The Telegraph finally reaches the conclusion which has been obvious to many Americans all along: Gun control laws impact only law-abiding citizens. The criminal, who has already decided to commit robbery or murder, will hardly shrink from the footling addition of an additional charge of illegal gun possession.

For James Andre Smartt-Ford, 16, Michael Dosunmu, 15, and Billy Cox, 15, the hand-wringing by police and politicians over the escalation of gun crime comes a little late: all three have been shot dead in south London over the past 10 days…

We have… the toughest gun control laws in the world. They have actually proved strikingly ineffectual.

Gun crime has doubled since they were introduced. Young hoodlums are able to acquire handguns – either replica weapons that have been converted, or imports from eastern Europe – with ease. With no dedicated frontier police, our borders remain hopelessly porous. The only people currently incommoded by the firearms laws are legitimate holders of shotgun licences, who are subjected to the most onerous police checks.

… what a price we are paying.

AP:

Members of an all-male singing group from Yale University say they were taunted with anti-gay slurs, attacked and beaten after singing “The Star Stangled Banner” at a New Year’s Eve party in San Francisco.

At least three members of the Baker’s Dozen a cappella group were hurt. One suffered a broken jaw.

No arrests have been made. Police said they are investigating.

The trouble started when a couple of partygoers began mocking the 16 student singers _ who wore sports jackets and ties _ as preppies, witnesses said.

“You’re not welcome here,” Sharyar Aziz Jr., an 18-year-old Baker’s Dozen member whose jaw was broken, quoted one partygoer as saying. “He called a few members of the group, whether it was fag or homo, very, I would say, juvenile taunting.”

Reno Rapagnani, a retired San Francisco police officer whose daughter hosted the event, shut down the party. As the singers headed back to a nearby home where they were staying, another group of young men got out of a van and jumped them, according to Rapagnani.

“They were surrounded, then tripped _ and when they were on the ground, they were kicked,” Rapagnani said.

Two other Yale students needed medical treatment following the fight, one for a concussion and the other for cuts and a swollen ankle.

Police said they arrived and found about 20 people fighting in the street. They interviewed some of the participants but let them go after taking their names.

KESQ:

There’s a growing sense of outrage among some in San Francisco over a New Year’s Eve fight in which members of a Yale University singing group was beaten and some ended up in the hospital.

As first reported by Dan Noyes of A-B-C affiliate K-G-O T-V, members of Yale’s all-male a capella group — The Baker’s Dozen — were reportedly jumped by a vehicle full of young men after they left a New Year’s Eve house party in San Francisco.

One Yale student — Sharyar Aziz — had his jaw broken in two places during the fracas. Others in the group were bloodied and bruised as well.

The party was being held at the home of Reno Rapagnani, a retired San Francisco Police Department lawyer. The trouble started at midnight after The Baker’s Dozen sang “The Star Spangled Banner.”

Witnesses say some of the local men didn’t appreciate the attention the Yale students were getting, called them derogatory names and made threats that they apparently followed up on.

The Yale Daily News has more details.

Joseph D. McNamara reflects in the Wall Street Journal, in connection with those 50 shots fired in the Sean Bell affair, on an increasing dangerous phenomenon in American life: the militarization of our police.

Simply put, the police culture in our country has changed. An emphasis on “officer safety” and paramilitary training pervades today’s policing, in contrast to the older culture, which held that cops didn’t shoot until they were about to be shot or stabbed. Police in large cities formerly carried revolvers holding six .38-caliber rounds. Nowadays, police carry semi-automatic pistols with 16 high-caliber rounds, shotguns and military assault rifles, weapons once relegated to SWAT teams facing extraordinary circumstances. Concern about such firepower in densely populated areas hitting innocent citizens has given way to an attitude that the police are fighting a war against drugs and crime and must be heavily armed.

There have been a lot of police in my family, and I grew up around the older school police culture and mentality.

When I was a boy, I once complained to my father that his injunctions about standing up to bullies were impractical when one was outnumbered, and he assured me that the man who knows that he is in the right has a natural powerful advantage over those in the wrong, which is usually decisive in and of itself. Moreover, he observed, criminals and bullies are basically all cowards anyway, and are generally scared to face anyone willing to stand up to them.

