6 dead after gunfire at Kirkwood, MO city council meeting

[bestlaidplans]

KIRKWOOD, Mo. - A gunman stormed a city council meeting Thursday night, killing two police officers and three other people before law enforcers fatally shot him, authorities said. The man's gunfire injured the mayor, a newspaper reported. (http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20080208/ap_on_re_us/missouri_shooting;_ylt=AoSzxq7M.8otM4wbyesiDgKs0NU E)

The victims at the meeting in suburban St. Louis were killed after the gunman rushed the council chambers and began firing as he yelled "Shoot the mayor," according to St. Louis County Police spokeswoman Tracy Panus.

Janet McNichols, a reporter covering the meeting for the St. Louis Post-Dispatch, told the newspaper that the 7 p.m. meeting with about 30 people had just started when the shooter rushed in and opened fire with at least one weapon. He started yelling about shooting the mayor while walking around and firing, hitting police Officer Tom Ballman in the head, she said.

Mayor Mike Swoboda was wounded, McNichols said. Public Works Director Kenneth Yost was shot in the head, and council members Michael H.T. Lynch and Connie Karr also were hit, she said.

The gunman also fired at City Attorney John Hessel, who tried to fight off the attacker by throwing chairs, McNichols told the newspaper. The shooter then moved behind the desk where the council sits and fired more shots at council members, she said.

McNichols identified the gunman as Charles Lee "Cookie" Thornton, a man she knows from covering the council. Thornton had previously disrupted meetings, she told the Post-Dispatch.

Dozens of emergency vehicles were on the scene, and an area of several blocks was cordoned off along a busy north-south corridor around City Hall.

Kirkwood is about 20 miles southwest of downtown St. Louis. City Hall is in a quiet area filled with condominiums, eateries and shops, not far from a dance studio and train station.

Mary Linehares, a teacher who lives about four blocks from City Hall and who walked down to the scene with her husband, described the town as quiet and eclectic.

"It's like a small town in St. Louis," Linehares told The Associated Press. "You can call it Mayberry."

[frizgolf]

Damn. Crazy shit.

[DaHood]

Nutty fucker.

[the-dude]

and began firing as he yelled "Shoot the mayor,"

Thats so strange, its like Reggie Jackson saying "Must... Kill... The.. Queen". It sounds like mind control! ;)

[ThomasC]

Between March 1996 and April 2005, Thornton had been charged with 114 violations of the city’s ordinances. He pleaded guilty or was convicted of most of them, according to court records.
Geez...

http://www.kansascity.com/news/breaking_news/story/481231.html

http://media.kansascity.com/smedia/2008/02/08/00/691-thornton_290.embedded.prod_affiliate.81.jpg

[CEZ]

If you don't like your mayor simply don't vote for him in the next election. But for goodness sake...don't try to shoot him! :eek: What the hell is wrong with people? Good grief....

[frizgolf]

If you don't like your mayor simply don't vote for him in the next election. But for goodness sake...don't try to shoot him! :eek: What the hell is wrong with people? Good grief....

Reasoning never came into the picture. The man needed to prove a point in his mind, and he pretty much cut butter with a chainsaw to do it.
Well, the point is well taken now. Thing is, how is he gonna run that business from prison now?

[bestlaidplans]

Reasoning never came into the picture. The man needed to prove a point in his mind, and he pretty much cut butter with a chainsaw to do it.
Well, the point is well taken now. Thing is, how is he gonna run that business from prison now?

He's not considering the police shot him dead.

[frizgolf]

He's not considering the police shot him dead.

D'oh! Details!

Hmmm, lemme fix that last post:
Okay, how's he gonna run that business from the grave?

[Duemellon]

when people feel persecuted or disenfranchised they may feel their options are falling away from them & they get to a decision.

Some people deny they're out of control
Some people self-medicate
Some people turn on themselves & become depressed/withdrawn/suicidal
Some people take it out on others (abuse)
Some people make a protest statement
etc. etc.

There's many ways people who self-categorize as being "desperate" try to express their will. When you find someone has chosen to express their will in a fashion that in no way will actually bring their desire to reality, then they have already given up & are simply trying to be noticed before they resign to to their hopelessness.

Unfortunately, violence is systemic in our system & flows through our social-viens. Expressing your desperation through violence is glorified. Stuff like this is simply on the increase. It's going to be until many of the social ills regarding success, failure, peer pressure, & such are taken care of.

[Homsar]

OR


Mental illness.

[classicgrrl]

Unfortunately, violence is systemic in our system & flows through our social-viens. Expressing your desperation through violence is glorified. Stuff like this is simply on the increase. It's going to be until many of the social ills regarding success, failure, peer pressure, & such are taken care of.

I do think violence is systemic in our system and flows through our social-veins.

however, I don't think it's on the increase. I think our ratings hungry media makes it seem that way...

[DaHood]

I told you not to fuck with that guy's head, Craig.

