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American Thinker
American Thinker
18 Feb 2023
Rajan Laad


NextImg:Michigan shooter’s prior felony gun charge was dismissed by far-left prosecutor

Three days back a gunman killed three and seriously wounded five others after opening fire on the East Lansing campus at Michigan State University.

How did the Democrats react?

A member of the state House, Ranjeev Puri even began with profanity to express condolences to the relatives of the victims.

Puri knew that his swear word-laced message would receive attention and elevate his profile. Puri made the tragic situation about himself instead of the victims, and perhaps exploited the tragedy to raise campaign cash.

Puri pledged to work tirelessly toward “common sense gun reform” in the U.S.

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Gretchen Whitmer called mass shootings “a uniquely American problem.”

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Michigan Democrat Congresswoman Debbie Dingell demanded the enhancement of background checks and “red flag” laws.

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Biden issued a statement urging Congress to enact “common sense” gun laws and to eliminate “immunity for gun manufacturers who knowingly put weapons of war on our streets.”

The mainstream media, which is the PR wing of the Democrats, echoed these sentiments, blaming everyone but the culprit.

Finally, the truth revealed itself.

The New York Post reported that Anthony McRae, the shooter who died of a self-inflicted gunshot at the site, was arrested in 2019 for being in possession of a loaded gun near an abandoned building. This led to McRae being charged with illegally carrying a concealed handgun without a permit. The Detroit News reported that McRae faced up to five years in prison for the felony charge.

However, those charges were dismissed by the office of Ingham County prosecutor Carol Siemon… a Democrat!

Siemon’s office allowed McRae to plead guilty to a lesser misdemeanor gun charge, and he served a little more than a year on probation, which ended in May 2021.

The Ingham County Prosecutor’s Office said in a statement that McRae’s 2019 offense would not have received “the legal maximum” prison sentence, should they have pursued it. According to Free Beacon, Siemon said:

The sentencing guideline score would have been the same if he had been convicted of either the original charge (possession of a concealed firearm) or the offense for which he was convicted (possession of a firearm in a vehicle).

A few months after McRae’s release in August 2021, Siemon made it her official policy to drop mandatory prison sentences for felony firearms charges.

Siemon, like most Democrats, turned into a race issue.

She claimed the sentencing enhancement led to “dramatic racial inequity” and was “not in any way linked to the goal that we share of keeping the public safe.”

Now a bit about Siemon.

The Free Beacon reported that she is part of George Soros’s network. She has participated in international criminal justice reform junkets. Siemon supported far-left San Francisco prosecutor Chesa Boudin ahead of a recall campaign that eventually ousted him from office last year.

In 2021, the Vera Institute for Justice, a think tank funded by Soros’s Open Society Foundations, praised Siemon for pledging to reduce racial disparities in prosecution.

Siemon seemed proud of the changes she made in her office when she announced her retirement in November.

She branded it as “substantial progress to reform the justice system and provide for a proportionate response to criminal charges[.]”

She claimed to have:

…changed the prosecutors’ office’s charging and sentencing practices, to provide a greater range of options to hold people accountable for the harm they cause while reducing incarceration and continuing to serve victims….

But her progressive politics weren’t celebrated everywhere; Siemon, who retired from the prosecutor’s office earlier this year, faced criticism from judges and law enforcement officials for her soft-on-crime policies.

A Michigan circuit court judge excoriated Siemon for disregarding her duty. Judge Rosemarie Aquilina said Siemon “is not a legislator, she is not a judge, and she is making our community unsafe[.]”

Siemon’s successor, John Dewane, pledged to be different by toughening up charges for repeat offenders, according to a recent interview.

My number one goal, and I put out some policies with regard to this issue, is the increase in gun violence in our community, specifically the Lansing area[.]

​​Johnson, president of the Law Enforcement Legal Defense Fund said that “progressive prosecutors such as Ms. Siemon continue to value reducing the incarcerated population over their duty to protect the public by enforcing the law.”

Now about the shooter McRae.

Neighbors revealed that McRae would dangerously fire off his gun in his backyard after he completed probation in May 2021. McRae’s father revealed his son struggled with mental health issues that turned him “evil” following the death of his mother in 2020.

If Siemon had done her duty and prosecuted McRae properly, he would have been in prison until 2024 and barred from owning a gun after his release.

Considering he was unstable and a repeat offender, he may have committed further crimes in prison which would have led to tougher and increased sentencing.

But instead, Siemon allowed him back into society and now three are dead. The lives of their close ones have been irrevocably devastated. The situation with the five wounded is no better. Some may suffer life-altering injuries while their families struggle to adjust.

It was not just the physical being that was harmed, it was also the death of many dreams and aspirations. The psychological trauma for all impacted by the event is unfathomable.

Siemon should have strictly followed the law established by elected lawmakers, but instead remains focused on gratuitous, political matters.

But, instead of ensuring that prosecutors do not commit such an act ever again, the Democrat politicians and media experts want to punish law-abiding citizens.

It must be remembered that firearms are often the sole means of affordable protection for regular people. As always, people demanding “red flag” laws which allow confiscation of guns on mere suspicion or other draconian anti-gun measures are themselves protected by armed bodyguards.

The Democrats are also targeting gun manufacturers for which there is no rationale. Any manufacturer is responsible for delivering a functioning product. Once the product leaves the firm, the maker is not responsible for its misuse or entry into the black market. If we go down that road, even baseball bat makers and car manufacturers will be sued when people misuse them to commit violence.

In a civilized society, prosecutors such as Siemon, who failed to perform her basic duties and hence has blood on her hands, should have been punished. Perhaps the pension amount is reduced or she is fined or some other form of punitive action; perhaps even some prison time.

In fact, she should have been forced out the moment she started going soft-on-crime, and her light sentencing of hardcore criminals should have been overridden with a suitable punishment. 

But that will not happen and sadly the cycle of violence continues while the Democrats target law-abiding citizens.

Image: Free image, Pixabay license, no attribution required.