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"Christian Identity is for pantywaists"
Right-wingers debate Buford Furrow's goals and his organizational ties.
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At a top-brass news conference at Los Angeles police headquarters on Wednesday, Chief Bernard Parks praised the well-knit cooperation between his department and the FBI for "a major case coming to a conclusion." Mayor Richard Riordan praised the "quick and professional work" of Parks' 140 or so officers on the case.

But only one of those who faced reporters at Wednesday's briefing voiced the real unease underlying this entire case -- that a mix of extraordinary luck and happenstance might have saved the city from a far bigger tragedy. A San Fernando Valley police officer admitted to reporters quietly that hours after Tuesday's shooting, "I had a sick feeling in my stomach. We didn't have a whole lot."

Indeed, the police found only one clue during the entire event -- the red van abandoned before the carjacking near the Van Nuys Airport 20 minutes after the shooting. The van was traced to Furrow, who had bought it only a few days before in Tacoma, Wash., and made him the prime suspect in the case.

Inside the van, a haul of thousands of bullets, survivalist literature and a military tactical handbook offered more insight than hundreds of officers had been able to gather in their searches through the city.

At police headquarters on Wednesday, Parks and Riordan looked shakily relieved that they had somehow managed to escape a Columbine-style massacre with no suspect in custody. "We're just pleased he did not carry out a more spectacular plan," Parks told reporters.

With no one killed, the preschoolers from Granada Hills moved down the block on Wednesday, to a neighborhood Episcopal church, where well-wishers hung signs on the fence. "Our [heart]s are with you," read one in magic marker. And on the dashboard of a police car sat a note from a small boy, evidently dictated to an adult, that read: "Thank you policeman for saving us from the gun, because I want you to be my friend. I was scared."

Americans still have good cause to be scared if they listened to the reactions of politicians in gun-friendly states on Wednesday. Several told the Associated Press that they had no intention of changing their stand against gun-control laws, despite four mass shootings this summer.

"The safe, personal possession of firearms is a highly honored tradition here and so far, there is not a highly compelling need for gun-control laws," said state Rep. Bill Fuller, a Democrat from Lafayette, Ala., who chairs the state's House Judiciary Committee.

And Arizona state Sen. Randall Gnant doubted that this shooting rampage would reverse years of affection his state has for the National Rifle Association. "I just don't think this Legislature, given the state's Wild West history, is going to be inclined to take this issue on."

That is, perhaps, until the next gun owner walks through another front door of another public building, and unloads yet another firearm on its occupants.
salon.com | August 12, 1999

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