Sing It

A Federal judge knows some lyrics.

People have heard about the Robb Elementary School shooting in Uvalde, Texas. They have heard about Sandy Hook, Parkland, the Pulse nightclub, and other tragic mass shootings. But they do not hear of the AR-15 used in Florida by a pregnant wife and mother to defend her family from two armed, hooded, and masked home intruders. As soon as the armed intruders entered the back door of her home they pistol-whipped her husband — fracturing his eye socket and sinus cavity. Then they grabbed the 11-year old daughter. The pregnant wife and mother was able to retrieve the family AR-15 from a bedroom and fire, killing one of the attackers while the other fled.

It does not require much imagination to think what would have happened next if the woman had lived in California and could not possess such a firearm. People do not remember the disabled 61 year-old man living alone on a 20-acre property in Florida with dense woods and a long dirt driveway. After the homeowner had gone to bed, three men armed with a shotgun, pistol, and BB gun invaded. One wore a “Jason” hockey mask. The disabled victim said he was awakened by a loud noise and grabbed the AR-15 laying near his bed. He saw the masked man and a second man coming toward him inside his home. Gunfire was exchanged. By the time police arrived, one attacker had run away, one lay wounded outside, and one was dead on the dining room floor. Police found the disabled man in his bedroom alive, but bleeding from a gunshot wound to the stomach. The AR-15 lay across his legs. Without his modern rifle, the victim would have become an evidence tag and a forgotten statistic.

People do not hear about the AR-15 used by a young man in Oklahoma to defend himself from three masked and armed home invaders clothed in black. The three intruders broke through a rear glass door. Though outnumbered, the homeowner put up a successful defense with his AR-15.People do not hear about the AR-15 that was needed when seven armed and masked men burst through a front door at 4:00 a.m. firing a gun. Outnumbered seven to one, it took the resident 30 rounds from his AR-15 to stop the attackers.

But he did, though.