It has emerged that Vester Flanagan, the reporter in Virginia who shot two of his ex colleagues in cold blood while on live TV passed a government-required background check and acquired his gun legally.
Buzzfeed reports that it has spoken with Thomas Faison, a spokesman for the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives, who confirmed that Flanagan’s Glock 19 pistol was bought “weeks ago,” and that Flanagan had successfully passed all the required background checks.
Faison also noted that Flanagan had purchased a second gun.
The finding again makes void arguments made by those calling for universal background checks.
One such person was Democratic Virginia Governor Terry McAuliffe, who within 3 hours of the killings was calling for new gun control legislation to ensure checks for all gun purchases.
The same arguments were made in the Dylan Roof case in June, until it emerged that the weapon Roof used was legally acquired.
Initial reports suggest that Roof had stolen the gun from his father. However, CNN later reported that he actually BOUGHT it from a shop, after passing a background check.
This begs the question then, if background checks on all firearm transactions are the one stop solution to gun crime, then how did Roof, a known felon, pass the background check that we are told over and over again is the key to reducing gun violence?
Indeed, it is the case that the majority of other mass shooters in recent years managed to buy the firearms they used legally after passing background checks.
The shooters at Virginia Tech, the Aurora Colorado movie theater, Fort Hood, Isla Vista, the Washington Navy Yard, the attempted mass killing at Arapahoe High School ALL passed background checks.
The shooter at Washington Navy Yard even managed to buy his firearm after the background check system was supposedly strengthened following the incident at Virgina Tech.
The fact is that criminals break the laws, and it seems the laws don’t work anyway. Further infringing on the rights of those who abide by the laws will not change either of these situations.
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Steve Watson is a London based writer and editor for Alex Jones’ Infowars.com, and Prisonplanet.com. He has a Masters Degree in International Relations from the School of Politics at The University of Nottingham, and a Bachelor Of Arts Degree in Literature and Creative Writing from Nottingham Trent University.
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