Brady boss mixes beating with guns
Brady Campaign President Paul Helmke apparently got mixed up or was deliberately exploiting the beating death of Chicago high school student Derrion Albert when he released a statement that “The youth violence problem in Chicago is a gun violence problem.”
Albert was the young man beaten to death by a group of thugs in an infamous video that shows one of his attackers wielding what has been identified as a railroad tie. Albert was not shot.
Yet when Education Secretary Arne Duncan and anti-gun Attorney General Eric Holder visited Chicago in October to talk with Mayor Richard Daley about youth violence, Helmke issued his statement.
“Illegal guns are being trafficked into Chicago and then used to kill school-aged children,” Helmke lamented. “I look forward to Secretary Duncan and Attorney General Holder offering specific solutions about how the Obama Administration will help keep guns away from children, illegal gun traffickers and dangerous people.”
Helmke offered no such encouragement about keeping railroad ties away from “dangerous people.”
IN court tosses suit over false firearms claim
The Indiana Supreme Court says two men who sued Papa John’s USA Inc. when they were detained by police after an employee falsely accused one of them of pulling a gun have no case because the statement to officers was privileged information under state law, according to the Associated Press.
But a justice who dissented from the 3-2 ruling noted that employee Kelly Tharp later pleaded guilty to false reporting.
Thomas Williams and Sanford Kelsey were handcuffed and detained by Westfield police for more than an hour. No gun was found.
Three of the justices held that there was insufficient evidence that the employee had knowingly lied.
Texas concealed carry license applications up
A growing number of Lone Star State citizens are packing heat, according to the Montgomery County Courier newspaper, and they provided some data from the Texas Department of Public Safety (DPS) to back that up.
The surge in carry permit applications began in December 2008, and during the first six months of this year, DPS reportedly received an average of 12,700 permit applications per month, and that is up 46% from the same period in 2008, the newspaper said. Last year during the first six months, the monthly average for carry permit applications was 8,700.
In an unusual development, the Oak Ridge City Council has given permission to its police department to conduct concealed handgun license classes at the nominal cost of $10, the newspaper reported.
Carter’s Country in Spring, a Houston suburb, had been offering two classes each week instead of just one for several months, but demand fell in May, so there is now only one course each week. Classes have been offered at the store for the past 14 years, the newspaper noted. The store’s instructor, Bruce Gilchrist, suggested that economics have played a role in the slowdown rather than lack of interest. He said more women and elderly residents are taking CHL classes.
Police slayings down sharply during ’08
The number of police officers killed in the line of duty last year dropped to the lowest point since 1999, according to data released by the FBI in October.
In 2008, according to the agency, 41 police officers were slain on the job, which was a sharp drop from the 58 killed in the line of duty in 2007. In 1999, 42 officers were killed on duty.
There were 68 officer deaths from other causes last year, with 68 officers killed in accidents, primarily car crashes.
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