7 shoppers killed in Dutch mall shooting

[Dennisch]

Yesterday was a very dark day in Dutch history..

(CNN) -- Dutch officials say a gunman opened fire at a mall on Saturday, killing seven people and wounding 16 others before shooting himself in the head, a journalist with CNN affiliate SBS reported, citing police and other officials.

Bas Eenhoorn, mayor of Alphen aan den Rijn, told reporters that the 24-year-old suspected shooter -- identified only as Tristan V -- fired an automatic rifle and killed himself before police arrived on the scene.

The suspect, whose full name is being withheld until a formal investigation is concluded, is a Dutch national who was living with his father, police told SBS. Computer equipment and other materials were confiscated from the father's apartment after the shooting.

A farewell note was found at the suspect's mother's home. Police told SBS that the suspect claimed in the note that he had placed explosives in several commercial areas in Alphen.

The areas were evacuated as police conducted a search. As of 11 p.m., no explosives were found.

Three of the wounded mall victims are in critical condition, officials said Saturday night. The motive of the shooting was not known and no indication was given in the note.

Eenhoorn plans to hold meetings Sunday with some of the victims, SBS reported.




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[zedextreme8177]

I wonder if this will be considered as terrorism or as a multiple-homicide. I would class it as the former.

 

[Sam48]

Lets hope people don't look on this as they did with the Tuscon shootings and try to put some sort of a ban on guns.

In fact, here's an old quote of mine from the "Guns" thread. The funny thing is it actually depicts this exact scenario.

But for your sake lets assume then that it's not a bank robbery. Now, as before, owning a gun is illegal, and the criminal in this scenario is the only one with a gun, like before. However, this time around, he's at a shopping mall, he has nothing to loose, and his only incentive is to kill people. Now what? Who's going to stop him before police arrive? And how many people could he possibly kill within that span of time?

 

[Dennisch]

We already have a very strict gun law in the Netherlands, and yet, guns are easy obtainable if you know where to search.

The shooter was already under investigation for illegal weapon possession.

 

[Solid Lifters]

Gun laws at work! Yeah! 👍

I feel so much safer, now.

 

[Sam48]

We already have a very strict gun law in the Netherlands, and yet, guns are easy obtainable if you know where to search.
\

The fact that you do have strict gun laws is the problem then.

 

[Dennisch]

The fact that you do have strict gun laws is the problem then.

With or without strict laws, it will happen. But by my knowledge this is the first time something like this as happened in the Netherlands. With innocent people being killed instead of criminals killing each other. There will always be a black market for weapons. And the open border policy in Europe isn't helping either, I'm nowhere near being a criminal, but I've seen plenty of real guns in my life, and they where all illegal weapons.

The victims:
3 women, 91,68 and 45 years old, 3 men, 80,49 and 42 years old.
17 people are wounded, 12 are still in the hospital,7 are severely wounded, 2 children have minor wounds.

 

[Keef]

Gun laws at work! Yeah! 👍

I feel so much safer, now.

We're not safe yet. We're only safe when every criminal has an automatic rifle and we have nothing to defend ourselves with.

Seriously though. He has an assault rifle, but guns are illegal? Assault rifle...guns are illegal...assault rifle...guns are illegal...

Does that make any sense to anybody?

 

[Dennisch]

We're not safe yet. We're only safe when every criminal has an automatic rifle and we have nothing to defend ourselves with.

Seriously though. He has an assault rifle, but guns are illegal? Assault rifle...guns are illegal...assault rifle...guns are illegal...

Does that make any sense to anybody?

Guns aren't illegal, when you join a shooting club, after a while you can buy a gun, or an assault rifle, but it's not allowed to be an automatic gun. I know a guy who has an LEGAL M16, but it's not automatic.

But what I ment to say was: You can get an illegal (unregistered) weapon without problems, on the black market..

 

[Keef]

Guns aren't illegal, when you join a shooting club, after a while you can buy a gun, or an assault rifle, but it's not allowed to be an automatic gun. I know a guy who has an LEGAL M16, but it's not automatic.

Are you allowed to carry a pistol with you for self defense on or in your own property and workplace, and anywhere outside of public or privately owned establishments?

Also, why can anybody with some know-how get a gun on the black market? Answer that question for me.

