Probation? Did I say probation?
Dr. Bishop’s life of crime in Massachusetts reached the point of probation?
She apparently punched a woman in I.H.O.P. for refusing to give up a child seat to Dr. Bishop’s child. From a Boston Globe blog:
In March, 2002, Bishop walked into an International House of Pancakes in Peabody with her family, asked for a booster seat for one of her children, and learned the last seat had gone to another mother.
Bishop, according to a police report, strode over to the other woman, demanded the seat and launched into a profanity-laced rant.
When the woman would not give the seat up, Bishop punched her in the head, all the while yelling “I am Dr. Amy Bishop.”
Bishop received probation and prosecutors recommended that she be sent to anger management classes, though it is unclear from court documents whether a judge ever sent her there.
The woman, identified in court documents as Michelle Gjika, declined to comment, saying only “It’s not something I want to relive.”
There’s an obvious Second Amendment lesson here: If Dr. Bishop had had a carry permit and a pistol in her purse at that I.H.O.P. , all those professors in Alabama would still be alive.
Why do you think that? She shotgunned her brother in the Bay State and never got so much as a slap on the wrist. Must be her charmin’ personality … sure ain’t her face.
It was a joke, Ben. I think my attempts at humor may be falling flat lately.
Not at all. I was just being a smartass.
This “going postal” has gotten way outta line, so to speak. It seems every kook and wacko and nut job in the land is armed and loaded with concealed heat these days. The UAH lady woulda killed several more people if she had a broken-in and oiled pistol that wouldn’t have jammed. Apparently she had a brand new piece loaded with hollow points, and one jammed on the ramp. Otherwise, she coulda snuffed out 10-12 lives.
But on the bright side, the Miss. legislature is passing bills to allow gun toters to pack their heat lawfully in even more places … restaurants, parks where kids aren’t playing, and who knows where else. Such is Progress.
Restaurant carry has always been legal. You just can’t carry in “any portion of an establishment, licensed to dispense alcoholic beverages for consumption on the premises, that is primarily devoted to dispensing alcoholic beverages; any portion of an establishment in which beer or light wine is consumed on the premises, that is primarily devoted to such purpose”. Just don’t go sit up at the bar…..
How did this Woman get around the system? Kill’s her brother, Pulls a shotgun on a car dealer, Punches a lady at an IHOP, Mails a pipe bomb… Did anyone see this coming? I wonder if her husband knew of her past. If he did he needs a straight jacket!
Given her propensities, her husband was justifiably afraid to say or do anything that might set her off.
I always assume I’d be buried under the jail just for driving without a license, so people like Bishop just astonish me.
I feel a lot safer when I am walking the streets of any major city in Europe. It is against the law there for anyone except the police to carry a gun. This country will never have a rational policy for controlling firearms, and fatal incidents like this are just a part of the price we pay for the decision to allow anyone and everyone to have access to handguns.
Outsider, we too have many laws regarding firearms. Laws dont stop people from doing bad deeds, they allow punishment for such acts. Check the statistices on law abiding citizens who legally use firearms. They have no problems. If someone is really to the point of acting like Dr. Bishop they will find a way to do harm. Case in point, years ago in California a man used a machete on a school playground…..The gun is always the scapegoat. Only the criminals in Europe have a gun…
bishop had connections. she went to harvard. somebody done something to cover her arse and keep her free on the streets. that somebody needs to be outed.
I can’t fathom the grief of losing one child to the hands of another child. But someone was in denial and failed to get this person effective treatment long before that dreadful day and before she set about in the world. She fell through lots of cracks to get to the cell she is in now.
justthefacts, I realize someone who decides to do harm to others can do it with a machete or a handgun, but it is a lot harder to kill four people with a machete than it is with a handgun. The availability and the ubiquity of handguns set the stage not only for murder, but also for tragic accidents. No one can predict when a person who has been a law abiding citizen will decide to take other peoples’ lives. The availability of a handgun just makes it so much easier to act on such an impulse and succeed. Any private citizen in Europe who decides to carry a handgun is, by definition, a criminal. If that person is caught the gun is taken away from him and he faces criminal charges. If you do not believe that the European approach makes for a safer society, there is nothing I can say that will persuade you on that point.
Outsider, 3 very close people have been the victims of a crime in Europe. Twice a handgun was used. Don’t kid yourself, they are prevalent there as well…..Our justice system just lets these people off the hook too easily as evidenced by Dr. Bishop….Gun crime should be grave time.
OK, justthefacts, here are some facts:
The homicide rates per 100,000 inhabitants:
Greece 0.75
England 1.37
Ireland 0.91
France 1.64
Germany 0.98
Italy 1.23
Austria 0.81
Spain 1.14
Portugal 1.79
U.S.A. 6.1
Who is kidding himself?
