The Saint Louis school shooting could have been prevented. Or so the Post-Dispatch would have us believe.

Police responded to Harris’ home on Oct. 15 after his mother found a gun, the same used in Monday’s attack, in the house and wanted it removed. Police said Thursday they did not have the authority to take the gun because Missouri does not have a red flag law.

Sounds bad, eh? But let’s back up to the beginning of the Post-Dispatch propaganda piece.

The man accused of killing a teacher and teen earlier this week in a south St. Louis school shooting bought the AR-15-style gun from a private seller after an FBI background check blocked his attempted purchase from a licensed dealer in St. Charles.

Let’s take that claim at face value for a moment. The perp’s attempted purchase was denied because he was a prohibited person. And the P-D suggests that it was because he’d been involuntarily committed. Maybe.

Police said Wednesday that Harris’ family was increasingly worried about his mental state in the weeks leading up to the attack and at one point had him “committed.” Involuntary commitment to a mental health institution is one of the triggers that can block the purchase of firearms at licensed dealers.

Note the bait and switch. His family had him “committed.” Then the “reporters switch to a — misleading — explanation on of involuntary committal, which requires adjudication — yes, by a judge — of mental deficiency; that would/should make the perp a prohibited person, and his gun store attempt would/should have been denied, and described.

But he then apparently went to a private party and bought his rifle in a private sale not subject to a background check.

But now we’re back to his family discovering that he had the firearm and calling the police. The police whose hands were tied by the lack of a red flag confiscation law.

Full stop.

If the perp was a prohibited person, not red flag law was needed to seize the firearm and arrest the prohibited person in unlawful possession of a firearm under Missouri statute 571.030; that is a crime.

Instead, a third person — sometimes described as “known to the family” or a “family member,” depending on the media outlet — took possession of the firearm.

And then for some starnge reason seemingly let him have it back later, just in time to shoot up a school.

Remember, this guy is supposed to be a prohibited person under state and federal law. One might “reasonably” expect that third party to know that. So for that person to transfer the firearm back to the Bucket O’Chum is also a crime under state and federal law.

Weirdly, at least to anyone unfamiliar with the Post-Dispatch’s long hatred of all things Second Amendment, it doesn’t appear to have occurred to the reporters to ask the police about their failures to arrest the responsible parties in the unlawful possession and transfer. Even though that most likely would have prevented the school shooting ever happening.

And no confiscatory red flag law needed.

I also have some private suspicions about the legality of the private sale through which chum-boy got the gun. Here’s a photo released by the police.

A PSA lower with what looks like a beat-up third-party upper. The lack of a handguard reveals the gas tube, and what I think is gas discharge damage back at the front of the upper (maybe because the tube was left unprotected by a guard). I really wonder if any responsible, law-abiding person would sell that POS to another user as anything but a fixer-upper or parts source. Just how “lawful” was that private sale? If the St. Louis cops ignored the other law violations, are they bothering to follow-up on that? Or are they just going to whine for an unnecessary — if they’d done their jobs — red flag law?

At least one shooting witness had said the perp’s gun jammed. If I’m right about that gas tube leak, that may be the cause. I suspect that gun had been rendered into an unreliable bolt-action. And thank goodness the clearly ignorant shooter had no idea how to deal with that.

 

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