This, of Course, is the Fault of the 80+ Million Gun Owners Who Didn't Shoot Anyone Yesterday

Hoo, boy. The Washington Post reports on the courtroom antics of the whacked-out goblin that went on a shooting spree yesterday:

Bail Denied for Shooting Spree Suspect
Accused Gunman Appeared Agitated in Court

By Daniel de Vise and William Branigin
Washington Post Staff Writers

SALISBURY, Md.--A man accused of killing two people and wounding four others in a shooting rampage in Delaware and eastern Maryland was ordered held without bond Friday after a profanity-laced court appearance in which he threatened the judge, prosecutor, sheriff's deputies and his own public defender.

Allison Lamont Norman, 22, handcuffed and wearing a black and white striped prison jumpsuit, babbled and muttered for the duration of his 20-minute arraignment Friday morning in Wicomico County District Court before Judge R. Scott Davis, who threatened to muzzle him.

In addition to threatening the judge and virtually everyone with whom he could make eye contact, Norman repeatedly tried to lurch out of his seat, only to be pushed back down by burly deputies.

No 5'-0" grandmothers in this courtroom. Those boys learn quick!

He angrily refused the services of public defender David Weck, lunging at the attorney at one point and being physically restrained by officers.

Lunged at the attorney, eh? Trying for a reduced sentence? That only works if there's a jury present! (And only if you connect.)

During the brief but tumultuous hearing, the judge read to Norman charges of first-degree murder and the use of a handgun in the commission of a violent crime -- offenses that could give Norman the death penalty if he is convicted.

Norman is accused of fatally shooting 24-year-old Jamell Weston in the face with a 9mm Glock handgun and wounding Weston's cousin, Marcus Cannon, in an apparently random act of violence at an apartment complex in Laurel, Del., Thursday morning. Charging documents say Norman, previously listed as a resident of Seaford, Del., lived at the Carvel Gardens Apartments in Laurel where the first shootings took place.

This reminds me of one of the long list of "things you must believe if you support gun control": You must believe that if people have guns, they'll go on shooting rampages, but having a concealed-carry permit just in case of a random "spree shooter" is just being paranoid.

Delaware is a "may issue" state. Maryland is too.

Norman then went on a 45-minute shooting spree while driving a stolen car south on U.S. Highway 13 to Maryland, police said. They said he wounded a man in a shopping center in Laurel, fired on a sanitation worker in Delmar on the Delaware-Maryland border, shot at cars in Salisbury and commandeered an SUV, killing the driver. Also shot were two women driving vehicles in Salisbury, one of whom was hospitalized in critical condition with a gunshot wound to the chest. Norman was captured after breaking into a townhouse and attempting to flee on foot, police said.

But Norman could be expected to follow gun control laws, because, well, they're laws, right?

The charges read in court Friday dealt with the killing of the SUV driver in Maryland, Davondale M. Peters, 28. Charges related to the shootings in Delaware are expected to be announced later Friday, and additional charges in Maryland are pending.

As he sat muttering to himself or speaking out loud in obscenity-laced tirades, Norman at one point seemed to describe what had happened Thursday.

"Pop, pop, pop, pop -- that's how I popped them, just like that," he said. At another point, however, he said, "I don't hurt no [expletive] unless they hurt me first."

A formal plea is expected to be entered at a subsequent court hearing.

"Sometimes I sit and look at life from a different angle," Norman said in one of his few profanity-free utterances.

But he kept the "sanity-free" theme.

When Davis was late for the 10 a.m. hearing, Norman said, "Where the [expletive] judge at?" After Davis arrived, the defendant repeatedly cursed him, spewing expressions of defiance and contempt.

Asked by the judge if he wanted to be represented by a public defender, Norman said, "Man, I don't want nothin' from that [expletive]."

When Davis said later that the defendant "clearly seems not to be interested in the services of the public defender," Norman said, "Hey, I'm not interested in [expletive] except going home. Yo, you'd better let me [expletive] go."

On a slab with a toe tag? Fine by me.

Norman then told the judge, "If you don't let me go to my family, I'm going to murder every [expletive] thing you touch."

He really knows how to charm, doesn't he?

After the prosecutor, Wicomico County state's attorney Davis Ruart, said Norman is a "flight risk" and should be denied bond, the judge said the defendant had not exactly made a case for his release.

Flight risk? One flew over the cuckoo's nest. He's a nutter, but I hope they don't find him "not guilty by reason of insanity." He apparently knows quite well what he did, that it was wrong, and why. You can be nuts and still be guilty.

"While we've been here, quite candidly, he has done everything he possibly can to threaten everybody in this room," Davis said. "I have quite candidly put up with more abusive language from him than I have put up with from anybody in the 16 years I've been on this bench."

Davis added that in the future, "I fully intend to muzzle him unless he decides to conduct himself in a civil fashion."

How candid. But won't that affect how the jury sees him? I'm sure the ACLU will be in contact shortly.

After the hearing, Nicole Tull, a Salisbury resident and cousin of Weston, the man murdered in Delaware, said of Norman, "He's crazy, I guess. I just feel sorry for him, I guess."

I feel sorry for rabid animals, too. It's not their fault they're rabid. Wouldn't stop me from putting them down, though. And I'm not guessing.

Tull dismissed Norman's threatening courtroom behavior and expressed relief that he is being held without bail in the Wicomico County Jail.

"I'm not worried about it," Tull said. "He's in there now. He's not going to bother me."

Tull said that at one point in his appearance, Norman "looked right at me and said, 'Right, cuz?' " She added, "I'm not his cousin."

Ruart, the prosecutor, declined to comment on Norman's mental state.

"Clearly, the defendant through his attorney can request a competency hearing," he said.

Right. That'd be the attorney he rejected?

As he was led out of the courtroom, Norman briefly struggled with guards and exited muttering and swearing.

Asked after the hearing to comment on possible consequences for Norman's courtroom threats, Ruart said, "He's got a lot more serious things to worry about."

Each and every threat, in case you didn't know, is - under U.S. law - "assault." But since he's facing the death penalty, Mr. Prosecutor seems to have a handle on things.

Now, I haven't seen any dancing-in-the-blood-of-the-slain press releases from the Brady bunch or the VPC on this case, but the Brady bunch did issue a release today pleading with Congress to not pass The Protection of Lawful Commerce in Arms Act because the legislation

...would slam courthouse doors across the nation to the victims and survivors of gun crimes.

Well, isn't it obvious here that Allison Lamont Norman isn't the guilty party here? No! It's Glock, Glock's distributor, and the retailer who originally sold the gun! (Why it isn't the BATFE's fault for licensing the distributor and the retailer I'm a little fuzzy on, but logic has so little to do with these things....)