Multiple fatalities, man arrested after shooting in Darwin - Sensationalist Headlines

https://www.smh.com.au/national/multiple-fatalities-man-arrested-after-fatal-shooting-in-darwin-police-20190604-p51uj5.html At least four people have been killed and a man is in custody after a gunman opened fire in Darwin on Tuesday night, Northern Territory police say. The incident began just before 6pm local time (6.30pm AEST), when police received several reports of shots fired in the Darwin city area. Duty superintendent Lee Morgan said police responded to an "active shooter situation", with initial reports that a man was using a shotgun. At about 6.45pm, a 45-year-old caucasian man was arrested in the Stuart Park area without incident. Pretty fucked up. Seems like they were targeting someone but shot anyone else they came across.

A damn shame, if only we had some sort of regulation on firearms that made it really difficult if not impossible to get your hands on them, that would have solved this. But seriously, that sucks that this happened, hopeful they can learn why he did it and be on the lookout for similar cases in the future.

Uh no, that wouldn't solve shit. If people really want to kill someone and anyone around them, they can use other means without a gun. Last month in a "Gun Control" country, a dude stabbed a lot of people with a knife, 10+ people at most. Don't use this tragic case as a ploy that gun control is needed.

I'm all for keeping firearms a serious labor to get akin to getting a car, but harder, but it's known that most gun violence is done with illegally obtained weapons. Stopping the majority of people who need or want em because a few slip through the cracks does nothing beyond force the aggressors to use less conventional ways to kill. You're essentially throwing the baby out with the bathwater mate. I'm also willing to bet real money on the fact that he got it illegally. He was just released from parole and has had multiple negative run ins with police, so he was definitely on the prohibited person's list your country has for firearm ownership, and the fact that the shotgun was also sawn off to be short also is a massive tell that it was not owned by him initially. Any modifications like that needs to be brought to the chief commissioner of police and then someone with an armourer's license if done legally. And because of his described history, no chance in hell he'd even have a class A gun license nor the permission to get a shotgun he had cut short. He either one, stole it, or two, bought it from an underground dealer, and neither of those are effectively prevented by stricter gun crime. He can just as easily steal any other lethally effective tool or again, just buy from an underground dealer. Your country already has some of the most sensible and Rock solid gun laws I've seen and I hope America follows suit, but "making guns harder to get" with your laws at this point will only punish those who need them. It's not like you can just apply and get a license y'know? You need a valid reason in your government's eyes, and Australia doesn't recognize self defense as a reason for the average person.

im pretty sure he was trying to be an absolute dickhead about how australia already has strict gunlaws and this happened regardless. if he has a manifesto i want it buried, if he has an identity i want it erased. call me a nazi but i believe someone who does something like this as a result of a mental break or as a result of his own twisted free will don't get to consider themselves part of our species-- PROBABLY extreme, but is there a single thing we can do to combat this?

Yeah I was bein a dickhead. As far as I can tell the only real solution is to learn from their actions and interdict them before they act but after they've set their intention in motion. Otherwise it's quite impossible to stop someone who wants to kill someone without warning and it's only down to luck or self defense if the victim survives

What. If someone has a mental breakdown and harms others that does't invalidate their existence as a human being, they still deserve to be treated as one and to be given help to get better. These sort of things can be prevented to a degree. Background checks and psych evals for gun owners, open access to mental healthcare and lessening the stigma around it. In this case this man was known to police, on parole and had a GPS monitor. How did he get access to a gun? Was the system keeping an eye on him? Were there warning signs that were ignored? There is always something that can be learned in needless tragedies like this.

"Why do people always bring up gun ownership in these threads rather than the actual causes of the shooting" Proceeds to try and rail on gun laws in a thread about a shooting, completely unprompted

Apparently it was a pump-action shotgun. They're Cat C (5 rounds or under) or Cat D (over 5 rounds), which are not available to most shooters. But as you said, he was on parole, so he was no allowed a gun anyway.

Seems like the cops are largely at fault here.

I took the extreme highway, I admit it... To have enough awareness to operate [what I'm going to guess] is a pump action shotgun and then jump in your car to flee the scene? Sorry, but it's hard to be empathic when you've faced an ocean of inhumane acts by verifiable subhuman insects whose only goal is something so egocentric, misguided, malicious, envious, whatever. At this point we've seen it all as a planet. I'm know I'm sounding like a heartless bastard about now, but I assure you I see someone distressed on the street I don't turn a blind eye. To jump around: someone in the american public school system is sure to have a bad time if they're even a little bit awkward and they might spiral down the depths of depravity and isolation, but in this case? A 45 year old man? Where do we draw the line? This man's motives aren't clear, but regardless we should change how the media reports on these people.