[bestlaidplans]

I told you not to fuck with that guy's head, Craig.

You caught me, I'm a fucking wizard.

[DaHood]

Grand Wizard?

[bestlaidplans]

Grand Wizard?

Funny coming from someone called DaHood.

[frizgolf]

I do think violence is systemic in our system and flows through our social-veins.

however, I don't think it's on the increase. I think our ratings hungry media makes it seem that way...

Listen to this woman. She is wise.

[Marlowe]

i saw this guy's brother being interviewed. what a fucking idiot. he was talking about how his brother [paraphrased quote], "...tried to resolve his problems through the courts, but when he couldn't get justice, he had to go to war". what the fuck? his lunatic brother kills innocent people and does he show any sort of remorse for the dead? no, he basically argues that his brother did what he had to do.

shame on you, asshole.

[classicgrrl]

i saw this guy's brother being interviewed. what a fucking idiot. he was talking about how his brother [paraphrased quote], "...tried to resolve his problems through the courts, but when he couldn't get justice, he had to go to war". what the fuck? his lunatic brother kills innocent people and does he show any sort of remorse for the dead? no, he basically argues that his brother did what he had to do.

shame on you, asshole.

I heard this NPR. the inability to control emotions and the feelings of helplessness with an external locus of control must have been passed down in the family. makes sense, there were probably raised by the same parent.

[DaHood]

Possibly a good analysis. But sick is sick and when sickness affects other people in such a catastrophic way I lose sympathy. Fuck this guy.

[Marlowe]

why is there such a strong urge to commit sociology every time something like this happens? this fucker was an adult and his asshole brother still is an adult. doesn't matter what their childhood was like, and amateur rationalization is conjecture at best.

after that korean dude, cho seung-hui killed people at virginia tech last year, his father committed suicide due to the shame that he had caused the family. the US could use an infusion of asian family values, and this guy's asshole brother would be a great place to start.

[Duemellon]

why is there such a strong urge to commit sociology every time something like this happens? this fucker was an adult and his asshole brother still is an adult. doesn't matter what their childhood was like, and amateur rationalization is conjecture at best.You are misplacing the focus & misinterpreting the intent by saying that.

What I & CGrrl seem to agree on is that this guy, as heinous & tragic the action was, was still a human being who we (at least) can have empathy for. I recognize that he was in a tremendous amount of pain & desperation to have done this action & I can imagine that he honestly felt he ran out other options.

All that said & done, it is not an attempt to absolve him or remove him from being responsible for his actions. Nor is it saying that he truly was out of options. He made a decision, a selfish, shortsighted, cruel decision, & if he had lived he should be punished to the full extent of the law & made to reconsider what he did wrong.

It still doesn't prevent me from being empathetic to the victim & the perp.

[Shlep]

You are misplacing the focus & misinterpreting the intent by saying that.

What I & CGrrl seem to agree on is that this guy, as heinous & tragic the action was, was still a human being who we (at least) can have empathy for. I recognize that he was in a tremendous amount of pain & desperation to have done this action & I can imagine that he honestly felt he ran out other options.

em·pa·thy /ˈɛmpəθi/ Pronunciation[em-puh-thee]
–noun
1. the intellectual identification with or vicarious experiencing of the feelings, thoughts, or attitudes of another.

Well, I gotta tell ya...despite the fact that my life has failed to go exactly as I would have liked it to, and that there are all sorts of things that trouble, upset, and frustrate me, and while I often become angry or depressed or whatever...I simply cannot adopt the emotional or psychological point of view of someone who thinks that the thing to do is blame a collection of low-level public servants for his problems and then decide the solution is to try and savagely murder them.

Perhaps this is some sort of personal shortcoming of mine. I don't think so...in truth, I think the guy was a twisted, deranged asshole who might have improved his own personal situation-- and the situations of the people he's left behind who are now left with no choice but to deal with the pain and suffering he inflicted upon them with this utterly senseless act of his-- if he had perhaps empathized with the people he was about to attack and/or their loved ones and decided instead to do the comparatively noble thing and blown his own brains out.

[classicgrrl]

I heard this NPR. the inability to control emotions and the feelings of helplessness with an external locus of control must have been passed down in the family. makes sense, there were probably raised by the same parent.

y'all read this statement wrong. I actually didn't write it out of empathy and Marlowe it's not sociological it's psychological for what it's worth.

my meaning (sorry Due) was the idiot was raised wrong and his brother shows the same symptoms as he did. I see this shit in my students all the time, they have almost zero ability to control their emotions caused by being a product of their environment. Just had it happent today - we had an open house and a student went OFF cursing crying and literally screaming at everybody in the hallways because an instructor called her out for being late and turning in late assignments.

