When Kori Ali Muhammad allegedly opened fire in Fresno on Tuesday, he not only killed three innocents, but also demonstrated anew that California’s litany of gun control laws poses no hindrance to determined attackers.
On April 18, Breitbart News noted that Muhammad allegedly shot and killed three people in Fresno, beginning with a passenger in vehicle. A pedestrian was then killed, and an individual in the parking lot of a Catholic Charities facility was shot and killed before police arrived to take Muhammad down. When police brought tackled him to the ground, Muhammad allegedly said, “Allahu Akbar.”
California has universal background checks, which means no one can legally buy a gun without doing so via a background check under the auspices of a Federal Firearms License (FFL). California also requires all firearms to be registered with the state, and has gun confiscation laws, Gun Violence Restraining Orders, a 10-day waiting period on gun purchases, an “assault weapons” ban, a “high capacity” magazine ban, and so much more. Yet not one of these laws prevented Muhammad’s attack.
It is interesting to note that Breitbart News pointed out the futility of a “high capacity” magazine ban, even as California Democrats were pushing it as part of a public safety campaign last year. After all, the Santa Barbara attacker, Elliot Rodger, only used 10-round magazines in shooting three people to death on May 23, 2104. “High capacity” magazines were not necessary.
We saw the same thing in Fresno Tuesday, where the Los Angeles Times reports that Muhammad allegedly used a .357 revolver to kill three innocents. In other words, he used a gun that does not even take magazines; a gun that requires the shooter to open a cylinder, eject the shell casings, and reload every five to seven shots.
In addition, Muhammad was a felon, which means he faced a 100 percent gun ban, yet he had a gun on Tuesday. Moreover, Tuesday’s attack was not the first time Muhammad had possessed a gun as a felon: the Times noted that he “was indicted by a federal grand jury in February 2005 for possession of cocaine with intent to distribute, possession of a firearm for drug trafficking and possession of a firearm by a convicted felon, after a Fresno police officer searched his car and found two large bags of cocaine, a loaded handgun and two rifles.”
Combine the overwhelming number of California gun laws with the fact that Muhammad was a felon, yet armed, and only one conclusion is reasonable — gun control does not stop determined attackers from acquiring the guns they need to kill innocents.
AWR Hawkins is the Second Amendment columnist for Breitbart News and host of Bullets with AWR Hawkins, a Breitbart News podcast. He is also the political analyst for Armed American Radio. Follow him on Twitter: @AWRHawkins. Reach him directly at awrhawkins@breitbart.com.
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