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Five days before Matti Juhani Saari murdered 11 people at Seinäjoki University of Applied Sciences in 2008, authorities attempted to confiscate his handgun, but he wasn’t home.

Finland violated the rights of the victims of a 2008 school shooting by giving the perpetrator a gun permit, the European Court of Human Rights ruled on Thursday.

Judges at the Strasbourg-based court found that in granting a gun license to the hospitality management student who would go on to kill 11 people and injuring as many more, the Finish government failed to protect its citizens’ right to life.

Nineteen relatives brought the complaint before the rights court, arguing that the police precinct which granted the gun permit only a month before the tragedy.

“The domestic authorities have not observed the special duty of diligence incumbent on them because of the particularly high level of risk to life inherent in any misconduct involving the use of firearms,” the court found in a 6-1 decision.

– Molly Quell in Finnish Police Chief Responsible for 2008 School Mass Shooting That Killed 11

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55 COMMENTS

  1. Sigh.

    Good way to convince any civil service bureaucrat to not issue any more permits to any one for any reason.

    Glad I live in the United States.

    • Minority Report is fictional. You cannot predict what someone will do in the future based on their past. It is a good indication but not a true prediction.

    • Finland has relatively permissible gun laws that don’t comport with the Marxist Euroligarchy. The court has an agenda and civilian disarmament is one of the goals.

      • Agreed…It’s not about the chief, the kids.etc. It is all about the gun and in the background it’s all about citizens owning guns.

        Are we to hold airlines responsible because they sold tickets to terrorists? Are we going to hold a car dealer responsible for selling a car to someone who later drinks and kills a van load of kids, etc?
        The perp gets a pass and the inanimate object and the police chief who did what amounts to the DMV issuing a driver’s license are held responsible. Holding the Police Chief responsible makes it’s difficult to determine who is more off in the head. The knee jerk nitwit judges or the perpetrator?

        Thanks to violent criminals there are risks everywhere you go. Unless you are Jet Li the only thing you can do when cornered is fight and to do that you need a firearm. Restricting rights by tying the hands of potential victims is a sick thought. One can wonder if gun control zealots enjoy hearing about unarmed victims being tortured and murdered? Do they have some sick fantasy to satisfy? After all Gun Control is rooted in racism and genocide and all sorts of evil and horror rose from that well. To see Gun Control today is to see the legacy of racists and nazis continue on.

        Make no mistake about it. On one hand Gun Control points at you and me On the other hand the criminal misuse of firearms points at criminals The difference is night and day.

        TRUMP/PENCE 2020.

        • The violent Marxist groups of ANTIFA/BLM (Burn 🔥-LOOT 💸-Murder 💀) rioters (peaceful protesters), (according to communist media outlets.), doing what THEY do best, being promoted by Demo-Commie politicians, Hollyweird stars, corporate sympathizers, and communist media shills…Allowing US citizens, especially minorities, to be assaulted, and murdered. While THEIR property & businesses was looted, pillaged, and destroyed…All incited by the leftist media, & promoted by the Socialist Marxist politicians of DNC…Who ordered police to stand down, to empty their jails, and encourage lawless amongst the left-wing anarchists. Politicians who help supply the violence with logistics, arms, and support…While frightened U.S. citizens, mostly Caucasian, who attempted to defend themselves, or exercised their 2nd Amendment rights with a firearm, were summarily subjugated to immediate malicious prosecution, false arrest, confiscation of property, confiscation of lawful arms, and deprivation/ suppression of Rights under color of law….That should tell you all you need to know about Socialism/the left-wing globalist agenda/and the New World 🌎 Order…There’s just NOT enough left-wing created victimhood…(P.S., as for Finland…Anyone who eats f@$$ing reindeer Stew, or fermented shark bits might have issues on both ends of the political Spectrum anyway!)

  2. There’s more to it than the summary mentions. The guy started praising Columbine, so the cops went to get the gun back. But he wasn’t home (wtf). So then 5 days later he does his attack. I suspect that doing nothing for the 5 days had more to do with it than the lack of Minority Report level precognition.

    • “There’s more to it than the summary mentions. The guy started praising Columbine, so the cops went to get the gun back.”

      OK, the cops were sent to retrieve the gun and botched it, so how is that the fault of the bureaucrat that issued the permit?

      (You can bet your ass they would love to do that here…)

      • I think I get the picture. Imagine you are the chief. One subordinate issues permits. Another subordinate will go out and retrieve guns if a permit-holder has a red-flag come up on him post-issue.

        The permit-issuer looks for past red-flags and refuses to issue a permit if a past red flag appears. That’s relatively easy.

        The gun-retriever has a tough job. He may not succeed in the time available between the post-issue red-flag appearing and a possible subsequent tragic incident.