I prefer the Swiss model.
Outsider, Actually the 2008 stats on homicide here in the USA say 5.4 per 100k rate. Of that roughly 60% of the time a handgun is used so your number is a little off. Culturally the USA is alot different than most European cities and its hard to compare our “apples” to their “apples”….
All right, justthe facts, let’s say the correct figure is 5.4, and let’s assume that a handgun is used only 60% of the time. That would make our handgun homicide rate per 100,000 3.24. That still puts our handgun homicide rate around three times as high as the rate for homicides from all weapons in most European countries. The subject of gun ownership and the questions whether it is appropriate to put limits or restrictions on private handgun ownership seem to be immune to rational discussion. In my view, it is just not safe to have handguns in the hands of private citizens as an accepted part of everyday life. Whether they are used for murder, or for suicide, or just discharge accidentally, they are dangerous things to have around. In my opinion, and we would be better off if our social contract excluded the private ownership of these weapons.
Outsider the founders of our country didn’t want us to be like the Europeans. The Federalist papers spell out the exact thoughts of the founders and how they believed that the European countries used gun control to control and tax away the masses. The right to bear arms is a basic American Right and all I can say to you sir is move to Europe……..
Your remarks are spoken like a true patriot, Hatfield, and they are certainly germane. The founding fathers were not like Europeans, my good sir, they were Europeans. If you think you are safer living amid a population armed to the teeth, then you best stay out of Europe.
but it is a lot harder to kill four people with a machete than it is with a handgun
I’d surely be winded by # 2. But someone should ask Judge Singletary what he thinks.
There is nothing wrong with our existing gun laws except an occasional astonishing lack of will to enforce them. The nutcase professor should have been prosecuted the FIRST time she committed a crime with a firearm —- no way shooting at her brother multiple times with a shotgun was an “accident” –ridiculous. Prosecution at that time would have ended this woman’s ability to threaten others in the future —she would have been in prison or a mental institution, and would not have been able to thereafter legall purchase, own, or possess a firearm. Moreover, any one of the subsequent offenses, if prosecuted, would have been enough to prohibit her future legal purchase or ownership of any type of firearm. More laws, and more restrictions are not the answer here. Nor is forfeiture of our constitional rights and freedom. The necessary laws to stop this woman existed but were simply not enforced by the prosecutor and the legal system. And it is those folks who now have blood on their hands. Pitiful.
I agree with Anderson in the sense that I often feel as though I would be thrown under the jail for a relatively simple legal infraction , and find it astonishing that there are folks like this crazy woman who just seem to slip through the cracks of our legal justice system, time and time again.
Leaving the gun issue totally aside, there were other incidents of excessive anger and acting out in her past. A reasonable background check by her prospective employer should have revealed them. Unless her prior employers buried her actual record to be rid of her, the administrators at UAH should have been aware that she was a nutcase when they hired her. I expect we will ultimately learn that her behavior was a major factor in her denial of tenure.
SOMSLAWYER: Where would a prospective employer go to look that up? We can require a prospective employee to allow us to obtain credit rating info. But … in the Bishop case … there was no criminal info to be found, was there?
And I don’t know what Equifax (or others) charge for a background check, but they likely aren’t cheap.
And regarding a state university … I don’t know whether accounting and appropriation controls permit spending state funds on BIs for university faculty hires. How many professors have criminal backgrounds?
Bishop had … I think this is correct … a terminal degree from Havard. How many bloodthirsty PhDs does Harvard crank out? Other schools jump at the opportunity to hire Harvard grads … it never enters the hiring committees’ minds that the prospective hire might be a nut case.
So … as one who has done a lotta hiring of terminal degree people, I don’t see immediately a reasonable cure for this (let us hope) isolated problem. Whaddaya suggest?
I assume there is an arrest and slightly more with the IHOP incident. There’s no arrest with the shooting of her brother and the events of that day, and so I wonder what any background check would disclose.
Some things like this are going to be far more visible now, thanks to Google and the internet, but even with that, I think Dr. Bishop would have been below the radar.
a friend of the law, I do not disagree with any thing you say in your 7:38 p.m. post. Existing laws should be enforced, and enforced strictly, no question about it. What strict law enforcement will not reach is a person, usually a teenager, who finds a handgun available in his home and takes it to school to settle some real or imagined score or who uses it to kill himself in a moment of dispair or angst. It really goes beyond the laws we all abide (or at least should abide); it is a symptom (and a source) of the basic violence we tolerate as a society. What bothers me is how willingly we tolerate it and at what cost.
