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Following the recent spate of shootings in the United States, including the one in Texas on May 24 that left 21 dead at a school and the one in Buffalo that killed 10 African-Americans on May 14, voices are being raised in the country to call for more gun control. On Wednesday, an 11-year-old Texas shooting survivor implored Congress for action with shocking testimony.
Her name is Miah Cerrillo and she is an 11-year-old girl who survived the school shooting in Uvalde, Texas. This Wednesday, she told a US Congressional committee in a video what happened on May 24, in the classroom where she was with her teacher and other children.
Miah explained that she was watching the Disney movie ‘Lilo and Stitch’ with other students when her teacher, having received an email, rushed to lock the classroom door and asked the children to hide behind her desk and with their backpacks.
The shooter arrived, armed with an assault rifle, and shot out the window in the door before pointing it at the teacher’s head, saying “good night.” He then he started shooting at the children.
“When I went to the backpacks, he shot my friend who was near me. I thought he was going to go back to class, so I covered myself in blood, spread it on myself,” Miah Cerrillo said.
Later, the girl went to the teacher’s body and took her cell phone to call the 911 emergency number. “I told them I needed help and to send the police inside the class,” she explained.
Miah sustained a gunshot wound to her back.
“I don’t want it to happen again”
The girl stated that she wanted “to be safe” and when asked by her father if she felt safe at school, she shook her head and said “I don’t want it to happen again”.
His father, Miguel Cerrillo, testified in person before the committee and called for changes to gun laws.
“I come here because I might have lost my little girl. And she’s not the same little girl that I used to play and run around with and do everything with, because she was her daddy’s little girl,” she lamented.
Parents of a 10-year-old girl killed at the same school also testified, along with a mother of a 20-year-old who was killed in the racist mass shooting in Buffalo, and Zeneta Everhart, the mother of a child survivor of the Buffalo shooting. buffalo.
“Children should not have firearms”
In his testimony, Zenetac Everhart stated that “children should not have firearms”. He described his son’s injuries to his neck, leg, and back, caused by a bullet explosion. “If after listening to us you don’t believe that something should change regarding weapons, I invite you to my house to clean my son’s wounds and those of my community,” she added.
These testimonies came a few hours before the Democratic-dominated House of Representatives begins debate on a major legislative package with sweeping measures to limit gun ownership.
It also comes just days after President Joe Biden issued his strongest call for Congress to take action on guns. A group of Democratic and Republican senators are also negotiating a more moderate bill to increase background checks and limit the sale of some gun components.
288 shootings in the United States since the beginning of the year
At the beginning of the session this Wednesday, Representative Carolyn Maloney, a Democrat from New York and chair of the Committee, stated that this year alone, the United States has suffered 288 shootings, the sum of the shootings that have occurred in all other countries.
On Friday, Maloney said the hearing will examine the human impact of gun violence and the urgency for lawmakers to enact gun control laws.
“I hope that all my colleagues will listen with open hearts as survivors of gun violence and their loved ones recount one of the darkest days of their lives,” Maloney said in a statement.
“This hearing is ultimately about saving lives, and I hope it galvanizes my colleagues on both sides of the aisle to pass legislation that does just that.”
To deal with the wave of shootings, the Democratic and Republican camps are opposed on the measures that should be adopted. Several Republican representatives believe that police officers should be present inside schools and that teachers should carry weapons to protect themselves, as well as children. The Democratic camp, for its part, has been fighting for several years to implement laws that control the sale of weapons.
With EFE and AP
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