        The chief has only one rational option. He tells the permit-issuer to issue NO permits to anyone except the chief’s good friends. That policy isn’t risk free either; but, at least there is some benefit to the chief for the few permits that get issued.

        This is the best-case scenario in a May-Issue scheme. No other outcome is rational from the chief’s viewpoint.

    • Next: the same court found Czechoslovakia guilty, because it issued drivers licence to Olga Hepnarova, who killed 8 and wounded 17 people by running over them intentionally with a truck.

  3. There are many Progressives / Liberals / Democrats who have proposed that the USA subsume it’s Constitution and laws under the aegis of European or International courts of law…it’s all part of that “One World – One Government – One People” mindset.

    • “it’s all part of that “One World – One Government – One People” :
      “Ein Volk, ein Reich, ein Führer mindset.”

      FIFY

    • “New 🌎 World Order/One-🌎 World Global Governance/aka, GLOBALISM!”
      (Re: Fight the Future! TRUMP/PENCE 2020 🇺🇸🇺🇸🇺🇸🇺🇸🇺🇸🇺🇸🇺🇸🇺🇸🇺🇸🇺🇸🇺🇸🇺🇸🇺🇸🇺🇸🇺🇸)

    • I think it’s a fine idea. Let’s just all get together and follow every one of the rules laid down by the one country which has saved your sorry asses from slavery and death twice already, while you continue to refuse to do anything to protect yourselves.

  4. It’s not mentioned in the article, but apparently there was nothing in this killer’s history to indicate he was a danger to society when he purchased the pistol – not until he made the comment online of the Columbine High School massacre “being the best entertainment ever”. As CGinTX mentions, it was more the fault of the follow-up when they went to his residence and tried to confiscate the weapon and he wasn’t home. Wouldn’t you think they’d check back more frequently or would try to figure out where he went? As we’ve said so often on this forum, it’s the criminal that perpetrates the violent act with the gun, knife, vehicle, or whatever else they lay their hands on. They and they alone are responsible for their actions.

    • “It’s not mentioned in the article, but apparently there was nothing in this killer’s history to indicate he was a danger to society when he purchased the pistol– not until he made the comment online of the Columbine High School massacre “being the best entertainment ever”

      That’s what makes no sense – Why wasn’t the supervisor of the cops tasked with retrieving the gun charged?

    • The Euro court found against *Finland* not the Detective Chief who issued the permit. It was Finland itself who went after the Detective Chief in 2011. He was acquitted of a (ridiculous IMO) charge of homicide, but was convicted of “negligent breach of an official duty” in the 2011 investigation. My Finnish isn’t so great but reading between some lines indicates that the 2011 conviction was likely because the police (remember this is the Detective Chief, so not a flunky bureaucrat) “could and should have retrieved the gun” prior to the shooting.

      That wasn’t enough for the families so they went to the Euro court…and got themselves about $350K – judgment against FINLAND not the Detective Chief.

      Again – just stating that the headline rarely gives the story, but confirmation bias makes you want to believe it on face value.

      • The facts of the story don’t matter. All it takes is a juicy headline to get the rabble roused. Even in this story’s text, there is nothing to support the headline given. TTAG is no better than the lying gun grabbers sometimes.

      • You and delta are the ones missing the point. Here is another example of some EU organization taking another oppertunity to dismantle another nation’s sovereignty to try and force them into compliance woth the EU’s agenda

  5. The idea that his gun would be confiscated just because he said something positive about Columbine is repulsive and ridiculous. Yes, this man did go on to commit mass murder. That cannot be predicted from a single statement. The number of people who have something horrible and reprehensible and then not killed anyone is far greater than the number who have.

    This is a part of the criminalization of certain speech. And certain thoughts.

  6. Finland is under the thumb of a European court?!? Didn’t they learn anything from being dominated by Russia? Columbine sure has been blamed for a lot of BS. ASSault weapon bans for a freaking Hipoint😕

    • They just fell for a common statist ploy: offer something highly desirable but tack on something undesirable. To get the goodies, the stupids swallow the poison unthinkingly. I’m pretty sure the Finns didn’t have the opportunity to give jurisdiction to the European Court of Human Rights as a standalone choice.

  7. Wrong so wrong if you do a check on someone and it’s okay can’t hold anyone to an nut that does wrong if so most government politicians judges would all be charged

  8. The European compact courts are one of the reasons Britian wants to disengage from the EU. However, the rub is that the EU compact requires anyone doing business with EU states must adopt all the EU laws and regulations. So even non-EU countries in Europe essentially give up their national identity. Can’t remember why the US isn’t affected, but to date, the EU standards have not been incorporated here. The globalists, of both parties, will eventually join the EU compact.

    • China does not abide by EU law, either.

      EU law is not enforceable outside of the EU, especially with entities as large as the US and China.

