Saturday, October 3, 2015

THE UMPQUA COLLEGE VICTIMS & THE SHERIFF SAYS A MOUTHFUL,THEN HIDES IT

Everyone forgets the dead victims in tragedies, except those who loved them.

As I stated in my previous post, so far there are nine innocent human beings who died in the Umpqua (native indian translation is "thundering waters") Community College massacre ranging in age from 18 to 67: Lucero Alcaraz, 19 Rebecka Ann Carnes,18; Jason Dale Johnson, 33; Quinn Glen Cooper, 18; Treven Taylor Anspach, 20; Lucas Eibel, 18;  Lawrence Levine, 67;  Kim Saltmarsh Dietz, 59; and Sarena Dawn Moore, 44.

They all had dreams, aspirations, goals to be the very best they could in life, now none of what they hoped for will ever come true for them and their families.

These dead human beings are the sons, daughters, father's, mother's, relatives, friends, lovers, and innocent victims whose lives have been stolen forever from them and those who loved them.
             

                                             Lucero Alcaraz, 19


She hadn’t picked a major yet, but was hoping to become a nurse or a pediatrician.

Rebecka Carnes, 18
Carnes’ cousin, Lisa Crawford, posted a message on her Facebook account, calling Carnes “vibrant” and said she was “loved fiercely.”According to the post, Carnes has just started school and a new job.

                                                  Jason Johnson, 33           


Johnson’s mother, Tonja Johnson Engel told NBC News her son had just started classes on Monday.
“He started Monday and he was so proud of what he had accomplished and rightly so,” she said. “The other day he looked at me and hugged me and said, ‘Mom, how long have you been waiting for one of your kids to go to college?’ and I said, “Oh, about 20 years.”                                         

                                                                 Quinn Cooper, 18







Cooper was originally from Roseburg. He had graduated from high school in June and died on his fourth day in college, according to a statement from his family.
“Quinn was funny, sweet, compassionate, and such a wonderful, loving person,” the statement added.
Cooper had been planning to take his brown belt test next week, and also enjoyed voice acting and dancing, according to the statement.
“I don’t know how we are going to move forward with our lives without Quinn,” the statement added. “Our lives are shattered beyond repair.”      

                                               Treven Anspach, 20
                           
Anspach’s family described him as a “one of the most positive young men, always looking for the best in life,” and as “a perfect son.”
The 20-year-old was from Sutherlin, Oregon.
                                  
                                                  Lucas Eibel, 18

According to a statement from his family, Eibel volunteered at a local wild animal park and at an animal shelter. He had graduated from Roseburg High School with “high academic marks” and received a scholarship.

Eibel was studying chemistry.

“We have tried to figure out how to tell everyone how amazing Lucas was, but that would take 18 years,” the family statement added.

                                                 Lawrence Levine, 67                            

Levine, 67, taught at Umpqua Community College, authorities said Friday. He lived in Glide, Oregon.
His Facebook page include a photo of him fly fishing, and he appears to have written for a fishing organization. In one entry described diving into the river near his home.
“As I gazed into the depths, I saw my shadow and rays of light emanating around my silhouette,” Levine wrote in 2013. “The light danced to the rhythm of the breeze on the water; it was all in one and magical, and that was what I dove into.”
     Kim Dietz, 59

Dietz was 59-years-old. She lived in Roseburg. According to a post on Facebook, Roseburg had worked as a caretaker at an Oregon vineyard and had a daughter who attended Umpqua Community College.

                                    Sarena Moore, 44


Moore, 44, lived in Myrtle Creek, Oregon, authorities said Friday. 


According to Moore’s Facebook page, she attended Reno High School and worked for the Oregon Conference of Seventh Day Adventists.


Countless others have been wounded both physically and emotionally.

These people above are the most important realities to remember as those who loved them will never see, talk, or touch them ever again.

Unless you have lost a loved one to violence as they and I have, do not even try to imagine what these people are feeling. It is beyond your comprehension to walk in their shoes.

