“Gun Death” Baby Shower

No death, but there are a lot of interesting points in this local story of violence.

Two people have been stabbed in a Lawrence apartment after what the police chief calls a “baby shower that went awry.”

Officers responding to a report of a stabbing late Saturday found between 50 and 100 people at the apartment. Police Chief John Romero tells the Eagle-Tribune that the stabbing was proceeded by a fight that apparently began when someone threw a bottle that struck a woman. Romero says the woman’s husband then pulled out a knife.

Romero says there was alcohol at the party. He says the two men who were arrested appeared to have been under the influence.

As a man, I haven’t been to very many baby showers. The ones I’ve seen, and the ones I’ve heard of drinking generally wasn’t part of the festivities. Also given that pregnant women shouldn’t drink, it strikes me as terribly rude to be swilling away at a party for a mother-to-be.

Also every baby shower I’ve been has been awash in fully-born babies, and young children of attending mothers. So we have bottles getting thrown around, and a knife fight breaking out at a BABY shower.

Also its not in the cited news report, but its said that the knife the attacker used had a 6″ blade. Let’s look at that:

That’s a commander-sized 1911, and a knife that has a blade that’s just under 7″…also some little rubber ducks, just because.

That’s a BIG knife, even with an inch shaved off its length. It could have been a VERY big pocket knife…or it was being carried as a weapon. I will note that Massachusetts has laws against knives this big, tho I don’t very often hear about them being enforced, also given the track record of the Massachusetts court system, I suspect this guy won’t be charged.

Still a baby shower is one of those “Joyous Events”, also they tend to be pretty tame affairs. This is not a drunken New Years or Independence Day bash, or Mardi Gras, this was a BABY SHOWER.

When violent crime erupts like this we must look at WHY. Given that this is not a nice town in Mass, one wonders what the street culture of violence might have contributed to this.

Also note that nobody was shot, but that didn’t make this crime any less serious. Until we look at why drunken knife fights break out in massive baby showers in poor neighborhoods, we’ll never make any headway in the safety of our streets…”Gun Death” or any other form of violent crime.