Ohio Sheriff: Accident Led to Amish Girl's Shooting Death
FREDERICKSBURG, Ohio – A man cleaning his muzzle-loading rifle shot the gun into the air, accidentally killing a 15-year-old Amish girl driving a horse-drawn buggy more than a mile away, a sheriff said Tuesday.A quibble, first. This was no accident. This was negligence, plain and simple. The four rules do not stop being applicable simply because it's a blackpowder firearm. The fourth rule is very much needed for cases like this - this imbecile decided that the best way to clear his firearm was to shoot it. Now, you or I would either a) Clear it that way before leaving the range to be safe; b) unload it the correct way (which, I will admit, may not be possible/easy to do with a BP firearm; or c) fire the damn thing into the ground where you know it won't hit anything vital.
Rachel Yoder was shot in the head Thursday night while traveling to her home in Wayne County, between Columbus and Akron. She had attended a Christmas party for employees, most of them under 18 years old, at an Amish produce farm and was riding home alone when she was shot, Wayne County sheriff's Capt. Douglas Hunter said.
Secondly: A mile and a half. From a black powder weapon. Think about that the next time you're tempted to launch one up in the air because "we're out in the middle of nowhere". There's still an ongoing investigation, so more evidence may come to light proving or disproving this idea, but right now it looks like one dumbass a mile and a half away killed someone completely accidentally. Had he been obeying the four rules, this young woman would still be alive. The story says no charges have been filed; I certainly hope they can pin an involuntary manslaughter charge on him at the least.
Because, you know, you do something as stupid as fire your gun randomly in the air, you deserve to be out a good $10K for a legal defense and/or a felony conviction...
That is all.
7 comments:
Aw, cr... um, crud. I read about the girl being found dead of a GSW (with signs she didn't die immediately) and figured it was some jackass with a .22 trying to scare her horse and missed. (I grew up in Ohio. It happens.) But this is just plain stupid. No, it wasn't an accident, but it was effing random. I think that annoys me worse.
I am amazed how the press keep using the term "accident." Why do they give this bozo a pass? Any other time we'd hear how gun owners are irresponsible.
Are Amish girls less worthy of outrage? Does the shooter know somebody?
As I commented over at Unc's, we don't really know the entire story. I guess it's *possible* the guy didn't know it was loaded. Maybe he bought it used. Maybe he had loaned it out. SOP before loading, storing, or cleaning a muzzle loader is to "snap caps". That means you install a percussion cap on the nipple of what you believe to be an unloaded gun and fire it in a safe direction. This would be the same as firing a centerfire cartrige that was primed but unloaded with powder or bullet. This is generally the safest way to ensure the gun is in fact unloaded and safe. Some guys will mark off their ramrod how far it should go in an empty barrel and just check that way, but even then you really should snap a few caps off first.
Even giving him that benefit of doubt, this was still gun safety fail that cost a life.
Oh, and 10 grand wont even pay for my cousin Vinnie to defend the case.
"Because, you know, you do something as stupid as fire your gun randomly in the air, you deserve to be out a good $10K for a legal defense and/or a felony conviction..."
Well, any gun besides a shotgun loaded with birdshot. We shoot those into the air all the time.
The problem with muzzleloaders is that too many seem to think that they ARE like a shotgun.
People forget that for a LONG time, much longer than metal cartridges have been around, muzzleloaders killed all kinds of things, including elephants. They generally did it at eyeball distance, because there were no decent scopes, but the laws of physics haven't changed, and when you throw a heavy chunk of lead out of a steel pipe it travels for quite a distance.
This is tragic. This guy messed up big time, but the same could have happened shooting AT something and having a ricochet, or a pass through. Throw lead enough, and bad things will happen, its simply the law of percentages, or as the russian saying goes, "Is gun, is not safe!"
Russian does not use the present tense of "is" as we do in English. The "is" is assumed to be there. The Russian would be "gun not safe" or "that gun, that not safe" or "it gun, it not safe".
It used to be 10 rules when I was a kid, and I think that may be something to think about. We can all remember stats to out favorite sports idols and how fast this or that car is and the ballistics of a .403 dingleberry at 400 yds, but that is all trivia! People overlook that the 4 rules are practical and crucial to the survival of each other never mind our Constitutional rights. Everyone is in a rush to get everything done yesterday or the easy way. This is a lazy pathetic way to live your life. I'm sorry, but we need to throw the book at whoever is responsible for this. If we don't police ourselves, then The Brady-ots will do it for us.
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