 

[Dennisch]

Are you allowed to carry a pistol with you for self defense on or in your own property and workplace, and anywhere outside of public or privately owned establishments?

Also, why can anybody with some know-how get a gun on the black market? Answer that question for me.

No, you are not allowed to carry it. If you should shoot a burglar, you will be the one with a problem with the police. As far as I know, it's only allowed to shoot a gun on a shooting range.

And for the black market, it's just because it is there. Criminal behaviour is illegal in the entire world, yet the world is riddled with criminals.

edit: When you own a legal gun/rifle etc. etc. , You need to have a safe for the gun, and a separate safe for the bullets. The police have the authority to check you when ever they feel like, unannounced. And if your gun is loaded, in your own house, you have a problem.

 

[Sam48]

With or without strict laws, it will happen.

Not necessarily. If there were no gun laws in place, people would probably consider carrying a pistol of some sort with them. If the criminal then knew this was the case, he would probably not consider shooting at a mall were there are lots of people.

 

[Dennisch]

Not necessarily. If there were no gun laws in place, people would probably consider carrying a pistol of some sort with them. If the criminal then knew this was the case, he would probably not consider shooting at a mall were there are lots of people.

So, then even more bullets would fly through a mall, possibly hitting even more innocent bystanders?

Carrying a gun doesn't stop an idiot with a deathwish.

 

[Keef]

No, you are not allowed to carry it.

You're not allowed to carry it in many places in the US also, which I totally disagree with.

If you should shoot a burglar, you will be the one with a problem with the police. As far as I know, it's only allowed to shoot a gun on a shooting range.

But this is ridiculous. In most states you're allowed to defend yourself against a home invasion with deadly force. Bonus points if the intruder drew a weapon on you. Of course, you still have to do the whole court thing but it is likely that the home owner will be acquitted of any wrongdoing, provided certain circumstances are met.

And for the black market, it's just because it is there.

Not a good answer. Why is it there?

Criminal behaviour is illegal in the entire world, yet the world is riddled with criminals.

It's pretty logical why some crimes are illegal, specifically the ones that violate people's natural rights. In some cases it makes sense to outlaw things that violate legislated rights, though there are many legislated rights around the world that can be argued against. But, owning guns? Defending your property? Why are these illegal? They only encourage criminals to break into homes because they know the person living there will be helpless to defend themselves.

When you own a legal gun/rifle etc. etc. , You need to have a safe for the gun, and a separate safe for the bullets. The police have the authority to check you when ever they feel like, unannounced. And if your gun is loaded, in your own house, you have a problem.

In the States, gun safes are a safety suggested, not an enforced law. Every day when my dad gets home from work he lays his loaded and holstered LCP on the counter because he's allowed to. My mom and I are both old enough to not mess with it, obviously, but if there were younger kids here my dad would lock his gun up and put it where nobody could get it.

 

[Dennisch]

I didn't create the laws, they are just there. Choice of our governement.

And why the black market is there? Because criminals created it.

We are not allowed to use excessive force to kick someone out of our house. Just the force that is needed. Alto the public opinion about this matter is seriously changing, because times are changing, and robberies become more often.

We have a very mild justice system, about which everybody in the Netherlands complains. Life in prison is rarely given. And with good behaviour they will cut a third of the sentence. Just this week a sentence was given to 12 men who gangraped a 16 year old girl. The longest sentence given? 12 months.

 

[Sam48]

So, then even more bullets would fly through a mall, possibly hitting even more innocent bystanders?

Carrying a gun doesn't stop an idiot with a deathwish.

Correct, but it is more likely to cause one to not even consider such an act in the first place.

 

[Jawsers]

Correct, but it is more likely to cause one to not even consider such an act in the first place.

If someone is beyond the edge of sanity, considering isn't even part of their thought process.

 

[ivoyared]

I didn't create the laws, they are just there. Choice of our governement.

And why the black market is there? Because criminals created it.

We are not allowed to use excessive force to kick someone out of our house. Just the force that is needed. Alto the public opinion about this matter is seriously changing, because times are changing, and robberies become more often.

