Law enforcement are bringing manslaughter charges against the shooter, who apparently didn't know the gun was loaded.
Let's assume the best. The three friends were sitting around discussing firearms while handling a gun. No alcohol or jesting that would cause carelessness. The shooter isn't pointing the gun at the head of the victim and it goes off. To me, that's the best scenario here, given the facts that have been reported.
The two witnesses panic and leave the apartment. They struggle all day with what has happened and finally agree to call the police. According to the news story they tell the police they should go and "check on Wilson (the victim)."
Four days later the shooter stands in front of the whole state of Maine on the most contentious moral issue of our time and offers testimony. Is it just me or is something terribly wrong here?
Even if the description above were accurate (and we already know it is worse because the District Attorney admitted the three men were participating in "something like" Russian Roulette) this story raises so many questions.
- What were the men doing when the shooter pulled the trigger? What is "something like" Russian roulette.
- Why did they wait all day to confess? If I were innocent in this matter I'd be either running for the hills or to the police to confess. The casual quality of both the shooting and the response of the law enforcement community is curious.
- What sort of thinking and emotions govern a man who can put a bullet in another man's head that kills him, then a short four days later testify in the most high-profile public hearing of 2009? I can't imagine what is going through this man's head.
- Did the organizers of the hearing know this happened? And if not, why not? The Attorney General appeared in the same testimony line as the shooter and his "lover." I would think they would be keeping this man from giving testimony, if they knew about the shooting. The homosexual community is pretty tight in Maine. I'd find it hard to believe they didn't know what was going on here.
If the shooter was a Christian man who testified at the hearing against homosexual marriage how would this propaganda opportunity be playing out publicly?
Point 4 is awful. You're making improper implications. Just because you perceive the man homosexual community as "pretty tight", it does not follow that they know everything every gay person in the state does. This isn't much different from meeting a black guy in Aroostook and asking him if he knows your black friend in Kennebec.
ReplyDeleteSo you ask how this would play out publicly if Christians were involved. In other words, you're saying a lot of propaganda would be prevalent if the tables were turned. Okay, let's say that's true. So what? Anyone who criticized the Christians would be making ad hominen attacks. They may be awfully stupid people, but that is not on what we judge their words. If they testified, we should look at their arguments and assess those. Assessing the individuals is not relevant. Beside that, I thought it was up to your particular god to judge like that, not you.
Respectfully, I think this post is very unfair. Assuming these men acted the way the AG said they did, then they are reckless and possibly disturbed. The article says that they have owned and operated a small business for many years and says nothing about any prior criminal record, so their motives and conduct are puzzling.
ReplyDeleteWhatever was going on with these specific individuals, it is misguided to suggest that organizers of a committee hearing in Augusta should or could have known about a shooting that had happened in Portland only 3 days earlier and for which no charges had yet been filed. According to the article hundreds of people testified at that hearing, so it is not like people were screened for recent unrelated criminal conduct.
It is even more unfair to suggest that the gay community at large knew about the shooting because "the homosexual community is pretty tight in Maine." What does that mean? That all gays in the state know each other and that they know what each one has done over the past 72 hours? We don't know the first thing about who these men know or what they may have told friends.
It would be wrong to use this sort of thing if a pro-traditional marriage supporter turned out to have committed an unrelated criminal act, so I don't see how you can justify using it to attack the pro-gay marriage side.