Something good came out of the Super Bowl loss

By John Sharp

Probably the only good thing for Kansas City that resulted from our Chiefs Super Bowl loss was that there was no dangerous celebratory gunfire in KCMO – at least from Chiefs fans – and very little overall gunfire following the game.

Police spokesman Captain Jacob Becchina said in an interview that from 6 p.m. to midnight on Super Bowl Sunday the Department’s automated ShotSpotter system that covers much of the central part of our city was only activated 10 times during that time period, recording only 35 rounds fired.

He said there were also 27 calls to 911 reporting shots fired in the city during that time.

I would like to thank the scores of faith leaders, many in south Kansas City, that I contacted prior to the game urging them to ask members of their congregations to warn their friends, neighbors and younger relatives of the dangers of celebratory and indiscriminate gunfire. None of them turned down the request.

I also asked them to spread the word about the much tougher criminal penalties for recklessly discharging firearms within any city limits since the Missouri General Assembly finally passed Blair’s Law last year which went into effect August 28.

The first offense is a misdemeanor punishable by incarceration not to exceed one year. A second offense is a felony punishable by incarceration not to exceed four years, and subsequent offenses are felonies punishable by incarceration not to exceed seven years.

The law is named after 11-year-old Blair Shanahan Lane who was killed here by celebratory gunfire while playing in the yard during the 4th of July holiday in 2011.

Before the new law’s passage, celebratory and indiscriminate gunfire in cities was generally just treated as a city ordinance violation, although then and now when such gunfire results in a fatality and shooters can be identified through the ShotSpotter system, eyewitness testimony and/or tracing bullets to their guns they can face involuntary manslaughter charges.