Want To Treat Guns Like Cars?

Are you SURE about that?

Driver gets 3 years in pedestrian fatality

A Lawrence man has pleaded guilty to charges that he was drunk when he struck and killed a jogger in Methuen last year. David Diaz was sentenced Monday in Salem Superior Court to up to 3 years in prison after pleading guilty to motor vehicle homicide with a blood alcohol content of .08 or greater and being reckless or negligent.

Prosecutors say that Diaz, 24, had been drinking before he struck Lay Bou, 56, just after 8 a.m. Feb. 5, 2010. Bou, a father of six, had been out on his regular morning jog. He suffered head trauma and was taken to an area hospital, where he was pronounced dead. Diaz was arrested at a hospital where he went for treatment of minor injuries.

Three years for killing someone while driving drunk (at 8 o'clock in the morning!). Oh, wait. "UP TO" three years - if this guy serves more than six months I'll donate to MADD. Now, imagine if you will. BillyBob Gunowner gets liquored up on Saturday night and starts randomly firing his AK-47 at the general public. He hits someone and kills them. What are the odds of him only serving "up to three years"?

Why do we treat automobiles like toys? You screw up driving a car and someone dies, and it's no big deal. Actual accidents involving firearms - like hunters shooting at the wrong target - are quiet rare, yet get tons of press; fatal accidents involving cars are relegated to the back pages, ho hum, nothing to see here. Murder is still murder, dead is still dead; whether the tool used irresponsibly to cause it is a car or a firearm makes no difference to the poor bastard being lowered into the ground.

For those that want to treat guns like cars, they'd better start making stiffer penalties for hurting others with automobiles first...

That is all.