So another unhinged, mentally unstable individual has decided to drive a vehicle through a crowd of people.
This time, in New York's famous Times Square. One young woman who just graduated from high school last year and was visiting family was killed on May 18 and her younger sister was hospitalized, while 21 others were also injured.
And no, the horrible act was not perpetrated by a terrorist or Islamic extremist.
Former U.S. navy serviceman Richard Rojas, 26, who was born in the Bronx, had a long track record indicating a clearly disturbed individual who needed help. However, his numerous and obvious pleas for help in lashing out at others seem largely to have been ignored.
"You were supposed to shoot me. I wanted to kill them," he allegedly told police following the attack.
A witness who helped authorities apprehend the navy veteran also reported the suspect yelled incoherently.
"He began screaming, no particular words but just utter screaming. He was swinging his arms at the same time," said Ken Bradix, a bouncer at a nearby Planet Hollywood.
America has become a country that's willing to send young men and women to fight interventionist wars that secure resources and economic interests for multinational corporations to exploit, all without any serious intention of caring for those who come home suffering from the likes of post-traumatic stress disorder, or other mental issues such as drug or alcohol addiction that often stem from the stress induced by service in the military.
American politician and democratic socialist Bernie Sanders says, rightfully so, that a country that is unprepared or unwilling to ensure its soldiers are properly cared for upon returning from a tour of duty should not deploy them to begin with.
Even the past several Canadian governments have not fared much better in our country's treatment of veterans, with our military also enduring far too many losses of soldiers who in their depression can see no recourse other than to take their own lives.
Perhaps it might be time to consider making sure those who serve their country come home with unrestricted access to all the support and resources they might need to recover from any trauma or mental duress they endured during their service.
Would that not be the least we could do for those who sacrifice so much for us?
On a side note, this sad chapter also underscores a statistical fact many people seem altogether too willing to overlook. Home born citizens of the U.S., or even Canada for that matter, are more likely to commit crimes than immigrants or victims of war. The simple fact is that people who are fleeing daily destruction or unending economic starvation are seeking a better life, not to establish some evil criminal syndicate or some such.
Very few sane people would escape a war zone only to seek a life of crime that might end them placed firmly behind bars after they narrowly escaped the jaws of death. That would seem counterproductive to their goal of finding and making a better life.
ó Simon Ducatel, Round Up editor
