Photo released by the Howard County Police shows shooting suspect Darion Marcus Aguilar, 19, of College Park, MD. Aguilar carried out the Saturday Jan. 25, 2014, attack with a 12-gauge shotgun at a skateboard shop at the Mall in Columbia in suburban Baltimore before killing himself, police said. Picture courtesy of Howard County Police Depart.
On January 28, 2014 Rep. Kelly “Mr. Speaker, on Saturday, a gunman walked into a mall in Columbia, Maryland, and opened fire, killing two people before taking his own life. Prior to the mall shooting, we saw six school shootings take place nationwide in just 10 days.”
“Countless other Americans are terrorized each day on streets that have become shooting galleries where kids aren’t safe to walk to school or go to the corner store or sit on their front porches. And yet we do nothing”, she said.
“Time and time again, despite the headlines and the bloodshed and the pleas from the parents of the victims to act, Congress has failed to pass commonsense gun reforms that would save thousands of American lives, including background checks, which are supported by 90 percent of Americans. Somehow, in the years between Columbine and Newtown, we have developed a collective indifference to the killings. After each shooting, we are in disbelief; but then we shrug and move on, dismissing the mass shootings as isolated incidents and ignoring the everyday shootings altogether”, said Kelly.
“Sadly, a callus has formed where our compassion should be. Or is it that the gun lobby’s agenda has taken the place of our country’s conscience? I am at a loss because I truly do not understand how we can continue to ignore the public health epidemic that is gun violence in America. What will it take? How many more must die? How many parents must weep before we do the right thing? Make no mistake, gun violence is robbing us of a generation. It is a slow-motion plague that is killing our kids one day at a time”, said Rep. Kelly (source: Congressional Record: http://thomas.loc.gov/).
Congresswoman Robin Kelly was elected to represent Illinois’ 2nd District on April 9, 2013.
As a former State Representative, Kelly she successfully sponsored bills to protect consumers from fraud, support economic development and increase the minimum wage. She also led the fight for landmark legislation to protect victims of domestic violence and improve public safety.