... And how is it their fault?

I never complained about people bringing up gun ownership, just per-emptively pointing out gun control doesn't work.

He was on parole and actively being tracked... or he was supposed to be.

Being on parole doesn't mean the FBI/equivalent camp outside your house in an undercover ice cream truck 24/7 to stalk you.

"Some people still commit crimes even when it's illegal" being a very solid argument against the efficiency of a given regulation, of course.

The police don't control who gets parole.

Obviously. The fact he was on parole wasn't something I meant to emphasise. Maybe the cops aren't responsible for his tracking either idk but it seems like someone somewhere screwed up.

It is a solid argument, yes. When us Australians are deprived the right to self defense it becomes a serious issue.

Nobody ever argue that gun control would make any and all shooting strictly impossible. The point is to reduce gun related deaths and injuries. Pointing to anecdotal evidence such as this shooting as proof that gun control is useless is just as patently ridiculous as pointing to a single shooting in the US to claim that easy access to guns alone is responsible for it. This whole argument of yours doesn't stand on its own and more importantly, it's completely irrelevant to the topic at hand.

From what I'm seeing in the updated article, the guy was on parole with an electronic bracelet.

Cool, but they do argue that it does reduce related deaths and injuries as you said and that's also provably false. This just CONFIRMS what is already known and it's not wrong to point it out. As for the topic, nothing to really talk about besides? It's a shooting, only thing we can do is give our condolences to the victims affected and move on. Or we can understand that there's more to the issue in gun related violence.

It doesn't confirm anything, no. Do you know what anecdotal evidence means? To prove or confirm such a claim, you need to provide statistical evidence. A single shooting isn't statistical evidence nor does it go against any of the claims of the pro-gun-control side.

Good thing I wasn't using this as the sole piece of evidence for the uselessness of strict gun control. But it does fall in line with the trend which is what I said it does, y'know, the actual statistical evidence? Nice of you to try and twist the argument into something it wasn't tho.

You didn't post any other piece of evidence for it here.

seems like the overall lower gun crimes per capita brought about by regulations, limited CC laws, and a national healthcare system are much better than our american system of "fuckall, go get a gun" but hey, individual incidents vs larger trends I suppose

Like you said, it was a jab, my frustration that the people who were killed were legally restricted their rights to self defense. Hardly worth a 10 paragraph rant about something that isn't wholly relevent to the conversation. And as I said in my first post the more effective thing to be done is to learn from this to per-empt future shootings.

speak for yourself, i don't want a gun to defend myself because it means someone else might be able to have a gun to defend themselves and the easier people can 'defend themselves' the easier it is for them to use that leverage to attack others as well.

Mate you have no clue what the fuck your even on about. Gun control isn't here to stop people from defending themselves its to stop them ever needing to, let me explain how this works since you don't seem to get it. When everyone has guns, that means the stupidest, most unstable members of society have an easier access to said guns because there are more guns in the country which means more chances for someone to slip up or steal one. You restrict them from everyone and those that really should not have the ability to access them have a far harder time getting one because no one has them. Gun control isn't there to stop people who would cause no issues, its there to stop those that would, the price for which is that almost no one is allowed them thereby helping to prevent the few that are here from falling in to the wrong hands. I for one enjoy the ability to walk down the road without every second person having the means to end my life on their waist, paranoia that you need to defend yourself from anyone at any time is not a healthy way to live. Also to counter point your argument directly: instances where someone would even have the capacity to "defend themselves" with a firearm in this country are almost non existent, more so when you consider how little civilians owning weapons does in the US when almost every mass shooting has the aggressor taken down by police, not victims.

Sure that's a reasonable sentiment, but I disagree when it comes to criminals with intent, they're already breaking the law and can generally have access to a firearm or other deadly items that you won't be allowed to have to even your odds, if you think that's an acceptable trade off then that's all right. I guess you don't understand it then huh? Because banning guns doesn't take guns out of the hands of people who give zero fucks about the law. And walking safe? Just goes to show you you have an irrational fear of guns. Anyone has the capacity to end your life regardless, they can just come up behind you and sock you, or stab you with a knife, or any other number of weapons that someone can use off hand, once again criminals tend to break the law. And to counter your counter: We have plenty of instances where we have the need to defend ourselves. Our homicide rates might not be up there with the U.S. but just about every other crime factor is, assaults are pretty much on par, more rape victims here(Easily explained due to reporting though), more burglaries, car thefts, etc. On a per capita basis of course. And regarding mass shootings, plenty of reports about how a civilian stopped a mass shooting before it even began as well as the supposed under reporting of firearm use that diffuses a lot of situations.