Emily Miller: Aaron Alexis made no effort to purchase AR-15, media 'obsessed' with idea

Brett T. | 9:54 PM on September 17, 2013

As Twitchy reported, the front page of Tuesday’s New York Daily News featured the (tasteless) headline, “Same Gun, Different Slay,” and trumpeted that Washington Navy Yard shooter Aaron Alexis had used the “Newtown” weapon to kill 12 people. That report turned out to be false, and tonight, the Washington Times’ Emily Miller reports that Alexis wasn’t denied the purchase of an AR-15 because he never tried to buy one.

My exclusive: Navy Yard shooter did NOT try to buy a rifle at Sharpshooters. Other media reporters are wrong. http://t.co/WYIoFX9rCH

— Emily Miller (@emilymiller) September 17, 2013

Miller writes:

Aaron Alexis passed Federal Bureau Investigation and Virginia state background checks to purchase a shotgun from Sharpshooters Small Arms Range in Lorton, Va., over the weekend.

Alexis did not attempt to purchase a rifle or handgun from the store, The Washington Times has learned exclusively.

The retail store put the former Navy reservist’s name through both systems checks before selling him a shotgun and shotgun shells, a source familiar with the investigation said.

@EmilyMiller So the New York Times has it wrong… Imagine my surprise…

— Alan Robertson (@warobertson) September 17, 2013

https://twitter.com/FastEddie517/status/380126847222022144

MILLER: New York Times Gets it Wrong, Media Obsessed With Linking AR-15 with Navy Yard Shooter http://t.co/1y46k4kn6F

— Emily Miller (@emilymiller) September 18, 2013

The rest of the media got the story so wrong (CNN’s Piers Morgan has been busy deleting tweets) that Miller wrote a column about the media’s obsession to connect the Navy Yard shootings to the weapon used in the Newtown massacre, the linchpin of the administration’s gun control efforts. Miller writes:

The liberal media is so obsessed with linking the Navy Yard shooter with the AR-15 rifle that it is making up false tales of Aaron Alexis trying to obtain one. The New York Times attempts to give the impression that a so-called assault weapon stopped Alexis from buying a rifle in Virginia, but that is not true.

…

The Times’ mistakes make it appear to be trying to give the impression only some unexplained “assault weapon” ban in the state stopped Alexis from killing more people. The truth is that we have thousands of gun laws on the books, but none of them stopped a homicidal maniac intent on mass murder.