There are some limits to the theory, of course, but my life experience persuades me that my father was perfectly correct.

When I was a boy, I also commonly heard the Pennsylvania equivalent versions of the Texan “one riot, one Ranger” story. Policemen typically believed, like my father, that moral ascendancy and personal courage counted for a lot more than brute force.

And, in the old days, police were trained to shoot only as the last possible resort, and to take good aim and hit what you were intending. The idea that police officers required “firepower” would have been laughed at by the men I knew back then. “Firepower?” they would have said. “For what?”

I knew men who served as policemen for thirty years, who never fired on another man once, but who had taken many an armed criminal into custody. If it had ever come to shooting, none of them would ever likely have needed more than one shot per man.

About ten years ago, when I was still living in Connecticut, you could already see the Barney Fife-ification of small town police work setting in. In Brookfield, one day, I saw a local cop stop at McDonald’s for a meal. He was armed with a 15-round Beretta pistol, and was carrying an extra five loaded magazines on his belt. Was he anticipating an attack by a Zulu impi? I wondered. It seemed like an awful lot of weight to carry around, considering the fact that no police officer in Brookfield’s history had ever previously needed to fire a shot in anger.

In my own Connecticut town, the chief of police was always junketing off to remote locations for special FBI training. The Board of Selectmen rained on his parade a bit, when they declined to fund his proposed sniper team. But the federal government nonetheless graciously provided him with a large variety of expensive toys, running the gamut from full-auto M-16s to night-vision devices.

One day, I needed to drop by the Newtown police station to pick up the form for my gun permit. I found myself talking to a secretary hidden away in a bank teller’s window behind bulletproof glass. The police station was now locked up, and fortified. You never know, some aggrieved citizen offended over a parking ticket might drop in one day and attack the poor cowering Newtown cops. The FBI, you see, had told our chief that security was important. You can’t just let ordinary citizens walk in on you.

And so it goes. We increasingly have a bunch of self-important paranoids, practicing and posing in the latest and most expensive hi-tech military gear, trained by some kind of totalitarian Gestapo to fill the air with lead at the slightest provocation.

And we see the results in cases like those of Amadou Dialolo or Sean Bell. Incompetence and cowardice increase with precise proportionality to the increase in police play-pretend militarization. We need to fire all those FBI blackshirts who disseminate these crazy and un-American paranoid procedures and philosophies of firearms use. And we need to turn police work back over to sensible human beings. We need to end the War on Drugs, which supplies most of the pretext for current undesirable trends. And we should take away all the semiautos, the .40 calibers, the 9mm Parabellums (especially the Glocks), and give those cops back nice old-fashioned six-shot .38 Special revolvers and billy clubs.

The Morning Call reports:

Five Bethlehem (Pennsylvania) police officers used excessive force to restrain a man high on crack cocaine who killed a drug dealer with a samurai sword and set him on fire, a federal jury ruled Tuesday night.

The verdict, after four hours of deliberation, stunned officers Matthew Crenko, Matthew Lazur, David Strawn, William Kissner and Louis Csaszar, and surprised Senior U.S. District Judge John P. Fullam, who called it ”remarkable.”

Sonny Thomas claimed he didn’t resist police efforts to handcuff him, but jurors found the officers violated his constitutional rights when they punched and kicked him that night in January 2005.

Thomas, 50, who testified he suffered bruises and recurring migraine headaches as a result of the violent scuffle, sought $35 million in damages but was awarded $1.

The jury found that five other officers named in the suit — Jeremy Alleshouse, John Iatarola, Mark DiLuzio, Moses Miller and Ronald Brazinski — did not use aggressive force or violate Thomas’ Fourth, Fifth and 15th Amendment rights of due process and freedom from unreasonable searches and seizures.

It’s impossible to sympathize with the defendant’s claims of “bruises and recurring migraine headaches.” And the judge’s comment on the jury’s verdict (“remarkable”) seems to indicate that he disagreed with their decision.

But they awarded the defendant a mere $1, which has to be interpreted as indicating that they believed the police behaved improperly, and felt obliged to rule accordingly, but had no inclination to do anything meaningful for the defendant whatsoever. I would say that Mr. Birkbeck has misreported the story completely. He immediately arouses our indignation at the defendant’s actions, supplies no information supporting the jury’s decision, and simply treats the whole affair as a “man bites dog” bizarre incident. But there was clearly a bit more going on here.

