'Cart Before the Horse' 

Editor:

Two stories last week caused me to wonder why we so often seem to get the cart before the horse.

First, look at the police shooting in Eureka and the mayhem resulting from the chase ("Police Shooting Investigation," April 27). Why do the police engage in chases through residential areas? It almost always ends badly. In this case, people are missing work due to injuries, and probably will be faced with huge medical bills. The Bayshore Mall assault victim, the pedestrian, the family in the Toyota which was hit (they have a Go-Fund-Me), even the people whose front yard was messed up, and the children at the locked-down schools all suffered to varying degrees. It seems with all the technology we have, there might be a way to track escaping miscreants without endangering the public. These types are sure to re-emerge doing some other cruel or stupid thing. As for the cops who shot at them? No chase, no shootout.

And, right across the page Trisha Sander's piece, "The Damage is Real," about how we terrorize children with school lock downs. You know what the administrators should be doing instead of wandering around rattling doors? They should be practicing how to keep armed lunatics out of the school in the first place. Exit doors don't need to be unlocked on the outside, they just need to open from the inside. Funnel everybody in through one entrance and pay attention to who is entering, and be ready to do something if they look like they have weapons. Is this overly simplistic? These drills are ridiculous because assault weapons can actually penetrate the classrooms the kids are cowering in. It's just like the nuclear bomb drills that terrorized children in the 1950s. They knew their desk would not protect them from a nuclear blast. Children are not stupid, also they have very vivid imaginations.

Carol Moné, Trinidad