(CT) Gun dealer who sold rifle to woman critical of system

[Drizzt]

Gun dealer who sold rifle to woman critical of system


(Branford-WTNH, Apr. 24, 2003 6:03 PM) _ Haunted by his actions a Branford gun dealer is carrying the weight of a crime on his shoulders. He says he's done selling guns and he's criticizing the system that allowed him to sell a rifle to a woman who has confessed to shooting her child.

Watch the story by News Channel 8's Leon Collins
State and local police say the man who sold Jennifer O'Connor a hunting rifle did everything by the book. However the gun dealer, Thomas Imperati, says there a flaw in the system that allowed him to sell O'Connor a deadly weapon.

"I second guess myself all the time," says Thomas Imperati of Tommy Gun Choppers. "Should I have seen something? Should I have known something? It's impossible. She was just like anybody else."

Tommy Imperati remembers the day clearly. On February 24th, 40-year-old O'Connor came into his shop to buy a 30-30 Winchester rifle. She wanted one with a scope.

O'Connor told the Branford gun dealer she and her husband planned to go hunting in Maine or Vermont. The father of two says he asked O'Connor if she had any children in the house.

"What did she say?"
"She said no," Imperati said.
"Why do you remember that so clearly?"
"After the circumstances, I .... "

After waiting nearly four weeks Imperati sold O'Connor the weapon on March 18th.

Police say on April 4th Jennifer O'Connor shot her seven-year-old daughter Sara in the back as she lie sleeping at their Branford home. The girl died three days later at Yale-New Haven Hospital.

Imperati says there was no way to know about the problems that O'Connor might have had.

"How could you look through somebody and see what's wrong with them. You can't tell if somebody has a mental problem especially if it's a very well hidden mental problem," Imperati said.

Sergeant J. Paul Vance with the Connecticut State Police says that it is possible for someone weave through the loopholes in spite of background checks.

"It's possible because a medical history is privileged information. Medical history of any type is not accessible through normal channels by anyone," Vance said.

"I've had guys that came in, businessmen that came in and couldn't buy a gun or had their permits taken away because twenty-five years ago they got caught with a marijuana cigarette in their car, when they were teenagers," said Imperati. "So, I can't understand why that could come up, and why a mental history if you had problems, or were under psychiatric care wouldn't come up."

Imperati says he carries a burden because he put the gun in Jennifer O'Connor's hands.

"It really upsets me. I've had nightmares with this woman calling me at wanting to buy another gun. I've had nightmares of her calling me telling me that she had broken out of jail and was coming after my kids."

Democratic state Representative Mike Lawlor told News Channel 8 there are two major changes he and other legislators are working towards. One change is to make regulations for longarms like rifles more like the much stricter regulations for hand guns. The second is to create a better working relationship between the law enforcement and mental health communities to keep guns out of the hands of people who shouldn't own them.

http://www.wtnh.com/Global/story.asp?S=1248579&nav=3YeXFR9v

 

[Standing Wolf]

The second is to create a better working relationship between the law enforcement and mental health communities to keep guns out of the hands of people who shouldn't own them.

For example: how about making prospective firearms purchasers prove sanity before being allowed to buy guns? A five-member panel of psychiatrists, perhaps?

 

[Monkeyleg]

Standing Wolf, you don't go far enough. We need to lock up everyone beforehand, and then let them prove that they're competent to exist on the outside.

It worked for Hitler and, what's more, many German citizens praised him for making the trains run on time.

 

[Darrin]

Police say on April 4th Jennifer O'Connor shot her seven-year-old daughter Sara in the back as she lie sleeping at their Branford home. The girl died three days later at Yale-New Haven Hospital.

This makes me feel nauseous.

I work for a large mental health company in TN. I've often wondered how many of our "clients" can purchase a gun, long or short. Some seem like decent people when you meet them. Then you realize he/she is being seen by a therapist for beating his/her 80 year old mother almost to death.

I can try to understand what the dealer, Thomas Imperati, is going through, but will never know. I hope he pulls through this because we need more dealers with a conscience.

 

[T.Stahl]

For example: how about making prospective firearms purchasers prove sanity before being allowed to buy guns? A five-member panel of psychiatrists, perhaps?