Sean Bell, the unfortunate groom-to-be, shot by undercover NY police in the aftermath of his bachelor party at the Kalua Cabaret strip club in Queens made a serious mistake, according to this FOXNews report.

(One) undercover (officer), thinking there was about to be a drive-by shooting in front of the club involving Bell’s group, followed Guzman, Bell and two others to their car.

“It’s getting hot! Something’s going to happen! Something’s going down!” the undercover radioed to his backup.

He hurried to the front of Bell’s Altima, which was parked on the side of a nearby street, and jumped in front of it.

That’s when the undercover put his right leg up on the hood of the Altima and began screaming that he was a cop, the sources said.

The cop was leaning over the hood of the car to try to see the hands of the people inside and make sure they didn’t have any guns, they said. But Bell floored the gas pedal and headed for the cop, the sources said, striking him and badly cutting his knee.

One of the Altima’s passengers — who possibly had a gun — jumped out of the back of the car, the sources said.

Around the same time, an unmarked Toyota Camry driven by a plainclothes police lieutenant and another cop behind him pulled up, but overshot Bell’s car. A police van with an officer and the narcotics detective then managed to block Bell’s car in.

Bell’s Altima first struck the police van in the driver’s desperate bid to escape, then backed up and struck the roll-down metal doors of a commercial building behind him. He then revved his car again toward the undercover — which prompted the cop to scream, “He’s got a gun!” and start firing, according to the sources, with the bullets passing through Bell’s car.

“The undercover thought they had more than one gun. He thought they would do anything to get away. He was yelling, ‘Let me see your hands!'” one source said.

The other cops, thinking they were under attack, started firing at the car, too.

Unfortunate, and doubtless a classic example of poor police marksmanship and gun-handling, but one is forced to face the fact that choosing to attempt to run down a police officer was a very bad decision on Mr. Bell’s part, resulting in Mr. Bell himself bearing the primary responsibility for subsequent unfortunate events.

One could not help reflect that if only the unfortunate shooting victim had previously viewed this helpful Chris Rock video: How Not To Get Your Ass Kicked By Police, he might have avoided making that particular fatal mistake.

Another atrocity produced by our absurd drug laws. It sounds like the lady died bravely defending her home.

Houston Chronicle:

ATLANTA — Police who shot and killed a 92-year-old woman after she wounded three officers were looking for a man who sold drugs to undercover agents at her home earlier that day, authorities said Wednesday.

The agents got a search warrant after buying drugs Tuesday afternoon from a man in Kathryn Johnston’s home, Assistant Police Chief Alan Dreher said.

Johnston’s niece, Sarah Dozier, said her aunt likely had reason to shoot the three plainclothes investigators as they stormed her house.

“My aunt was in good health. I’m sure she panicked when they kicked that door down,” Dozier told WAGA-TV, adding that there were no drugs in the house. “There was no reason they had to go in there and shoot her down like a dog.”

Police insisted the officers did everything right before entering the home, despite suggestions from the woman’s neighbors and relatives that it was a case of mistaken identity.

Johnston was the only resident in the house at the time and had lived there for about 17 years, Dreher said. The officers “knocked and announced” before they forced open the door and were justified in shooting once fired upon, he said.

Rev. Markel Hutchins, a civil rights activist and spokesman for the family, said he could understand why Johnston would have a gun because she lived in a high-crime area. “She was afraid,” Hutchins said. “This is a horrifying situation in a neighborhood where crime happens often. This incident is a result of a mix-up.”

As the officers approached the house around 7 p.m., a woman inside started shooting, striking each of them, said Officer Joe Cobb, a police spokesman.

One was hit in the arm, another in a the leg and the third in the leg, face and chest, with the chest shot striking a bullet-resistant vest. The officers were taken to a hospital for treatment, and all three were expected to recover, police said.

Fulton County District Attorney Paul Howard said his office is conducting its own independent investigation into the shooting, but said a preliminary review shows the officers had a legal right to search the home.

Hutchins said he would try to meet with Police Chief Richard Pennington and would meet with lawyers.

