Used a gun
similar to those used in recent mass shootings.
He killed FIVE police officers.
How many of these weapons wouldn't be in circulation if the assault weapons ban hadn't been allowed to expire twenty years ago?
Reagan's rolling in his grave.
NEW YORK (WABC) -- Details are emerging about the weapon used to carry out the deadly ambush on police officers in Dallas, and while not confirmed, it is believed that the sniper used what is increasingly the weapon of choice in mass shootings.
"We will find that it was a military-style assault weapon with a large capacity magazine on it," Citizens Crime Commission president Richard Aborn said. "And this happens over and over and over again."
Last month, a military-style rifle was used by the gunman who killed 49 people at an Orlando nightclub. And last December, a husband and wife terrorist team killed 14 using a similar semi-automatic rifle. Adam Lanza used a military-type rifle in 2012 to kill 26 students and teachers at a school in Newtown Connecticut, and a similar AR-15-type military rifle was used to kill 12 people earlier that year in a Colorado movie theater.
"The AR-15 Assault weapon is the preferred weapon of these mass killers," former NYPD sergeant and FBI special agent Manuel Gomez said.
Gomez says that until Congress reinstates the ban on these military-style weapons, they will continue to be used in mass shootings because of their killing efficiency.
"You can shoot 50, 60, up to 100 rounds in one minute," he said. "And each round designed to enter the body and tear that piece that it entered apart."
A report by New York's Citizen Crime Commission concluded that after Congress lifted the ban on these military-style rifles in 2004, the number of people killed by semi-automatic, high-capacity guns tripled. Aborn said the Dallas police killings adds to their death toll.
If the shooter had used an assault rifle Reagan and Brady would have died almost instantly.
Though I understand why you said that, the more likely reality is that were Hinkley to have used a rifle of pretty much any sort and at the same range in which he used his handgun, he probably wouldn't have had an opportunity to shoot Reagan or Brady. After all, he began shooting from just 10 feet away from the President. I think the Secret Service would have noticed him carrying a rifle long before he managed to fire it and either confiscated it or removed Hinkley from the scene.
Refrain, if you would, from posting the obvious. NO KIDDING.
The comment was about the rounds used, I'm not sure why that wouldn't be obvious but I guess not everyone knows the difference between a pistol round and what type ammo is used in an assault weapon. Hinkley used a very cheap $50 .22 pistol. The rounds were explosive rounds but the one that hit Reagan didn't explode. They think the one that hit Brady in the head did explode, but it was a .22 so even a direct hit in the head didn't kill him.
Velocity of a .22 long rifle about 1,200ft/sec
Velocity of a .223 round from an AR-15 about 3,200ft/sec
Nearly three times the velocity. Damage done to tissue corresponds to the energy contained in the projectile when it enters tissue. Brady's head would have likely exploded and Reagan wouldn't have made it to the hospital.
No one hit by Hinkley died from ten feet away because the gun he used fired the cartridge on the left. A .22 long rifle or similar, even an explosive round didn't kill Brady. The shooter in Dallas used a weapon that fired something similar to the cartridge on the right. From moderate distance on moving targets and he killed 5 people very rapidly.
This is the problem with assault rifles, it isn't the rifle, it is the ammo it uses. Pass a law so that all assault rifles can only physically use the cartridge on the left and there is no need to ban these weapons. They then become the same as an 1880's .22 rifle.
