Thursday 22 March 2012

First the Euro........

Another mad murdering criminal bites the dust in Toulouse. Just heard the questions from Sky News's man near the spot posing the interesting question, `where did he get all those weapons and how was he allowed to travel so freely?`

That's a question that was often posed during the Thatcher years, and she took some stick for her views.

10 comments:

Old AF Sarge said...

Oh yeah, open borders. A great idea if you live in some utopian paradise. Not so good when armed loons can come and go as they please. So HD, are firearms laws the same within those countries adhering to Schengen? (My guess is no...)

Hogdayafternoon said...

AF Sgt: You can buy all sorts in Belgium (a nice line in FN's). France would sell brimstone to the devil..... whereas in the good ole UK, lets just say this, even our Olympic pistol shooting team have to leave the country to practice.

Quartermaster said...

Germany has many restrictions. If I recall correctly, it's near impossible to get a hand gun over .30 cal, and you might be able to 5lb of smokeless powder in 10 years if you hand load.

I don't care about selling brimstone to the Devil, as long as they will sell me the weapons I want. With my Daewoo DR-200, and .45 ACP pistol, I can handle what I need to handle. I've also got an SKS just to have it, but it shoots, which is also important.

John Donovan (the Armorer), over at Castle Argghhh, makes me look like a piker in that regard. The man has a bloody flame thrower of all things (I do think it's deactivated, but he's implied that it might not be in one series of posts where I had a playful set-to with him).

God Created man, but Sam Colt made him equal.

sparkflash said...

"He also had a long record of petty crimes in France for which he served time in prison."

I suspect not, but if he obtained his firearms legally, then questions need to be asked about just what the criteria for obtaining them is and where they can be transported to - I don't think it would be good enough to say, if you bought them legally in Yemen, you can take them where you will.

If Schengen is abandoned, the logistics of stopping and searching every car, van or truck that crosses a border makes the mind boggle, but is linking a passport to a persons criminal record, an impossibility? Passport swipped through a scanner, if you've got a criminal record, you and your companions and vehicle get searched. Too much?

I'm sure this will make me sound callous, but with over 730 million people in Europe, there's going to be some wrong'uns and this will happen.

Hogdayafternoon said...

Spark`: I agree totally. I was in Holland on a field study trip with the Amsterdam Police when the PIRA machine gunned some off duty British service personnel, near Enschede I believe. The car went from Holland, into Germany then into Belgium in a matter of an hour or so, unchallenged. But a six mile queue at the borders would neither prevent or detect this type of incident.
Made us off duty police feel pretty vulnerable for a few days tho`, with our short hair and our white transit people carrier. But that's terrorism n`est pas?

JuliaM said...

Interesting to see how Sarkozy's officials were clearly far less concerned with the suspects 'human rights', or the 'concern in the community at police action'.

Just 'Come out, or we go in!'.

There may, however, be questions asked about the surveillance he was supposedly under, and why he wasn't picked up earlier.

Old BE said...

Err, he was a French citizen.

Old BE said...

Or were you talking about cross-border supply of weapons?

In which case I will retreat back to my cubbyhole because I know nothing about whether it's easy to obtain nasty equipment in other Schengen countries..!

Hogdayafternoon said...

I think there are plenty of guns legally available in France. Failing that, if you know the right district, an AK via the Balkan route will come quickly to hand for small change.

JuliaM said...

Yes, BE - I was talking about cross-border weapons.. ;)