About what is already happening in Austria and now Germany (for those under 25).

The result? A bright future for psychologist and psychiatrists.

 

[El Tejon]

So, if he sold her a framing hammer (or tire iron, crowbar, bowling ball, baseball bat, mixing bowl [all of which El Tejon has seen used as murder weapons]) which she used to bash her sleeping child's head, this East Coast Eloi would be out of the hardware business?

"Boohoo, I want the goverment to make me feel better." If this woman wants another gun, Mr. Boohoo, don't sell it to her. If she comes after your kids, defend them.

Geez, talk about the Mommy State.

 

[another okie]

He didn't put the gun in her hands. She put it in her own hands.

 

[UnknownSailor]

This dealer didn't pull the trigger, either, and the sooner he realizes this, the better.

 

[Sir Galahad]

The problem is that letting the government decide what is or is not a "mental" disorder will lead to them deciding people who are NOT mentally ill are "incompetant".

In a free society, people often die due to freedom. That's the way it is. Any car dealer feel terrible about selling a car to a guy who gets drunk and winds up crashing into a church bus and wiping out a children's choir? Suppose we ought to screen car buyers for anyone with the POTENTIAL to abuse alcohol? How about the woamn in Texas that drowned her kids in the bathtub? Where were the hysterical cries to put "tub locks" on bathtubs and have a "cooling off period" prior to purchasing a tub? Maybe a psych eval to only let "responsible" and mentally competant bathers own bathtubs. Everyone else would have to own a shower with a drain that doesn't allow more than .001" of water sit on the floor of the stall. How about those "assault tubs" that old enough water for more than one person to bathe in? People don't need tubs that hold that much water to take a bath. A shower is also more environmentally sustainable because it wastes less water than tubs. We ought to ban tubs-----for the children.

 

[pax]

Sergeant J. Paul Vance with the Connecticut State Police says that it is possible for someone weave through the loopholes in spite of background checks.

"It's possible because a medical history is privileged information. Medical history of any type is not accessible through normal channels by anyone," Vance said.

There goes doctor-patient confidentiality.

Not that it's been anything but a hollow shell for several years. Still.

I wonder how many dangerously depressed or borderline schizophrenic or otherwise mentally unstable people won't seek treatment with that sort of invasion of privacy hanging over their heads? How many unnecessary suicides and grisly murders will result from a simple little change in the law designed to 'close loopholes' like this?

Freedom is safer than tyranny. Not that anyone ever believes that until it is too late. And those who seek freedom for safety's sake, throw away freedom the very instant they start to feel that slavery is safer. Ah well.

What's one more invasive law, anyway?

pax

The man who asks of freedom anything other than itself is born to be a slave. -- Alexis de Tocqueville

 

[cobb]

With this type of thinking, how do car dealers sleep at night.

 

[geekWithA.45]

I feel for this guy...

My guess is that he was put on the spot, perhaps by a reporter. as in:


"Hey! You've sold a gun to an unbalanced mom who used it to kill her kid! How do you live with yourself? How do you sleep at night?"


Well, if you're in the biz of selling guns, you need to consider that someday a reporter will ask you that, and have some answers ready.

In this case, the poor guy did a very human thing, and deflected the criticism from himself. The problem is that he misdirected it at "the system that allowed him to ...(blah blah blah)".

For starters, this presumes that such a system is possible, even in principle.

If it CAN go BANG at all, it can be made to go bang at the wrong time, or when pointed at the wrong person

One suggested answer:

"I don't sell guns for the purpose of murder and mayhem. I sell guns for the noble purposes of sport, defense, and hunting, and I do not accept responsibility for the hienous acts of those who would misuse my products, nor can I, even in principle."

Of course, it takes presence of mind and brass to pull something like that out of your hat under pressure, but we all need practice at this sort of thing anyway. After all, every responsible gunowner is an emmissary to the rest of the world who may not understand it.

 

[jimpeel]

I hope his new vocation is not selling cars. Wouldn’t want him having nightmares over that guy he sold the new Ford to who went out drinking and ran over a group of kids crossing the street. We truly have become a nation of sniveling, whining, feel-sorry-for-ourselves, idiots who are more than willing to take on the sins of another as our own.