The family of a man killed in a shooting in Austin, Texas, is urging the public not to politicize his death to push for more gun control laws.
“This should not be used to politicize any sort of gun control,” Nick Kantor said about the death of his brother, Douglas Kantor. “The fact that that’s what it seems like politicians are doing with this story is deeply disturbing to me and my family. This is the last thing we want. We want Doug’s story to be told for what it was and not politicized for some agenda.”
Douglas Kantor, 25, died Saturday when an argument between groups of teenagers erupted into gunfire around 1:30 a.m. in Austin’s popular 6th Street area. Thirteen others were injured in the shooting.
The shooting prompted gun control advocates to push for increased legislation, which the Kantor family believes isn’t the answer.
“This was not a mass shooting,” Nick Kantor said. “This wasn’t somebody on top of a rooftop gunning people down for no reason. This was rival members of groups that were having a problem with each other and decided that they were going to have a standoff in the middle of a street party that my brother was attending, and my brother was caught in the crossfire.”
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Two juveniles have been arrested in connection with the shooting, including 17-year-old Jeremiah Roshaun Leland James Tabb.
In the same interview, Kantor also spoke out against the nationwide push to defund police departments in the name of social justice.
“Defunding the police just gives a false sense of security to those people who abide by the laws,” Kantor said. “My brother went out here seeing plenty of police presence in Austin and feeling safe, not realizing that there were gang members walking among him with guns.”
