What's Missing Here?

Tip from teen’s mother aided search for suspects

Police detectives scrambling with little evidence to solve the weekend killing of an elderly grocery clerk were able to make swift arrests after receiving several key tips, including one from the mother of one of the teenage suspects, according to several law enforcement officials with knowledge of the case.

The mother, Germaine Northcross, had called police to say she believed that her 16-year-old son, Onyx White, had been involved in the robbery and killing, according to the officials, who asked to remain anonymous because of the ongoing investigation.

There's the usual hand-wringing about how these were boys that "fell through the cracks" and came from families known to law enforcement. There's the inevitable tagging of this as a "senseless" killing - as though any other robbery where the clerk is killed is any less senseless; as though sticking up a store for a couple hundred bucks is worth taking the life of another.

But what's missing - and most telling in MA, home of the "More likely to live here" gun laws and top three Brady ranking - is any editorializing about the fact that it was a gun used to kill the store clerk. The usual anti-gun suspects are quick to dabble in the blood of the recently deceased when it fits the narrative; it's quite telling that they want no part of this story.

Let's recap:

• Underage perpetrators
• Criminal records
• No license to carry
• Not elilgible to purchase ammunition
• High Brady ranking in MA for our gun laws

In the third most restrictive state, one that requires a permit to simply own a firearm, let alone carry one, two underaged criminals still managed to get ahold of a gun. In a state where it is required that a gun owner keep their firearms under lock and key, two hoodlums still procured a firearm. This wasn't swiped from the nightstand of a grandparent in a state with "loose" gun laws - this was a gun somehow produced in one of the most heavily regulated states in the nation with regards to firearms.

And yet underaged thugs still managed to get a gun. Think about that the next time someone tells you that all we need is "X" gun law(s) to stop the violence. In Massachusetts, where possession of a single piece of brass is a felony if you don't have the proper permit, two teenagers got a gun and killed someone with it. What law will stop that? What legislation could we possibly pass that would make criminals less likely to break the law again? Hint: None.

All we can do is punish those that break the law, and punish them severely. Of course, this is Massachusetts, where they'd rather prosecute someone for having a collapsible police baton than for killing their brother in cold blood. Depending on the "justice" system to reduce crime is unlikely to work. The only person who can truly help you be safe is you - not the cop on the corner, not the judge in the courtroom. You are the only person who stands a chance in the face of those that refuse to behave according to society's laws and mores.

And you stand a much better chance of prevailing with 10 rounds of 230 grain equalization than a piece of paper and strong words.

That is all.