As always, there are these ironic, side stories that pop up, in particular the ones about the law enforcement community whose sworn job is to fairly enforce the laws, treat the dead with compassion, and above all to be honest in doing their jobs.

Now that this massacre is in his jurisdiction, I wonder how the Sheriff feels about his ignorant prejudiced statements re "actors hired by the Federal government that were part of the Sandy Hook Massacre as part of a conspiracy".

No wonder he immediately tried to hide it by deleting his post off of Face Book about "the conspiracy", after all, these are now his dead friends, his community, and it really happened.

It is so easy to pontificate about the violent death of others that you don't know, but when he saw this happen in his Town, one of the first  things he thought of doing was to protect his own ass by removing the stupidly, moronic Face Book post.

Good job Sheriff, your a real piece of work, little children in Connecticut murdered along with Twin Towers human beings supposedly murdered by the government, but now when it hits you in the face, run to erase your ignorant mumbling.

Am I pissed at him, yes, because to those such as him, it never is about the victims who have died, it always is about the politics, egos, protecting ones job, and saving face of those who are so cruel as to judge others who have suffered tragedies.

As the national debate over gun control raged online after the mass shooting at Umpqua Community College on Thursday, comments on the subject posted on Facebook by Sheriff John Hanlin of Douglas County, whose force responded to the latest rampage, came under scrutiny.

The sheriff, who has made no secret of his strident opposition to tougher gun laws, made his views clear in a letter to Vice President Joseph R. Biden Jr. posted on his department’s Facebook page on Jan. 16, 2013, after the massacre at Sandy Hook Elementary School. Mr. Hanlin urged the vice president to treat his letter as “a formal request that you NOT tamper with or attempt to amend” the Second Amendment.
“Gun control is NOT the answer to preventing heinous crimes like school shootings,” he wrote, adding that efforts to restrict gun ownership “would be irresponsible and an indisputable insult to the American people.” 

The sheriff also warned the vice president that “any federal regulation enacted by Congress or by executive order of the president offending the constitutional rights of my citizens shall not be enforced by me or by my deputies, nor will I permit the enforcement of any unconstitutional regulations or orders by federal officers within the borders of Douglas County Oregon.”

Ok, he's entitled to his views on gun control but......

Three days before that letter was released, Mr. Hanlin shared a link on his personal Facebook page to a YouTube video, which suggested that the shootings at Sandy Hook and the attacks of Sept. 11, 2001 might have been staged by the federal government to provide a pretext for “disarming the public” through gun control legislation. 

In a comment imploring his Facebook friends to watch that video, whose producer claims that the parents of children “allegedly shot” at Sandy Hook were actors, the sheriff wrote, “This makes me wonder who we can trust anymore.




A screenshot from the Facebook page of Sheriff John Hanlin
 in Douglas County, Ore..Creditvia Facebook

After that update attracted criticism, 
it was removed from Mr. Hanlin’s 
personal Facebook page on Friday, 
but not before numerous screenshots 
were made and shared online.

Shame on Mr. Hanlin, trying to score points on the unknown innocent dead 
with his complete indifference of a 
fantasy tale, now he sees real 
mass killings in his own backyard.

This is what Americans do, 

distancing themselves from 
ugly reality by weaving their 
webs of self denial, indifference, 
that tragedies happen only to 
others, and will not visit them 
with the horrors of killings.

The "safety bubble' of "not here 

where I live", and "it's a government 
conspiracy killing people 
elsewhere", doesn't work 
any longer to protect us.

Perhaps, but I doubt it, he and 

others will learn some humility 
that the innocent dead in his town 
are precious human beings, 
just as those he casually dismissed in 
other town's killings as somehow
being actors conspiring to fake the 
horrific losses of those they loved.

Where will the next mass murder 

happen, and it will, seemingly 
out of nowhere,the cycle 
will continue because we refuse 
to do anything serious to stop it.


