Yesterday saw a shooting and hostage situation at the city of Tacoma’s largest center of public commerce, the Tacoma Mall.
A lone 20yr old man walked into the mall armed with a rifle and fired approximately 20 rounds, wounding six people, one of which is still in Tacoma General Hospital in critical condition. He then took a half dozen people hostage in the Sam Goody music store and held them there for a few hours.
At around 1600PST he released the hostages and surrendered.
The media is going apeshit with this story, and not just in a bad way: There is, of course, the standard “The Armed Gunman� talk, like there is any other kind of gunman, and they keep saying that the guy had an AK47, although the authorities have yet to confirm that.
The guy’s name has been released as being Dominick Maldonado who has an extensive criminal past, including multiple juvenile convictions for crimes such as burglary and possible gang ties. The local news stations have also interviewed Maldonado’s former girlfriend and acquaintances whom he text messaged and called on his mobile phone during the stand-off. They are saying that Maldonado was not exactly what you might call ‘mentally stable’, which I would have gathered as well after reading crap like this that he sent out,
“The world will feel my anger.”
What will hopefully come out, since the guy is alive, is where he got his rifle (and what make, model and caliber it was) and just what the hell he was thinking. So far, his ex is saying that he felt that no one was listening to him.
I can foresee into the future, this jackass whining his way into a short term stay at a mental institution and then getting released out onto the streets again.
Brian Maloney at The Radio Equalizer Blog is reporting that the local news stations went whole-hog on this story, even keeping the local police from contacting Maldonado for negotiations by calling directly into the store and carrying on conversations with the hostages
According to accounts, Tacoma police officers actually had trouble reaching anyone inside the Sam Goody store where employees had been taken hostage, due to tied up phone lines.
Why? Because during the standoff, news media outlets were flooding the store with calls.
Now, the reason I doubt the claim that he had an AK47 is this,
Roberta Davis, 53, of Port Orchard, said she had been shopping at JC Penney and never felt the bullet pass through her thigh as she fled.
“I didn’t realize I’d been shot until partway through my run,” she said. “I said to my husband, ‘Oh, my leg hurts.’ I looked down at my pant and there was a hole in it and blood coming down my leg.”
That would have to be one light flesh wound for a 53 year old woman to not notice being hit by a .30cal projectile at close range, even with the adrenaline flowing.
As soon as more info come outs, I’ll let you know.
You sentiments seep though your words AK, but I’m here to tell you that you need to put it in writing. Since you are currently in your sleep period, I’ll do it for you:
Rule #1 of being adequately armed: Don’t wait for the shit to hit the fan to buy the weapons that you will need when it does. If you want an AK-47, you need to get it NOW, or get two, they’re cheap.
Rule #2 of being adequately armed: Always assume that there will, in the future, be an attempt by the government to disarm you. Buy your weapons as anonymously as you can, even paying more in private deals if you can. When you have sufficient weapons, have enough to have two full suites of them (pistol, shotgun and carbine at a minimum). Put one suite in a place away from your home, as anonymously as possible, but a place that you will be able to get to when the SHTF.
Rule #3, of course, is take care of your weapons and practice with them. Have a proper purchase, maintenance and ammo budget in your financial scheme.
If you follow these rules, you will not be terror-struck every time some bad guy does a crime with an assault weapon and the press makes a big deal of it.
BTW, this guy is a copy of the DC shooter of last year (or was it the year before last?). There will always be chumps like this, and the lefty press will always make a big deal out of it.
The way you counter this, of course, is by telling everyone who mentions the situation to you that if any of the customers in the store or patrons in the mall has been armed and willing to use their weapon, and knew how to overcome the chump’s advantage of range, the guy would be on an autopsy table by now, and fewer people would have been hurt.
THAT is your reply to anyone who utters “oh those awful assault weapons”. The cure for armed crime is armed citizens.
Period.