Tim O’Mara
Jefferson City
To the Editor:
So this guy, U.S. citizen Dmitriy Andreychenko, walks into the Springfield Walmart exercising his Second Amendments rights — sporting a tactical rifle, handgun, 100 rounds of ammunition, and wearing a bulletproof vest — and gets arrested for, according to the prosecuting attorney, acting in a “reckless and criminal manner endangering other citizens.” He’s facing four years for these charges and “making a terrorist threat in the second degree.”
I read six reports on this story in many different media outlets — including the Tribune — and nowhere could I find that my fellow American made any threatening comments or acted in a threatening manner. He was, according to his own statement and witnesses, recording himself on his phone. He also told his wife and his sister he was conducting a “social experiment” to see if his Second Amendment rights and adherence to Missouri’s “open carry” laws would be honored. They were clearly not.
I’m confused. Either Mr. Andreychenko has the right to bear arms and carry them openly in Missouri, or he does not. Could it be his timing that got him arrested? He conducted his “social experiment” days after the mass shootings in El Paso and Dayton. This brings up an interesting question: Does one’s constitutional rights temporarily vanish depending on current events? If exercising our constitutional and state’s rights frightens our fellow U.S. citizens — and Walmart shoppers — are we not allowed to exercise them? If so, for how long does that ban last? Who decides how long we have to wait until we can once again exercise our rights?
Can someone smarter than I please clarify this? What am I missing? Maybe Republican Leader Mitch McConnell — who has continuously held up a Senate vote on the background checks passed by Congress in February — can help me out here. He and President Trump now seem to be in agreement that background checks are “front and center” on their agenda. Trump went so far as to say McConnell was “totally on board” with these stronger background checks and also added that the NRA’s views would be “fully represented and respected.” I feel safer already.
I anxiously await the explanations. In the meantime, I also look forward to reading about the NRA’s protests to free proud American gun owner and Second Amendment warrior Dmitriy Anderychenko.