Odd News Reports Shape Editor’s Closing Column
February 20, 2006
by Joseph P. Tartaro
Executive Editor
My Hindsight column is frequently the last thing written for each issue of Gun Week. Most of the time when I approach a column, I have a particular subject I want to comment on or call to the attention of our readers, or a personal viewpoint I want to put in the record.
But sometimes, as I scan through news stories and clippings that come in daily and even hourly, I have to admit to being a bit stunned. Usually about how the world has changed so much in my many years.
Many of our readers have their own recollections of different times, different values and what I can only say is a different social environment, but when you look at the following four stories I have selected from the news services in the closing days of January, you see why I am sometimes bewildered a bit by it all.
Kids Beat UPS Driver
According to a Jan. 30 CBS report from Bellwood, IL, a United Parcel Service (UPS) driver was savagely beaten by middle school students while delivering packages in the western suburbs of Chicago.
The attack happened in Bellwood along the 3200 block of St. Charles.
In a CBS 2 excusive, reporter Joanie Lum talked to the man who was savagely beaten just trying to do his job.
UPS driver Thomas Murphy says he was beaten by a group of school kids on busy St. Charles Road in Bellwood, the route he has driven for 12 years.
He says a teenager walked out in front of his delivery truck at about 3 p.m. on Jan. 27. When he stopped the truck, 15 to 20 youths surrounded him.
“Somebody clocked me with a pipe. I took kicks from my right. My eyes caked over. I tried to get up and defend myself as best I could,” Murphy said.
He was beaten from his head to his ankles.
“I remember being down on one knee, falling to the ground with kids on top of me,” Murphy said.
He thinks a passing motorist called for help.
The Bellwood police believe the attackers came from Roosevelt Middle School, located a couple of blocks away. They have stepped up patrols in the area.
“If other delivery drivers are going to face this, we want our patrols in the area,” said Bellwood Police Chief Robert Collins.
“Somebody should be held accountable for these kids. They run wild like a pack of wolves, where’s the parents?” Murphy said.
In spite of his trauma, Murphy says he wants to get back to work.
“I have every intention of getting back on my route. I’d like to do it with some sense of security,” he said.
Police say an anonymous witness has come forward with the names of several people involved in the attack. Murphy identified a couple of people in a photo lineup Jan. 30, but no one’s been arrested yet.
Jan. 30 Post Office Deaths
On Jan. 31, Associated Press reported, that a female ex-postal worker opened fire at a mail processing plant in Goleta, CA, killing six people and critically wounding another before committing suicide, citing police statements.
Deputies responding to a call of shots fired about 9:15 p.m. on Jan. 30 found two people dead outside the plant.
Two wounded women were located inside and were taken to Santa Barbara Cottage Hospital. One died and the other was listed in critical condition early Jan. 31 with a gunshot wound to the head.
Nearly five hours later, deputies found four additional bodies, including one believed to be the female shooter, Santa Barbara County Sheriff Jim Anderson said. The shooter, who was not identified, died of an apparent self-inflicted gunshot wound, he said.
“We do not believe there is any additional threat to the community,” Anderson said.
The Monday night rampage sent dozens of employees running from the sprawling distribution center and prompted authorities to warn nearby residents to stay indoors.
Postal employee Charles Kronick told KEYT-TV in Santa Barbara that he was inside the building when shots rang out. Some 50 to 60 employees were seen running from the plant.
“I heard something that sounded like a pop, and then I heard a couple seconds later, another pop, pop, pop,” Kronick said.
His boss came running over and told him to get out of the building, Kronick said, adding “We all hightailed it out real quick.”
The victims’ names were not immediately released. Sheriffs’ Sgt. Erik Raney said all the victims were believed to be current employees.
The 200,000-square-foot facility is located just a few blocks from the University of California, Santa Barbara. About 300 people are employed at the plant in Goleta, about 90 miles northwest of Los Angeles.
Kill Fish with Kindness
The Chicago Sun-Times reported at the end of January that People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA) believes that if we kill fish we should do it with kindness.
To alleviate the finny critters’ pain and suffering, Illinois should require fishermen to follow a “Code of Angling Ethics” before they’re issued a license, the animal rights group said.
“Just like dogs and cats, fish feel pain, so if you wouldn’t hook dogs through the mouth and drag them behind your car, you shouldn’t hook fish through the mouth and drag them behind your boat,” said PETA’s Karin Robertson, according to the newspaper.
Robertson, PETA’s fish empathy project manager, said more than 500 research papers attest to fish intelligence. “They use tools—there is a South African fish that lays its eggs on a leaf and transports them around on it to protect them from predators and strong currents,” she said. “Fish socialize with each other and have very long-term memories.”
“The code, established by the National Marine Fisheries Service, urges careful handling and release of any unwanted fish,” the story continued.
That any organization should have a “fish empathy project manager” at a time in our history when middle school students gang up and attack a UPS delivery man on his regular route may be a measure of our times.
Here in Buffalo, NY, we have a new school superintendent who is trying gamely to solve the problem of violence in grammar and high school level students, including incidents in which teachers, principals and teachers aides are injured directly or as collateral damage in gang fights. I’m sure his struggles to curb violence are repeated in school district after school district every day all across the country.
But such things apparently shouldn’t worry us, because someone is really ready to help.
Hillary Sees Impatience
To conclude this column, I will cite a Jan. 30 Newsmax.com report which may also be instructive.
Americans are growing “impatient” as they wait for a woman to be elected president, 2008 presidential candidate Hillary Clinton said on Jan. 28, according to NewsMax.
“People are saying, ‘Well, at least we’re ready,’ ” Clinton told interviewer Jane Pauley, as the two held a public chat for charity in San Francisco.
“There’s a feeling that it’s time,” she added.
Then, in quotes picked up by the The New York Sun, the former first lady said she detected “a certain impatience” to see a female president following the election of women to similar roles in other countries.
Despite Mrs. Clinton’s claims, a Gallup poll the same week found that 51% of Americans had already made up their minds not to vote for her.
The top Democrat offered the comments after Pauley noted that President Bush had recently said she’d make a “formidable” candidate.
Mrs. Clinton declined to return the compliment however, and instead blasted Bush for mishandling the rebuilding of New Orleans after it was destroyed by Hurricane Katrina. Return to Archive Index
