Mullings: An American Cyber-column By Rich Galen

�

Click here for the Secret Decoder Ring to this issue!

Click here to keep up with Galen's Speaking Schedule

Looking for a back issue of Mullings? They're in the Archives

They Got the Guys

Friday October 25, 2002

Click here for an Easy Print Version

NOTE: The Fall Subscription Drive is in its last week! If you didn't participate last winter, this is your chance! Your paid subscription makes Mullings possible. Read all about it here:

Unless you live here, you cannot understand the feeling of relief that washed over the Washington, DC region when the news spread early this morning that, "they got the guys." They had been captured at a rest stop on Interstate 70 at about 3:00 AM Thursday.

In downtown Washington, strangers were congratulating each other for having gotten through this three-week horror of the sniper. Standing in the line to order a sandwich at lunch I said to the guy behind me that it was colder than I had thought it was going to be.

"It's warm and sunny, man," he said. "They got the guys."

Humor began to raise it's optimistic head. This is the kind of event which - for the time being - only those who have lived through it have the right to joke about, and only among each other. The notion of the Mayor of Montgomery, Alabama thinking that the Maryland-Virginia-DC region is "New England" created grins which turned into outright laughter when it was pointed out that the Mayor's name is Bobby Bright.

Someone pointed out that demanding $10 million be transferred to a credit card account which was attached to a stolen card meant the only place they could have bought anything would have been Iraq or North Korea. And the only thing they could have bought would have been high grade aluminum tubing.

Everyone had one eye one office TV sets, or one ear tuned to the local radio news stations.

We knew "they got the guys," but were these the ONLY guys?

Shortly after midday the word was released that the car had been searched and a rifle had been found.

It was A gun; but was it THE gun?

We didn't find that out until shortly before 8 PM when the senior ATF agent at the Task Force announced that ballistic tests had tied it to every shooting which had provided enough bullet fragments to do the measurements.

Montgomery County police chief, Charles Moose, in response to a reporter's question about whether the area was now safe said, "the gun is off the streets."

It was THE gun.

The questions of how the snipers could slip away time after time with no one able to finger them was answered when the word came out that a hole had been drilled in the trunk through which a rifle could be fired. The car would be driving away - slowly so as not to attract attention - before potential witnesses were aware anything had even happened.

Now the back story will be written. We know the identities of these guys, but we don't know who they are. We know what they did, but we don't know why they did this.

But for the neighborhoods from Baltimore to Richmond. And from The District to Fredrick. It's over.

They got the guys.

High school sports will be played this weekend. Elementary school children will be able to go trick or treating next week. Their parents will go to the grocery store and not worry about carrying their bags to their cars. At gas stations, people will take the time to completely fill their tanks, instead of slipping out of the car; putting in five or six bucks worth, then scooting back behind the driver's seat.

And here's our suggestion for every school district in the region. On the next sunny day, at noon, have every principal get on the PA system in every school and make the following announcement:

"All students are ordered to immediately leave the school building for the rest of the day. You are to move quickly and quietly outside.
And play."

Current Issue | Secret Decoder Ring | Past Issues | Email Rich | Rich Who?