June 9th Is Andrew Steele Day

By Jeff Simpson

Today will go down as Andrew Steele Day.  Andrew Steele is a former Deputy Sheriff who was forced to retire from public service early due to suffering from ALS.    Andrew Steele also shot and killed his wife and sister-in-law.  

Now, Andrew Steele is a suspect in the killings of his wife and her sister, Kacee Tollefsbol, at the Steeles' home Friday in Fitchburg, Wis., a suburb of Madison. Steele himself is being treated for an apparent suicide attempt that police say they never saw coming. He was arrested Friday.

Andy was a really good guy, no one saw it coming:

 "Nobody closely aligned with Andy and his family expected something like this to occur," Dane County Sheriff Dave Mahoney told The Associated Press on Monday. "We believe his diagnosis had an impact on the family but they were moving forward.

Now the Republicans in Wisconsin think its a good idea if Andy was allowed to roam free and armed in our public schools.    I mean how many people could he possibly kill at a time, and what are the odds that it would be your kid?

Besides, it was not his fault!  

An ALS-afflicted former Wisconsin deputy was acquitted of killing his wife and her sister because his disease made him not legally responsible for the murders, a jury found.
Andrew Steele, 40, had written in a rambling suicide that he’d had “numerous threesomes” with the women before killing them both in August in a botched suicide pact at his Fitchburg, Wis., home outside Madison.
But a jury found early Thursday that the Dane County Sheriff’s deputy, who resigned in June after his amyotrophic lateral sclerosis diagnosis, found the disease affected his brain and he wasn’t in his right mind during the slayings.

Wait! So he might not even go to prison?   There is no provision in the new law that stops Andy from now carrying a gun into your school if they release him.  

Andy can celebrate with some cake and ice cream that the Republicans in the Legislature were looking out for him today!

  

Van Wanggaard Wants To Put Your Child In Danger

By Jeff Simpson

Newly elected Senator Wanggaard, who was so unpopular in his district, the Republicans had to completely redraw his district to shield him from moderates, just got a bill passed that eliminates the 48 hour waiting period to buy guns.

"Wanggaard said arguments that the waiting period helps defuse potential incidents are "a great talking point" but the wait plays little to no role in gun violence. He said people don't have to endure waiting periods to buy other items that could be used as deadly weapons such as skillets or steak knives."

Yes when Van talks, you understand why they needed to redraw his district.  

Simple minded Van, is on the gun(ie NRA) bandwagon and is on a roll. His next objective is to arm our elementary schools.

The 2011 concealed carry law prevents citizens from bringing a firearm near elementary, middle and high schools. The proposed bill would exempt off-duty and retired law enforcement personnel from this ban.
Bill co-author and Judiciary and Public Safety Committee Chair state Sen. Van Wanggaard, R-Racine, said the proposal would increase school safety in the event of an active threat and noted that he himself was armed during the hearing.
"When you have a firearm for your career, you learn that carrying it is a positive," said Wanggaard, a former Racine police officer. “This is a common sense change to state law with bipartisan support … We want to multiply the good guys with guns.”

 Let's hope that even Mr. Wanggaard has the common sense to wait until this trial is over before he introduces this bill:

A jury found Andrew Steele not criminally responsible by reason of mental defect for the deaths of his wife Ashlee Steele, 39, and her sister Kacee Tollefsbol, 38, in August.
Ashlee Steele and Tollefsbol suffered gunshot wounds and other trauma at the Steeles' home on Yarmouth Greenway Drive in Fitchburg eight months ago. Ashlee Steele was dead at the scene and Tollefsbol was pronounced dead later at the hospital.
Andrew Steele did not deny killing the women but last month pleaded not guilty by mental disease or defect due to his nervous system disease ALS. He was diagnosed with ALS last summer and retired from his position as deputy at the Dane County Sheriff's Office in June.

It would be nice if Mr. Wanggaard had passed this bill before and allowed Mr. Steele to be armed in a local elementary, looking to do the same to his children, that he did to his wife.