We have a very mild justice system, about which everybody in the Netherlands complains. Life in prison is rarely given. And with good behaviour they will cut a third of the sentence. Just this week a sentence was given to 12 men who gangraped a 16 year old girl. The longest sentence given? 12 months.

And I thought Brazilian justice system was terrible.

 

[Dennisch]

And I thought Brazilian justice system was terrible.

You should see our prisons, you would consider it to be a 1 or 2 star hotel.

 

[Keef]

I didn't create the laws, they are just there. Choice of our governement.

Here in the States many of us are fighting against the government having a choice in much of anything.

And why the black market is there? Because criminals created it.

Why did they create it? Yes, I'm going to keep asking until you get close enough to the point to make the connection I'm going to make.

We are not allowed to use excessive force to kick someone out of our house. Just the force that is needed. Alto the public opinion about this matter is seriously changing, because times are changing, and robberies become more often.

An honest question: What if the force that is needed is deadly? If it is needed it is not excessive, and yet there can be no force more excessive than that which causes death. If some dope walks in my house with a gun I'm going to try and kill him before he kills me. Besides it being my house, it's my life and that goes for wherever I happen to be.

We have a very mild justice system, about which everybody in the Netherlands complains. Life in prison is rarely given. And with good behaviour they will cut a third of the sentence. Just this week a sentence was given to 12 men who gangraped a 16 year old girl. The longest sentence given? 12 months.

Strict of lenient, the more important point is that a justice system be based on morality. As argued in the Human Rights thread, there seems to be one correct morality, and many incorrect ones.

 

[daan]

Correct, but it is more likely to cause one to not even consider such an act in the first place.

So you're saying that if guns were widely available, then folk would reconsider going to a public place and shooting everyone indiscrimately?

If so, then look at the last 10 spree killings and you'll find that 5 of them were done in the US which would seem to disagree with your point.

 

[Dennisch]

Here in the States many of us are fighting against the government having a choice in much of anything.

Here in the Netherlands also, but the government doesn't always listen, just like it happens in the States.

Why did they create it? Yes, I'm going to keep asking until you get close enough to the point to make the connection I'm going to make.

Just stop and think for a second. Buy a gun with your name attached to it, as a criminal you would never do that. Or buy a gun that doesn't exist in the database, would be my choice, if I was a criminal.

An honest question: What if the force that is needed is deadly? If it is needed it is not excessive, and yet there can be no force more excessive than that which causes death. If some dope walks in my house with a gun I'm going to try and kill him before he kills me. Besides it being my house, it's my life and that goes for wherever I happen to be.

If some dope enters my house with a gun, deadly force will likely be needed.
So then it becomes a mather of proving my innocence, which will not be too difficult, even in the Netherlands.
We had a case here where some dope broke into the house of a Pro Boxer,the burglar didn't have a weapon, needless to say the boxer won the fight, in his own house, and he got sentenced to jail.

Strict of lenient, the more important point is that a justice system be based on morality. As argued in the Human Rights thread, there seems to be one correct morality, and many incorrect ones.

You can kill someone, and be out in 3 to 5 years.
That's incorrect.
You can rape 60 kids, and get 7 years jail time, and then your sent of to TBS.
TBS is a sort of therapie to get you back to sanity, can last the rest of your life. But it has proven itself that it doesn't work, and still we have it.

 

[Joel]

We had a case here where some dope broke into the house of a Pro Boxer,the burglar didn't have a weapon, needless to say the boxer won the fight, in his own house, and he got sentenced to jail.

That's just absurd.

 

[Dennisch]

That's just absurd.

It is. And it happened. But thankfully the new government is working on these cases, so that maybe you can finally defend your life and stuff, without being jailed for years.

 

[Joel]

It is. And it happened. But thankfully the new government is working on these cases, so that maybe you can finally defend your life and stuff, without being jailed for years.

That scares me, to imagine that a guy's house was broken into, and just because he could handle himself in a fight means he gets put in jail.

To be honest, it's really not much different here in Canada. It's tough to get away with defending yourself here too.

 

[ivoyared]

At least here in Brasil, Human Rights is the reason why the justice system fails.

There was a 15 year old that stole more than 20 cars and never got sentenced to jail, because Human Rights thought that he was too young to stay in prision.