“What strict law enforcement will not reach is a person…..
While I understand the thought process behind this type of reasoning, IMO it is flawed. This type of reasoning could be used to ban automobiles and/or alcohol because we can’t rely upon the existing laws to stop all drunk driving on the roadways. In fact, this type of reasoning could be used to erode and eradicate most of our constitutional rights and freedoms. I don’t want to go down that road.
I live in a rural area, far enough away from any local law enforcement that my personal defense and defense of my family and home must be, at least initially, initiated by myself. My second amendment rights provide me the tools to protect myself and my family in the absence of readily available law enforcement. In many instances, a handgun is the most practical and appropriate means of that self protection (eg. kind of cumbersome and dangerous to carry a loaded shotgun or rifle in my vehicle with me at all times, or by the nightstand next to my bed).
Thank goodness my constitutional right (both federal and state of MS) to bear arms is not subject to the whims of emotion after every incident involving a firearm. To those who would disagree, I say “good luck” with the constitutional amendment process.
a friend of the law, I respect your point of view, and I understand the points you are making, but I think your analogies are a little overbroad. Automobiles are very useful for purposes other than inflicting injury on other people, and they are rarely used intentionally for that purpose. Alcohol is a different issue, and banning it has been tried once, to the delight of organized crime and to the detriment of society (by making so many people criminals for an essentially consentual activity that normally affects no one but the drinker). Dealing with alcohol consumption took two Constitutional Amendments for the whole roundtrip. I do not plan to undertake a campaign for a Constitutional amendment to stop, limit, or control the possession of handguns. I see the futility in that. What I do not understand is why so many people cling so tightly to the right to possess handguns despite the obvious risks that having a handgun creates and despite the societal costs of handgun possession in terms of accidental deaths, homicides, and avoidable injuries. You do not appear to regard the handgun related fatalities as too great a price to pay for the freedom to keep a handgun on your bedside table, despite the fact that a shotgun would be a superior weapon for purposes of self defense. In my view, as a society, we pay too high a price for the right to keep a handgun; in your view, that price is not too high. We just disagree in our judgments on this point, and the law certainly supports your view, not mine.
The Government armed at the teeth keeps it’s citizens cut off at the knees. Funny it’s not always a gun used in some crimes. Constitutional rights, home and property protection? From who? Maybe you could shoot the street crooks for breaking in but the taking of property by the court. What then? Bruce Lee, the art of fighting without fighting? The horsesh1t sucks. Till some in the courts get their own evaluation I make no claim that constitutional law actually exsit. No doubt someone ruled against such the right of others with release from pass prosecution of this person. The failure of the courts leave many with the what if’s. Constitutional rights. Right! OK move along nothing here, let’s go, move on.
“You do not appear to regard the handgun related fatalities as too great a price to pay for the freedom to keep a handgun on your bedside table, despite the fact that a shotgun would be a superior weapon for purposes of self defense. ”
Outsider, I view these types of issues as ones of common sense. Within my right to bear arms, I do indeed exhibit common sense. Years, ago, back when I had small children in my home, I had no easily available loaded firearms in my home. My firearms were all unloaded, locked up, and safely secured. I made my own assessment that the risk outweighed the potential benefit. For several years now, I no longer have small children in my home. Its just me, the wife, and my dogs –totally different scenario. And yes, I agree with your assessment that a shotgun is more effective than a handfun for self-protection —in fact, I have a shotgun, with plug removed, loaded with buckshot, at the ready in my closet in the event of any intruder. But, I also have a loaded pistol even closer to me, in the drawer of my nightstand (just in case there is not time to get to my closet), and one in my vehicle at all times. I do not carry a firearm on my person — I try to avoid areas or places where such might feel necessary. But, I like having that option if I felt such was necessary.
The point of all this is that within our broad constitutional right to bear arms, each person has to decide for himself what makes the most sense for them. One size does not fit all — not in a country where people live in such diverse places —- cities, rural, mountains, plains, swamps, hills, delta, etc. —and in differing situations. I think we should be free to make our own decisions, as opposed to having government do it for us.
If government would focus more on enforcing existing laws, instead of dreaming up of new ways to take away our constitutional rights and liberty, the motivation and justification to further encroach on our freedoms would often not exist. In the case of this crazy woman, a prosecutor simply doing his job could have prevented all of this insanity. But hey….this crazy woman graduated from HARVARD by God…so, she can get away with anything…. shoot and kill her brother, threaten others at gunpoint, terrorize an IHOP….whatever….cuz she graduated from HARVARD……..by damn. Lord have mercy.
Two questions:
Did this woman obtain a gun legally?
Should only the criminals have guns?