A Missouri man has been charged with a Class E felony after aiming a loaded .380 Smith & Wesson at a fellow motorist’s head during a road rage incident in late August. Edward Burns, a 48-year-old from Ozark, saw Laura Umphenour’s Toyota minivan covered in anti-Trump (and assorted other liberal-type) bumper stickers, and his Neanderthal brain just couldn’t handle it.
Burns pulled alongside Umphenour in traffic, and then this all-star threw up the universal sign for “Loser” at her through the window. As you might expect, she signaled back with an alternate version of “You’re Number One.” That’s when Burns saw red, yanking his pistol from a hip holster and pointing it at her through the glass.
The story may have ended there, as many road rage incidents undoubtedly do, had it not scared Umphenour so badly that she jerked her steering wheel. Did I mention the two drivers were in motion at the time? She careened into Burns’ vehicle, then off the road and into a guardrail. The “responsible gun owner” escalated what could have been a simple exchange of disagreements in political views into a potentially deadly incident over bumper stickers.
Burns at first denied to the police on the scene that he had pulled a gun. Upon searching his vehicle, they found the handgun hidden inside a briefcase — a clear indicator to you, dear reader, that this cowboy knew guns were banned in Tombstone.
Now all of this just sounds like my own crazy leftist opinion on what may have been going through his head until you see what was in his statement. From the Christian County Headliner:
During his confession he noted several political decals, which expressed a different political view than his own, on the rear of (the) van, which he thought were stupid,” the statement says, which also says that Burns cooperated throughout the interview. “Edward indicated at no time was he ‘scared’ of (the victim) and indicated he only displayed the gun in an attempt to stop the road rage incident. Edward said he wanted (the victim) to know not to mess with him.”
I guess Edward Burns just couldn’t ☪☮e✡is♰.
Featured image via Facebook
