Samuel Moreno-Carranza, age seven, was injured after his mother fired a rifle inside church and police responded, killing her

Samuel Moreno-Carranza, age seven, was injured after his mother fired a rifle inside church and police responded, killing her

A boy who was shot in the head at celebrity pastor Joel Osteen’s Houston megachurch on 11 February has lost “a portion of his frontal lobe” while recovering at the hospital, according to his grandmother.

In a Facebook post three days after the shooting, Walli Carranza said her seven-year-old grandson, Samuel Moreno-Carranza, “has lost a major part of what makes us who we are” after “half of his right skull [had] to be surgically removed during two surgeries done in less than 24 hours”. Samuel had endured “cardiac arrest multiple times, and no one can determine whether he has significant brain activity because his scalp tissue is too friable” to let doctors attach electroencephalogram wires to him, Carranza added in a post that doubled as a criticism of the US’s lack of meaningful gun control.

  • BassaForteEnglish
    0•4 months ago

    Am I saying anything about the general population’s right to own a gun? Am I even implying anything about it? No. Nor am I equating the shooter to the “good guy with a gun”, or saying that anybody other than the cops directly had anything to do with the child being shot.

    No, but the user I first replied to is by saying that “off-duty cops” are “good guys with guns”- they’re not the same. Your response was seemingly backing up the parent-commenters comment, making me think that you were agreeing with them.

    What I am pointing out though is that either this woman came into legal and rightful possession of a gun, or otherwise obtained it illegally, both of which are relevant to a conversation on gun control.

    Agreed 100%, but again the parent commenter didn’t mention anything about the woman, they mentioned the off-duty cops that they called “good guys with guns” that shot the 7-year old.

    So yes, I will agree that the woman had legal possession of a gun and committed a crime with it, that IS relevant to a conversation on gun control.

    However, the off-duty cops shooting the 7-year old is NOT relevant to a conversation on gun control because they are cops.

    • @[email protected]
      2•4 months ago

      off-duty cops shooting the 7-year old is NOT relevant to a conversation on gun control because they are cops.

      Right. Because they didn’t have guns and weren’t shooting? Because then the victims don’t exist? Because they had more Range time? Because they were trained in high-stress situations and extremely familiar with their weapons?

      This all sounds like me challenging Tony Hawke to a freestyle competition.

      • BassaForteEnglish
        -1•4 months ago

        Because they are cops, not civilian gun owners. Again, even if there was no second amendment, I guarantee cops would still be able to carry while off-duty. I’m saying the cops who shot the kid shouldn’t be wrapped with civilian gun owners because they aren’t civilian gun owners.

    • @[email protected]
      1•4 months ago

      If the cops directly shot the child without there being the presence of a firearm near the child, then that would be a fairly different conversation. And yeah, the parent comment may have assumed the “good guy with the gun” was not a cop, but instead a citizen. However, with these being cops, and their decision to shoot spawning from a citizen with a firearm who had intent to use that firearm to harm innocent people, it is still valid for there to be a gun control debate, because if you take her gun out of the equation, there likely was not going to be a police initiated shooting in this situation.