 

[Sam48]

So you're saying that if guns were widely available, then folk would reconsider going to a public place and shooting everyone indiscrimately?

Unless they're a complete psychopath like the one in the article.

If so, then look at the last 10 spree killings and you'll find that 5 of them were done in the US which would seem to disagree with your point.

Depends which state you're in. Although it does not take much to get a license to do such in most states, other do not allow it all.

 

[Keef]

Buy a gun with your name attached to it, as a criminal you would never do that. Or buy a gun that doesn't exist in the database, would be my choice, if I was a criminal.

Good job! You've realized that criminals get their guns through the black market specifically because the government has made it difficult to get guns legally.

People want guns, just like people want drugs. Many governments around the world have outlawed drugs, and made guns extremely difficult to get legally. And yet criminals still have them, because they want them. Drugs have become so commonplace that when Charlie Sheen says something about snorting coke people put the quote on a T-shirt and sell it. People think it's funny. Obviously outlawing these drugs has done nothing to help society except cost it tax dollars.

Same goes for gun regulation. It costs money to uphold on these rules and standards, and yet it does nothing to keep guns out of criminal hands. They always find a way to acquire them.

Prohibition is a perfect example of the government trying to regulate something that people want. They made the manufacture and sale of alcohol illegal. So what did people do? They made their own. They transported it hidden when the law wasn't looking. If they were looking, they ran from the cops. They literally went underground and set up bars in secret basements where nobody could find them. And alcohol was relatively commonplace. People want what they want, and even people who normally abide by the law will go out of their way to acquire certain things if they want it bad enough. You could consider it a black market for R12 Freon for old car air conditioning systems that I may or may not have participated in.

Black markets develop when somebody doesn't want you to have something that you want. Simple as that. Without any of these rules and regulations the black market would not exist. The registering of guns is one of these rules, by the way.

We had a case here where some dope broke into the house of a Pro Boxer,the burglar didn't have a weapon, needless to say the boxer won the fight, in his own house, and he got sentenced to jail.

That's preposterous. I would be embarrassed to live in a country that operates that way. Hell, it's getting to the point where I'm embarrassed to live where I do.

 

[Sureboss]

I'm sorry, but you cannot make any kind of reasonable judgement on that case of the boxer, all you know is the summary of the case from a third-party. It's like the Tony Martin case in some respects.

In the UK we have a law (which I think is very similar in Netherlands) which states you can defend yourself and your property and possessions with reasonable force, no law for self-defence should ever give you the right to beat someone to a pulp or kill someone (in the case of Tony Martin) who is actually running away from the property. I remember another case in the UK where a guy stopped burglars armed with knifes who had tied his family up, by coming at them with a cricket bat, the burglars made a run for it and he and his brother chased them down the street and to quote a Times article I just found:

"What followed was described in Reading Crown Court as self-defence that went too far. Walid Salem, one of the intruders, suffered a permanent brain injury after he was struck with a cricket bat so hard that it broke into three pieces. Neighbours saw several men beating Salem with weapons, including a metal pole. "

Whilst I won't care if scum who partake in such crimes get maimed or worse, I will care if my legal system allows it to happen. It of course gets murkier with guns, in a showdown (I'm thinking of an old western duel type situation), where it's "him or me" then yes, shooting to kill is acceptable in that situation. But you should never be allowed to use any force you deem as necessary because people will act as judge, jury and executioner, which is wrong.

Going back to the boxer case. Now, I'm guessing being a pro boxer he can take someone down pretty easily and probably knows some moves that can stop someone without injuring them. Do you actually think that if he beats this burglar to within an inch of his life, way beyond what was necessary to protect himself then he shouldn't be punished for taking the law in to his own hands? Don't get me wrong, I don't care if this burglar is hurt, but no one should be allowed to act out punishments they deem fit. Regardless of how inadequate you deem to the punishments set out by law are.

Anyone got a link to it? be interesting to read it.

So you're saying that if guns were widely available, then folk would reconsider going to a public place and shooting everyone indiscrimately?

If so, then look at the last 10 spree killings and you'll find that 5 of them were done in the US which would seem to disagree with your point.

Absolutely, to expect a rational response from someone who is already at the point of wanting to go on a shooting spree because the public can have access to guns in public places is a bit fanciful.