From the True Crime Desk

I'll have to file it under "Things I'll Never Know," but I have no idea if the police ever found the woman walking up my neighbor's driveway yesterday, or why the police were even looking for her in the first place. Those kind of small-crime stories don't make the evening news, there are no newspapers anymore to speak of, and the whole world seems to lurch from one crisis to the next without ever reflecting on the fuller story behind any one of those crises.

The separate shooting at Atlantic Station yesterday was big enough of a story to get press coverage. That indicdent apparently started after a group of young people were escorted off the Atlantic Station property by security for unruly behavior and violating the area’s curfew for minors. Two groups among those escorted off site apparently knew each other and some sort of altercation broke out. By the time it was over, five victims, all teenagers, had been shot and a 12-year-old boy killed.

Police haven't said whether they have identified any suspects. 

Last month, two women were shot at Atlantic Station ten days apart in similar incidents after being caught in the crossfire between feuding groups. And last January, another woman was shot there, again after being caught between groups that were fighting.

The gun infestation in American culture has now gotten to the point where groups of teenage schoolchildren are now armed and settling whatever beefs they have by shooting at each other.  Second Amendment or not, we need some common-sense guns laws in this country to stem the tide of weapons in too many hands, as well as some better parenting to keep high-schoolers from packing a piece when they're hanging out with friends.