It has nothing to do with Stand Your Ground, semi-automatic-weapon sales or further perversions of the Second Amendment. But guns are back in the news around here. We now know that a person fronting for someone else in the purchase of a firearm that is used in a double murder is not guilty of a crime. Even if the person fronted for had no way to legally buy it–and the adult “straw buyer” knew it. There are no penalties for those who knowingly buy guns for those legally prohibited from doing so. That’s because no state law has been broken.
That’s the unconscionably outrageous upshot in the case of Benjamin Bishop who gave $279 to a buddy to buy the 12-gauge shotgun that Bishop, an 18-year-old schizophrenic with a criminal record and history of drug addiction, used to kill his mother and her boyfriend.
Bishop might be adjudged criminally insane; a court of law will ultimately determine that. But it’s crazy to allow the straw purchase of weapons. This isn’t addled ideology; this is criminal negligence and statutory stupidity.