According to the Sacramento Bee, the Ranch Tehama shooter who murdered four and wounded another ten people in a northern California shooting spree was Kevin Janson Neal. And he was no stranger to the local law enforcement community.
District Attorney Gregg Cohen told The Bee that Neal is currently being prosecuted by his office for assault with a deadly weapon and a stabbing that had occurred earlier this year. Cohen said in that incident the victims were two of Neal’s neighbors . . .
One of whom he apparently shot to death — despite an outstanding restraining order — before moving on to other random victims and then the Rancho Tehama school.
Reportedly using “a semi-automatic rifle” . . .
At least two young boys were shot, one inside an elementary school and another when the suspect fired, seemingly at random, at a car heading to the school. Both boys are expected to survive, but the mother driving the car was critically wounded, said Assistant Sheriff Phil Johnston.
He was apparently unable to enter the school due to a lockdown that was initiated when teachers heard Neal’s gunfire outside.
After leaving the school the suspect stole another car and began firing at officers when they raced to town to confront him. They returned fire and killed him at a nearby intersection. All told, the ordeal lasted around 45 minutes, Johnston said.
Seven different shooting locations were being treated as separate crime scenes.
So let’s recap. We have in individual who had been charged with at least two felonies and was out on bail. He was also the subject of a restraining order issued to his neighbors, one of whom is now dead.
Despite the fact that all of that made his possession of firearms a legal impossibility, Neal somehow got his hands on a rifle and two handguns. And all this in a state with some of the most stringent gun control laws in the nation.
What’s the over/under on the number of hours until calls for still more stringent gun control laws emanates from Golden State legislators to make what Neal did today even more illegal-er?