British Police warned a jeweller not to distribute to neigboring jewellers pictures of a thief captured on the shop’s video camera, because doing so would infringe the woman’s human rights.

The Daily Mail reports a story proving that old age and treachery really can overcome youth and inexperience.

A 70-year-old former British soldier who fought guerillas in Aden and Triad gangs in Hong Kong showed four muggers how it doesn’t pay to mess with the SAS.

Douglas O’Dell is past retirement age but the moves he learned as a volunteer in Britain’s toughest regiment half-a-century ago stood him in good stead when he was ambushed near his home in Bielefeld, Germany, by four local toughs.

The former Provost Sergeant put paid to the danger on the street like he once took out bandits in hotspots across the globe.

THWACK! The first mistake came when one of the teenagers grabbed him around the throat and said in German: “Give my your money, grandad, if you don’t want to get hurt.”

“Bad move,” said Douglas. “The only part he got right was grandad. If you’re gonna grab someone from behind take their arms and pin them to their waist.

“This joker, I was able to grab his elbow, crouch down and throw him over my shoulder. He landed on his back on a fence and squealed like a stuck pig.”

CRASH! As one went down another moved in and Douglas thought he saw him reaching for a knife. The Birmingham-born divorcee, who has a daughter and three grandchildren, said: “I had the measure of him but I slipped on some wet leaves as he came for me and bashed my face badly on the concrete.

“I saw his boot coming towards my face and I thought: ‘No you don’t, sunshine.’ I grabbed his leg and twisted it until he too was screaming out in agony.

“Then I got to my feet and kicked him in the chest.”

With two down the two remaining would-be muggers had enough. One peeled his groaning pal from the fence, the other picked up his crippled accomplice from the pavement.

“The last I saw of them they were limping down the pavement like a WW1 trench raiding party who got clobbered,” said Douglas.

AP reports:

A drug raid on a Los Alamos scientist’s home in New Mexico turned up what appeared to be classified documents taken from the nuclear weapons lab, the FBI said Tuesday.

Police discovered the documents at the scientist’s home while making an arrest in a methamphetamine investigation, according to an FBI official in Washington who spoke on condition of anonymity because of the sensitive nature of the case.

Angilo Freeland bolted from his rental car in the midst of a routine traffic stop last Thursday in Lakeland, Florida.

Polk County, Florida Sheriff’s Deputy Vernon Williams pursued Freeland into a wooded area, accompanied by another deputy and a German shepherd. Freeland killed Deputy Williams, wounding him in the ensuing gunfight, and evidently finishing him off execution-style with two gunshots to the head. The police dog (named Diogi) was also killed, and the other deputy wounded.

Police officers from all over West Central Florida turned out for the manhunt. The murderer was located hiding under a fallen oak tree in the woods. Seeing a gun in his hand, police officers opened fire. Autopsy results found that Freeland had been shot 68 times by the time the shooting stopped.

“That’s all the bullets we had, or we would have shot him more,” Polk County Sheriff Grady Judd told the Orlando Sentinel.

Deputy Vernon Williams left behind a wife and three children. His death in the line of duty occurred on his wife’s birthday.

The Scream. 1893. Oil, tempera and pastel on cardboard. Nasjonalgalleriet.

Reuters reports that Edvard Munch‘s best known painting, The Scream, stolen by armed robbers in 2004 has been recovered.

1 Dead, 15 injured

There has been another case of Islamic murder by motor vehicle. The SF Chronicle reports:

As many as 14 people were injured this afternoon by a motorist who drove around San Francisco deliberately running them down before being arrested by police, who believe the same driver struck and killed a man earlier today in Fremont.

At least one hit-and-run victim remained in critical condition this evening.

Reports of the incidents began pouring in at 12:47 p.m., police said.

Within a half-hour, San Francisco police had cornered and arrested 29-year-old Omeed Aziz Popal, who has addresses in Ceres (Stanislaus County) and Fremont.

Authorities suspect Popal was the same driver who ran over and killed a 54-year-old man in Fremont around noon….

Mayor Gavin Newsom visited five of the victims at San Francisco General Hospital.

“This was so senseless and inexplicable,” the mayor said afterward.

Note how the Chronicle, in the case of this kind of story, carefully overlooks parallels, and fails to discern any possible religious motivation.

Gateway Pundit has a link collection.

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