      Also thinking that Brazil does not bow to the EU, yet, they trade with them. Probably others as well: Indonesia, India, Malasia…

      • “China does not abide by EU law, either. ”

        Understand. My actual knowledge of EU rules is based on snippets from “news” articles. The issue is not only that some nations do not abide by EU standards, but that EU sigatory nations are prohibited from trade with nations who do not incorporate EU authority. It is this obstruction that has caused so much sturm and drang in the UK.

    • The European Court of Human Rights applies to members of the counsel of Europe, not just the EU. Non-EU countries like Ukraine and Russia also fall under the jurisdiction of the European Court of human rights, and although it hasn’t ever been 100%, the ECHR has made a big diffrence for human rights abuses in countries like that. Its amusing for Americans to bitch about the ECHR, but when you are in a country like Russia with a completely disfunctional government and that is your only pathway for justice, it’s a godsend.

    • I’ve read that a .22 does not have stopping power. Someone who has been killed has also been stopped. But since a .22 has no stopping power, it cannot be lethal. Therefore, he must not have used a Walther P22.

      Just in case: /sarc.

  9. What we need to be doing is supporting president Trump. We are looking at soon becoming nothing more than another gun less nation state if Biden/Harris win the election by hook or by crook.

  10. From reading the full article it does not appear that his mental defect was known when the permit was issued. It became known after and police went to his home to take his gun away. But he wasn’t home, and that was it.

    I see no fault at the first instance. But after that with police having evidence the man admired and desired to emulate the Columbine killings? Yeah, at that point you put out an All Points Bulliten, put detectives and a fugitive search detail on his ass. Start thinking about likely targets his twisted evil mind would be focusing on. Get some officers inside those places, ready to stop anything.

    Just going to his house to take his gun is wimpy incompetence. If you think you have a killer, hunt that killer with urgency.

    On that score, I’d fault any police agency, gun permits involved or not.

  11. I’m of two minds about this. In the article, it seems that the greater element of culpability was the department’s later lazy attempt to confiscate the gun. “We think he might be a homicidal maniac! Whelp, he’s not home … oh, well. We tried.” I don’t really have a problem with the decision on those grounds.

    However, I do have a problem with ceding national sovereignty to unaccountable international courts. The Finnish government seems to normally be pretty fair and reasonable and look after their citizens well. The EU, on the other hand, is run by a bunch of unaccountable globalist busybodies and I wouldn’t let them tell my country how to build its government website no less give it control over internal matters of justice.

    In fact, according to the article, the Finnish government didn’t ignore this case: “The Finnish government launched an investigation directly after the shooting and brought charges of negligent breach of an official duty and grossly negligent homicide against the Detective Chief Inspector who actually issued the permit. The police officer was convicted of breach of duty, but acquitted of the homicide charge in 2011. ”

    I don’t know why they’re more focused on the initial issue of the permit. They don’t go into any detail on whether there were red flags. Mind-reading isn’t really a thing. But the failure to effectively execute the confiscation does seem plainly negligent. Once you’ve decided something needs to be done, failure to execute is a pretty obvious failure.

    I also note that if some of the other students or faculty had been armed, he wouldn’t have been free to conduct his massacre unhindered.

    I further note, no offense intended to the victims, that this shooting and the Virginia Tech shooting prove that a .22 LR pistol is a dangerously lethal weapon and should not be underestimated.

    • Good post.

      On this point:
      “The EU, on the other hand, is run by a bunch of unaccountable globalist busybodies”

      The complexity of the EU’s banana regulations has been an internet myth about an “EU BANANA BAN” for some time. Even so, they really do have a detailed regulation, creating classifications by which bananas must be sorted. Length, width, curvature, they put a great deal of effort into defining an EU acceptable banana for import. They did not actually ban a banana, they just went incredibly far beyond saying “Don’t send the EU crappy bananas”.

      Can only help but wonder what the total costs of all their research, meetings, travel and meals and debate it took to figure out the European Banana Question.

  12. I was willing to give this the benefit of the doubt and read into it but ” the European Court of Human Rights ruled on Thursday” was all I needed to see.

    It’s a fundamentally different view of rights. We consider something a ‘right’ if the government can’t stop you. In the middle east, Asia and increasingly Europe, something is a ‘right’ if the government can stop others for you.

    • “In the middle east, Asia and increasingly Europe, something is a ‘right’ if the government can stop others for you.”

      Nice turn of phrase.

  13. Hospitality Management student murders 11 people. that’s funny to me, not that they got kilt, but by a hospitality management student is

    • “Apparently, RBG just died…that should send the Left into escalating acts of desperation.”

      Just saw that on local news website.

  14. Yep. The CRIMINAL has virtually zero responsibility for HIS crimes. The European Court of Human Rights is a fucking joke. The countries still supporting the European Union are beggars to their own demise.

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