Judge Blocked Boulder's Assault Weapons Ban Just Days Before Deadly Shooting

[TheBlackAdder]

Last edited Wed Mar 24, 2021, 01:05 AM - Edit history (1)

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A Colorado judge blocked Boulder, Colorado, from enforcing a ban on assault-style weapons just 10 days before a man opened fire in a supermarket there, killing 10, including a police officer.

According to the arrest affidavit, Monday’s shooting was carried out with a Ruger AR-556, an AR-15 semi-automatic rifle that would have been prohibited under the two-year-old ban, which the city of Boulder passed after the school shooting in Parkland, Florida.

“This [shooting] is directly on the heels of the trial court staying the assault weapons ban our city had enacted,” Boulder City Councilor Rachel Friend tweeted after the shooting Monday. “I am [nauseous] and heartsick and angry and mostly so, so sad.”

With some exceptions, the 2018 ordinance largely banned the possession of assault weapons within city limits, describing them as “semi-automatic firearms designed with military features to allow rapid spray firing for the quick and efficient killing of humans.”

The ordinance also banned ammunition magazines capable of holding more than 10 rounds and prohibited the sale of firearms to anyone under the age of 21.

It’s unclear how old the suspect in Monday’s shooting was when he obtained the weapon earlier this month, or where he purchased it; he is currently 21 years old.

“I hope and pray we never have a mass shooting in Boulder,” Tom Carr, Boulder’s city attorney who drafted the ordinance, told the Daily Camera in 2018, “and what this ordinance is about is reducing, on the margins, the ease with which somebody could do that.”

https://www.huffpost.com/entry/boulder-assault-weapons-ban-shooting_n_6059fa75c5b6cebf58d1ea4f

Hmm.

UPDATE: It turns out that the rifle was purchased just 6 days before the shooting.

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[TheBlackAdder]

1. Kick with update.