Differences Between a Knife and a Gun

Trey Smith

The 20-year-old student accused in a stabbing rampage at a Texas college campus told investigators he had fantasies of killing people and had planned the attack, sheriff's officials said late Tuesday.

Dylan Quick, 20, was charged with three counts of aggravated assault with a deadly weapon after the stabbings, said Donna Hawkins, an official with the Harris County Prosecutor's Office.

"According to the statement the suspect voluntarily gave investigators, he has had fantasies of stabbing people to death since he was in elementary school," a statement from the Harris County Sheriff's Office said. "He also indicated that he has been planning this incident for some time."

Quick used "a razor-type knife" to stab victims at the Lone Star College's CyFair campus Tuesday, the sheriff office's statement said.

Fourteen people were injured in the attack, officials said. Two of them remained hospitalized in critical condition late Tuesday, said Kathryn Klein, a spokeswoman for the Memorial Hermann Texas Trauma Institute.
~ from Sheriff: Student Plotted TX College Attack, Fantasized About Stabbings by Catherine E. Shoichet and Joe Sutton ~

I'm sure some people will seize on this incident to say, "You see, you see, it's not just guns. People can attack others with knives." There should be no question about it. People can utilize all sorts of implements to victimize others.

But there are two very important points to this story. The first involves the number of victims and the lack of fatalities at the scene. Unless one of the two victims in critical condition succumbs to their injuries, no one will have died. This is in no way to minimize the trauma the victims incurred, but can you imagine the increased carnage that would have been wrought if Quick had been shooting people at close range? Most likely, a few of the victims would have been killed.

The second important point concerns how the rampage came to an end: several people tackled the assailant. It is far easier to tackle an assailant wielding a box-cutter as opposed to a gun. Merely approaching a shooter can be hazardous to one's health. If he is a good shot, he can keep those trying to subdue him at bay. Such individuals can be injured or killed from several yards away. I am not saying that it's a walk in the park to subdue an assailant with a knife, but if you had your choice, who would you rather try to tackle? A person with a box-cutter OR a person firing an assault rifle or semi-automatic handgun?