5 comments:

  1. Treven Taylor Anspach was the distant cousin of Emmy award winner, David Anspaugh (sic). Brave man! Well done, Treven! Rest in peace!

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  2. REST IN PEACE Treven Taylor Anspach and all of the victims of this horrific tragedy.

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  3. Wow! The victims came from multiple births:
    Jason Dale Johnson was a twin and he was of Norwegian origin and he died very unexpectedly, while Rand Alsandair McGowan is a triplet of Irish and Mexican origin and he is still living and last but not lease, Lucas Kenneth Eibal was a quadruplet and he was of German origin and he died very unexpectedly. Rest in peace, Jason and Lucas. Rest well, Rand.

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  4. Tracy Leu Heu is the only person of Laotian origin. Her parents came from the Kingdom of Laos, now a Marxist-Leninist state, Lao People's Democratic Republic. Christopher Lee Mintz is of Melungeon origin. Ana Boylan has Irish and French-Canadian origin.

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  5. Thank you "Anonymous" for the above information about Tracy Leu Heu, Christopher Lee Mintz, and Ana Boylan who you mention. They are some of the survivors of this horrible tragedy. I have written below some information about them & I am sure that they will never forget the trauma experienced by them in being there during this massacre of innocent human beings. It always raises the questions to me of why do people die and others live when deranged killers do their evil violence.

    Christopher Lee Mintz, 30, was an Army veteran who had served in Iraq, according to his family. When the gunman opened fire in a classroom next to his, Mintz rushed toward the sound of the bullets, according to an account he gave Jayme Skinner, the mother of his son.

    Mintz approached the gunman and pleaded with him.

    “It's my son's birthday!” Mintz said as — shot seven times — he collapsed to the ground.

    Bullets hit Mintz in the upper back, hip, abdomen and left hand, Skinner said. Yet somehow, he survived.

    Tracy Heu told CNN's Sara Sidner in an exclusive interview that she was sitting at the front of the classroom facing her teacher when the gunman entered with a shot.
    Who were the victims?
    "He just came in and shot towards the back of the wall and told everybody to get in the center of the room and on the ground," Heu said.
    Harper-Mercer, 26, had guns and wore body armor, she said, and seemed determined to shoot. He didn't appear anxious or stressed, but rather "he seemed happy about it," Heu said.
    A mother of three said she's relieved to be alive. She and two other people were the only ones able to walk out of the classroom. Everyone else was either too wounded or dead.

    Ana Boylan, one of the survivors of last week’s Umpqua Community College shooting, recounted her harrowing experience during an interview on Good Morning America on Monday.

    Speaking from the Oregon hospital where she’s recovering from a gunshot wound to her back, the 18-year-old fought back tears as she recalled the scene in her Writing 115 class and the actions of gunman Chris Harper-Mercer.

    “I could hear everyone breathing hard, and freaking out and crying, and he asked everyone to move to the center of the classroom, so we just sort of army crawled to the center,” Boylan revealed. The teenager was only on her fourth day of classes, her brother Korre previously told PEOPLE.

    Boylan said Harper-Mercer laughed after shooting the class teacher Larry Levine.

    “He sounded really deranged because he said that he’d been waiting to do that for a really long time, and he laughed,” she said, adding that Harper-Mercer revealed he intended to also kill himself.

    She said the gunman instructed the students to rise one by one and share what religion they practiced. Boylan said that after the first student shared his beliefs, he was shot.

    “The shooter said that he would only feel pain for a couple of seconds and that he would be with God soon, and then he shot him,” she said.



    Boylan also echoed reports that Harper-Mercer gave one of her classmates a note for the police.

    “He said, ‘The kid in the glasses, get up, I need you to do me a favor, today’s your lucky day,’ and handed him this like business envelope,” Boylan said.

    After several minutes of terror, Boylan heard another student in her classroom confirm the shooter’s death.

    “I didn’t think I was gonna make it, the last thing I remember praying was that my family and my loved ones and the family and loved ones of my peers would somehow know that we’re okay,” she said.

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