Baltimore Police Commissioner Blames Guns For Shooting

[Charlie T Waite]

Baltimore is one of the more violent cities in our nation. That was true even before the violence surge kicked off last summer about the same time as the riots. They weren’t exactly spared in that department, either.

A recent incident there shows us just how ugly things can get.

An officer-involved shooting took place shortly after the suspect pointed a gun at uniformed police officers.

Baltimore Police shot and wounded a man on The Block overnight Thursday while helping to close the strip clubs for the night, saying the man drew a gun in a fight on the street and pointed it at an officer.

The man was hospitalized with injuries that were not considered life threatening, Baltimore Police Commissioner Michael Harrison said.

Harrison addressed news reporters at the scene, saying he watched an officer’s body camera footage and that the man had pulled a gun during the fight, taken off running from police, then turned back toward officers with his weapon. Police did not say the man fired.

Nor does it matter if he fired or not. You point a gun at me, I’m not inclined to let you get a shot off first, after all. Why should these officers be any different?

So far, so good though. We get what happened at it sure sounds like a good shoot. Probably because it is.

However, that’s when Harrison steps in it.

“Once again, this speaks to the amount of guns that are unlawfully in our city,” Harrison said, “and the willingness of individuals to illegally carry those guns and then willingness to use those guns. Many people could have been hurt.”

No, it really doesn’t.

This is one guy. You’re always going to have one guy with a gun. London, with every advantage for gun control you could ever dream of has more than one guy with a gun, so why would Baltimore be different?

This isn’t a weekend with 50 people shot and killed on Baltimore’s streets. This is one person who pointed a gun at the police.

But nope. Harrison has to get in the preferred political narrative.

Notice that there’s no mention of ongoing anti-police sentiment? That seems like a valid thing to bring up since this joker allegedly walked right up to uniformed police officers and pointed a gun at them with a crowd of people around them. Since he ran, it doesn’t sound like suicide by cop, so what was it? Anti-police sentiment sounds plausible, at least.

Nah, let’s not figure that. Let’s just blame guns for it.

In fairness to Harrison, he did blame illegal guns, which is far better than some people do. The problem, though, is that even by specifying illegal guns, you’re still saying this proves something it simply doesn’t. One guy with a gun doesn’t mean there are guns in every other criminal’s hand.

Granted, in Baltimore, they probably are; and despite Maryland’s extensive gun control laws, too, I might add.

I only wish Harrison had even bothered to mention the possibility that the anti-police sentiment we’ve seen since the death of George Floyd just might have played a factor.