-By Warner Todd Huston
The family of one of the victims in the murderous crime perpetrated at Sandy Hook Elementary in Newton, Connecticut last year won’t have their Second Amendment rights taken from them even though they lost one of their dear ones to a killer using an AR-15 rifle that terrible day.
A story in the Republican-American features the Paradis and D’Avino family who are gun enthusiasts and supporters of the Second Amendment of the U.S. Constitution and they say despite the crime that befell their family, they are still strong supporters of American’s rights to bear arms.
Rachel D’Avino was a 29-year-old teacher at Sandy Hook who lost her life when the crazed gunman made his way through the building killing as many as he could before finally taking his own life as police closed in.
The killer used a Bushmaster rifle which is a civilian version of the AR-15 rifle that many in the media absurdly calls a “military-styled assault rifle.” But regardless of labels, the gun was effective enough to kill all too many women and children.
But this incident won’t deter the family from their belief in the U.S. Constitution nor will they let it destroy their warm family memories of target shooting together.
Hannah D’Avino, sister of the murdered teacher, is also a bit upset that the media keeps acting as if all the families of the victims are essentially the same.
“We’re very frustrated mainly because the 26 families got lumped together. We’re 26 families made of individuals that all have different opinions,” Hannah D’Avino said. “It’s like people are speaking for me and speaking for my sister. They don’t know her and they don’t know us.”
Hannah and other family members are also sick and tired of the media trying to get close to them. One reporter began to warm Hannah up saying she was a friend of Rachel’s only to admit later that she lied, she didn’t know Rachel and just wanted an interview. Another reporter scooted past State Trooper’s guarding the family pretending to be delivering a gift and claiming to be a friend of their. Once near the family she admitted she was a reporter looking for an interview.
Hannah admits that right after the incident she started to feel that guns were the problem. But time spread it’s healing balm.
“As time went on, my values came back and I became more rational,” Hannah D’Avino said in the interview. “Obviously, there was something wrong with (Adam Lanza) and something wrong in his house if had access to that many firearms.”
“No one has access to your guns. You keep them locked up. That’s your responsibility as a gun owner.”
The family went on:
Paradis and D’Avino said they aren’t opposed to any gun control. Instead of enacting new federal laws, Paradis said, existing federal laws should be enforced. They also didn’t support Connecticut’s new gun laws that were passed in April that widened the definition of “assault weapon.” That law has banned hundreds of guns by declaring illegal any gun with more than one military-style feature, including pistol grip, a fixed magazine of more than 10 rounds, or a collapsible stock.
“The shooter in Newtown didn’t use an assault rifle, he used an assault-style rifle. It’s much different. He could have used a much larger caliber, the same semi-automatic stuff and he could have done a lot more damage,” Paradis said. “But hey, we all had political agendas, didn’t we?”
They say more needs to be done about mental illness, which they say is the true reason Rachel and the others died. They tried to discuss this with members of Sandy Hook Promise, a group formed in the days following the shooting, but their concerns were dismissed, they said. No one from Sandy Hook Promise returned calls for comment.
“Our big thing, it’s not the gun that killed the kids. It’s the mental illness that killed the kids and his mother. It’s a lot easier to take and ram through gun control because it doesn’t cost anything to ban it. To put a program in for the mentally ill, that’s going to cost money so you can’t go that way,” Paradis said.
More should be done to ban access to guns by the mentally ill, and doctors should be able to register names of people who should not own or have access to guns, he said.
I find this refreshing. But what do you think?
____________
“The only end of writing is to enable the reader better to enjoy life, or better to endure it.”
–Samuel Johnson
Follow Warner Todd Huston on:
Twitter
Facebook
Tumblr
Warner Todd Huston is a Chicago based freelance writer. He has been writing opinion editorials and social criticism since early 2001 and before that he wrote articles on U.S. history for several small American magazines. His political columns are featured on many websites such as Andrew Breitbart’s BigGovernment.com, BigHollywood.com, and BigJournalism.com, as well as RightWingNews.com, MrConservative.com, CanadaFreePress.com, StoptheACLU.com, Wizbang.com, among many, many others. Mr. Huston is also endlessly amused that one of his articles formed the basis of an article in Germany’s Der Spiegel Magazine in 2008.
For a full bio, please CLICK HERE.