The brazen shooting of 17-year-old Brian Hall at a QuikTrip on Monday evening was appalling enough. But how shocking that another man, minutes after the shooting, stepped over the injured clerk allegedly to try to steal cigarettes. News accounts suggest Hall was everything that the alleged shooter and shoplifter clearly are not, a young man who was doing the right things and trying to make an honest living and good life. Our thoughts and prayers are with Hall’s family. As for the other two players in this community tragedy — they are something else again, something ugly and unrecognizable to people of conscience.
Posted by Rhonda Holman
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29 Comments
How about that. We have another Ian on the boards.
This nonwhite member of the WeBlog community graciously welcomes you to the boards, and politely requests that you control the spittle when ranting like a depraved lunatic.
Cheers!
Back to the topic, though. It’s just sick. It’s bad enough when a 17 year old kid loses his life for no reason at all. Reading about a monster with no apparent compassion using the situation to steal some ciggies…well, that makes me want to cry. Or vomit. Or both.
The person tryint to steal smokes was most likely a drug addict (beyond tobacco).
The killer I read this morning was mentally ill and stop taking meds.
It’s our society. Unfortunantly innocent people get killed in this brutal world over trival stuff.
There are people who will take advantage of any situation if given the chance to get away with it. Stealing and killing. It’s a sad fact of human behavior.
It’s true that some people don’t take their medicine and other are on drugs, but they were both adults and still new better, they deserve the worst of punishments. If the family knows that he was not taking the drugs that he needed, why did’nt they do something. May God Bless Brians Family and Friends.
It is a tragedy that a young man lost his life senselessly. There is no logical/sensible explanation for it.
The only thing worse are the people who are going to turn this into a racial or political (ban guns) statement. They are sicker than the shooter.
The shooting at quick trip is another example of how the system has failed the mentally ill. The laws have changed to the point that families can’t intervene when a loved one starts to get psychotic. The only way families can court order a member into treatment is if that person is openly homocidal or suicidal, then hospitalization is for crisis intervention only, so the person can be released in a matter of days, long before they’re really ready to go home.Unless we stop the cutbacks to mental health services and give families more power to intervene, these tragic situations will continue to happen.
Tater and Raptor — I agree with you. And further, the shooter will receive millions in tax-paid services of public legal defenders plus $29,000 per year for room/board in the Kansas prison system plus his meds.
I’m in total agreement with Tara and Damoon.This was a senseless act (in all regards). Unfortunately the family couldn’t intervene about the meds.This isn’t a race thing it’s a mental illness thing which turned into a criminal thing.How can I protect my children when at any moment they can be hurt by a stranger just for being in the wrong place at the wrong time?My heart and prayers go out to all families involved especially young Brians.
Keep repeating the mantra–guns don’t kill people, people kill people.
Had the shooter been armed with a toothpick, say, he could have poked the clerk IN THE EYE, and that would have really, really hurt.
Damoon, your post reminds me once again that at the present time our Sedgwick County political leaders are primarily interested in providing more “recreational venues for the people.” This is to the exclusion of spending time and money on real important needs of the county such as mental health that might prevent these senseless acts.
This tragedy was a result of a system created by the joint contributions of Conservatives AND Liberals. [I suspect concervatives hoped to save money and liberals thought community treatment was more humane]. It started in the 60’s that in order to obtain an involuntary treatment order, the petitioner (usually family) had to demonstrate that not only was the person psychotic, but also a danger to self/others. Advocates supported this extra requirement, because epidemological studies in the 60’s showed that mentally ill patients were no more violent than non-mentally ill people. Can you guess the flaws in this research? That’s right, most severely mentally ill people were locked up in state mental hospitals, forced to take their medications, and thus would not show up in community sample statistics.
In the 1990s research has shown that if unmedicated, & if psychotic, that mentally ill people are definitely more violent than non-mentally ill people. The risk goes up for violence if the person has delusions congruent with command hallucinations to harm others. Guess who is most likely to be the victims of mentally ill person’s violence? Answer: family members, especially mothers.
I beilieve in every one having rights. If we are going to continue treating mentally ill people in communities with as little funding as is provided for this, then the laws need to be changed so that it is easier for families to obtain involuntray treatment petitions.
Research has consistently shown, btw, that the successful outcomes from involuntary treatment are no different than from voluntary treatment for severe and persistent mentally ill people.
Things need to be changed. It is too bad when a tragedy such as this is the reason we consider change.
I read in the paper that the perpetrator of the murder, had a past conviction related to beating someone with a baseball bat. I would be in favor of putting any mentally ill person with a history of violence on the “no gun buying list” whether their prior offenses involved guns or not.
I am not that familiar with the gun ownership law. If you have a history of mental illness, is that enough to keep one from purchasing a firearm? How is this list composed?
Untreated paranoid schizophrenia and guns are a bad combination. Too often, a fatal one.
Hey DD, happy day after your birthday!
“I am not that familiar with the gun ownership law. If you have a history of mental illness, is that enough to keep one from purchasing a firearm?”
Who wants to bet that fred owns a gun?
Ooh, good question, DD. I think most people would agree that those with a history of paranoid schizophrenia should not be able to own a gun. But how do you enforce something like that without shredding apart a patient’s right to privacy? And what mental illness is too dangerous allow gun ownership? Depression? Anxiety? PMS?
