to fears that firearm ownership is needed to deter such crimes. But here's the most stunning statistic. In the decade before the Port Arthur massacre, there had been 11 mass shootings in the country. There hasn't been a single one in Australia since. ~~~~~~
I think that's enough for now. If you spot any more of these slogans and arguments, drop me a note via Facebook, Twitter or in the comments below and we'll work together to debunk this specious clap-trap once and for all. Doing so will help to unravel the deeply entrenched gun culture in America, and this must be an ongoing commitment, running concurrently with any and all legislation that comes as a result of these horrifying gun massacres.
I can remember obama, telling Barbara Walters, what was clear to me, that he did not wish to see the shootings become a political issue about guns, because he felt the event to be personal, not political. Now, with all the media attn. on guns. PPl will buy more out of fear. It was an ill mind that pulled the trigger.
The opposite of Love, is not hate, it is FEAR.
President Obama Cries Over Connecticut Shooting 14.12.2012
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