But Due has a point - we're all a product of our environment. What's more, that environment is usually not of our own making. I didn't chose to be raised by emotionally and physically absent parents and this girl didn't choose to be black, inner city, female, and poor with a welfare mom and no dad and no prospects. In fact, props to her for creating her own prospects when everyone around was negative, including society at large.

meh. in a way we've got no one to blame but ourselves because we chose as a society to have an economy built on capitalism and that involves have winners and losers and everything in between. The folks who are the losers will be pissed. It's our own damn fault. (there's the sociological Marlowe)

Doesn't give anybody an excuse to get a gun and shoot people to resolve those emotions. Dude could very well have focused his energy elsewhere just like my student chose to do. he didn't. I have less sympathy for him working where I do and seeing that folks CAN make that choice and even doing it under worse circumstances that what this guy probably had. thats what makes him an idiot.

[frizgolf]

we've got no one to blame but LBJ because he chose a Great Society to have an economy built on welfare.

Fixed that for the neo-cons out there.

[Buzzstein]

after that korean dude, cho seung-hui killed people at virginia tech last year, his father committed suicide due to the shame that he had caused the family. the US could use an infusion of asian family values, and this guy's asshole brother would be a great place to start.

You would like more parents to kill themselves if their offspring go on a shooting rampage?

[DudeMan]

You would like more parents to kill themselves if their offspring go on a shooting rampage?
in many asian cultures, japan being most notable among them, it is considered honourable to commit suicide when one has made a grave mistake or one's progeny has brought shame upon the family.

far be it from me to tell anyone what to do, but what do you think is a more honourable reaction to a horrific, murdering act by a family member... cho seung-hui's father committing suicide, or this asshat's brother rationalizing his completely indefensible actions?

[on2wheels]

You are misplacing the focus & misinterpreting the intent by saying that.

What I & CGrrl seem to agree on is that this guy, as heinous & tragic the action was, was still a human being who we (at least) can have empathy for. I recognize that he was in a tremendous amount of pain & desperation to have done this action & I can imagine that he honestly felt he ran out other options.

All that said & done, it is not an attempt to absolve him or remove him from being responsible for his actions. Nor is it saying that he truly was out of options. He made a decision, a selfish, shortsighted, cruel decision, & if he had lived he should be punished to the full extent of the law & made to reconsider what he did wrong.

It still doesn't prevent me from being empathetic to the victim & the perp.

You recognize he must have been in pain?! How would you know? What you KNOW, from the article, is that this guy was really pissed off. That is different than pain. I think that most people would agree that assholes do this sort of thing because they have no impulse control and no control over their temper (those may be the same thing). And what really bothers me is that the first thing you think of is to think about HIS pain and HIS situation instead of the victims. That must be a little salt in the wounds for victim's survivors when they read someone trying to empathize with this terd wrapped in skin from the start. I have felt pretty desperate and pissed a few times myself, but I used a little thing called self-control......and I'm not a complete psychopath.

[classicgrrl]

in many asian cultures, japan being most notable among them, it is considered honourable to commit suicide when one has made a grave mistake or one's progeny has brought shame upon the family.

far be it from me to tell anyone what to do, but what do you think is a more honourable reaction to a horrific, murdering act by a family member... cho seung-hui's father committing suicide, or this asshat's brother rationalizing his completely indefensible actions?

I would prefer that no one committ suicide. its unnecessary and a waste of resources. in fact, the asshat's brother rationalizing doesn't mean anything. the father committing suicide now leaves the rest of the grieving family to grieve double fold and possible scars the rest of his children and wife for life.

honestly, your comment is just as bad as the asshat's brothers...:rolleyes:

[DudeMan]

the father committing suicide now leaves the rest of the grieving family to grieve double fold and possible scars the rest of his children and wife for life.
only when you view the situation through your own narrow cultural prism. but if you widen the lens and view it from a traditional japanese & korean cultural standpoint, his act helped to restore a measure of respect and honour to the family after his son did an unspeakable act. so to many, his action was noble because it allowed his family to live their lives with some measure of their honour restored.

[Duemellon]

You recognize he must have been in pain?! How would you know? What you KNOW, from the article, is that this guy was really pissed off. That is different than pain. I think that most people would agree that assholes do this sort of thing because they have no impulse control and no control over their temper (those may be the same thing). And what really bothers me is that the first thing you think of is to think about HIS pain and HIS situation instead of the victims. That must be a little salt in the wounds for victim's survivors when they read someone trying to empathize with this terd wrapped in skin from the start. I have felt pretty desperate and pissed a few times myself, but I used a little thing called self-control......and I'm not a complete psychopath.You're new around here eh?

You appear to be projecting some expectation of what I meant instead of leaving it open when it was left open. Now you've characterized what I've said as being someone who believes such a course was a foregone conclusion of external factors & suggest he's not to blame & he's the main victim.

I'll just let it be for now. I'll just state you've taken the intent of my post incorrectly, probably due to you having an expectation of "If someone says X then it means they're Y" & leave it at that.