Correct me if I’m wrong, but I think that if you’ve had a seizure in the past 6 months, you cannot legally operate a vehicle. How does that work? Do they use the honor system, or do doctors report seizures to the DMVs?(wierd!)
“…I would be in favor of putting any mentally ill person with a history of violence on the “no gun buying list”
All we need is more laws? Like a law is going to prevent something like this? Last time I looked, murder is against the law too, did that stop him? Not for a second.
The Columbine murderers broke various laws before shooting their first victim..did the laws stop that?
Sadly, passing more laws is not the answer. I wish I did have one.
Tara,You probably get put on the list only if you’ve been involuntarily committed. That would leave most of the mentally ill able to buy guns- those who are undiagnosed, were privately treated as outpatients or signed themselves into the psych ward, not to mention those who are just idiots. Pretty meaningless restriction!
Making guns illegal will not deter criminals from getting guns.
There are illegal drugs everywhere, it’s a pandemic, and no matter how much the police try to get them off the streets, they are still out there.
You think banning guns from law biding citizens will be a saftey issue? No way!
Good post, DD. If we could focus on providing more services in the community and changing the laws so that families can intervene when mental illness symptoms starts to exacerbate, it would make a huge difference. I do medication management in a home health setting and my clients are assessed on a daily basis. Often we can head off a psychotic break when a client starts going downhill by informing the doctor and implementing the necessary med changes, plus we make sure that they take their medications everyday. Because of the cutbacks 3 yrs ago, we lost almost half of our clients that we saw on a daily basis because they could no longer qualify for services. Being on their own without supervision made it easy for many of them to stop taking their meds and end up in trouble. The state didn’t really save any money because the hospitalizations increased as a result of the clients no longer being monitored by qualified nursing staff that could go into the field and prevent them from getting sick in the first place.It’s safer and less expensive to provide community services for those with severe and persistant mental illness than to ignore them until they act out THEN hospitalize them. It’s easy for the state to ignore the mentally ill, because they don’t stand up for themselves, and as a result, we have situations like the tragic killing of the young man at QuikTrip.
“All we need is more laws? Like a law is going to prevent something like this? Last time I looked, murder is against the law too, did that stop him? Not for a second.”
Firearm restrictions likely won’t stop all incidents of mentally ill people killing others. I read the perp had beat someone with a baseball bat: that can kill you, too.
I think if a person is a paranoid schizophrenic, has a history of violence, a history of stopping meds and acting out, I am not opposed to such a person’s right to own a firearm being denied.
If such a law saves one innocent person from being murdered, it would be justified, in my opinion.
Anyone who murders someone should be put to death. That is perfect retribution.
What a tragedy.
I find myself agreeing with Damoon. (shocking!!) For a number of reasons (budgets, “rights” for the mentally ill, “least restrictive environment” policies) we have gutted mental health services in this country, and made in increasingly difficult for families or authorities to intervene before serious tragedies occur.
It’s a shame – and the reforms, many done in the name of the rights of the mentally ill, have not well served the mentally ill.
I wish I had a magic bullet answer, but I don’t. Sounds like Damoon has more experience inside that system than I do; my experience is with the frustration of being unable to get persons wh need help the aid they need through a care and treatment petition before the tragedy occurs.
The answer is to put people in politics who are willing to buck the system and do what is needed to be done: Give the mentally ill the treatment they require. If that means taking them off the streets and institutionalizing them so they can get needed treatment, so be it.
The problems we are seeing now, such as the recent shooting, are only going to get worse. Government fundings are getting cut more and more. Charity, both religious and private can only go so far.
What really jacks my jaw is the amount of money spent on this ridiculous war with two countries we have no business being in. If those billions and billions had been spent on helping the needy, as it should have been, we wouldn’t be blogging this issue.
Where are the leaders we need with the balls to do what has to be done? I certainly haven’t seen or heard of them. Anybody out there have any real names to throw in the mix?
This is a consequence of the states failure to keep mentally ill dangerous people off the streets. People like this with paranoia should be in Larned where they can be watched and forced to take their medications. But the state wants to save a few dollars and lets them roam the streets. I would rather pay a few dollars more in taxes and see Brian Hall graduate from East High.
Most of the state institutions have been shut down, that’s why we have so many mentally ill in the community. It’s fine for them to be in the community, as long as they are supervised and get the care they need. Most people who suffer from severe and persistant mental illness are no thereat to anyone and they deserve the chance to have a life and live the way every American has the right to.
Walker, might I suggest David Adkins for the r’s and TOM SAWYER for the d’s?
They have each shown a willingness to stand up to the bullies in their own parties, and to put what is right before their own political gain.
Hehehe, and neither one has a snowball’s chance in hell of getting their party’s nomination. Or winning a statewide election.
Sing with me to the tune of “when johnny comes marching home again”
“The swift boaters come marching two by two hurrah, hurrah…The 527’s come marching now hurrah, hurrah”…”
Just a note to the racist at the top of the comments. The cigarette thief is a white male who hates blacks and mexicans just like you.
I know him. He’s one of the most disgusting people I’ve ever met. Then again, I’ve never met you.
Have a nice day. Loser.
Today would have been Brian’s 19th birthday.
We love you and miss you, Brian.
I knew Brian Personal he was part of my family. He dated my sister!! He was a very loved person and he was a loving guy would do anything for anyone. You guys that are saying stuff that has nothing to do with Brian sicken me. Thats horribel. Brian We love and miss you