Hochul's Bugaboo

On July 28, one Shane Tamura double parked in front of a Manhattan high-rise, sauntered in carrying a weapon appearing to be modeled on the AR platform, and killed four people before taking his own life. The first to be taken out was an off-duty police officer working a security side job; second was a female Blackstone executive who had the misfortune of being down in the lobby instead of up in her office; and the third was an unarmed security guard. The killer then took the elevator up to the 33^rd floor where he killed a woman who worked on that floor before turning the gun on himself. Carthage Must Be Destr... Miles, Richard Best Price: $5.81 Buy New $12.00 (as of 04:05 UTC - Details)

Because the killer had a note on his person requesting that his brain be examined for evidence of CTE, it was thought that NFL offices on the 5^th floor might have been his intended target; CTE is most associated with football injuries, and Tamura had played high school ball. But conspiracy theorists posited that his real intended target was the Blackstone offices on the 44^th floor, Tamura unknowingly exiting the elevator on the wrong floor.

Although close-up photos of the killer’s weapon appeared in the media, reporters as usual fumbled the ball in their attempts to describe it. Some described it as an “AR-15 assault rifle,” some as an “M4 rifle.” Others were more tentative, describing it as an “AR-15-style rifle” or an “M4 assault-style rifle.” According to Kathy Hochul, it was an “AR-15-style assault rifle,” a “weapon of war.”

An assault rifle is a relatively compact military weapon capable of fully automatic fire that takes a cartridge smaller than that used in a typical battle rifle; the less powerful cartridge makes it easier to control the weapon during fully automatic operation. The original AR-15 fell into this category, later becoming the M16 and its variants; the current military incarnation of this weapon platform is the M4 carbine. Civilian versions of these weapon are semiautomatic only; in the case of the M4, however, the civilian version also had to have its barrel lengthened from 14.5 in. to a civilian-legal 16 in. Referring to any of these semiautomatic civilian versions as an “assault rifle” is a definite misnomer.

The killer’s weapon has a barrel that appears to be shorter than 16 in., probably accounting for its mistakenly being specifically identified as an M4. In reality, the damned thing is what is known as an “AR pistol.” What looks like a shoulder stock is actually a “stabilizing brace” that can be opened like a clam shell to fit around the sides of the shooter’s forearm, cinched tight with a strap that goes all the way around the forearm. (Check out pictures of the killer’s weapon and then do a Google image search for “stabilizing brace,” and you’ll see exactly what I’m talking about.) Because the weapon is technically a pistol, its barrel can legally be shorter than 16 in. So Hochul’s “weapon of war” actually turns out to be a semiautomatic pistol designed to be strapped to the forearm of someone with impaired motor skills.

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