On Tuesday, Jack Pawlowski went to Astoria’s Ditmars Park to do some target shooting. Accompanied by his five-year-old daughter and three-year-old son. In a children’s playground.

After firing off a few rounds, Mr. Pawlowski passed the plastic gun–which resembled a .38-caliber pistol–to his daughter, who rode around on her bicycle and aimed it at a pair of two-year-olds, according to witnesses.

The website QueensMamas reports that the playground is usually full of "toddlers riding scooters, digging in the dirt, playing ball or blowing bubbles.”

On this morning however, “all that changed, when several 2-year olds had a plastic 38-caliber loaded pellet gun pointed at them. They became the target of a gun wielding 4-year old, whose father sat looking on, smiling while his daughter terrorized the children; in fact, it was the father who loaded the gun and fired shots at the tree before handing it over to his daughter."

Mr. Pawlowski, for his part, thinks people are totally overreacting. Speaking with the Daily News he dismissed the story as “concerned parents” making a fuss over nothing.

“They’re a little paranoid,” Mr. Pawlowski told the Daily News. “There’s a lot going on in the world—killing kids, stuff like that."

Did you ever think that they might be "paranoid" because you gave your five-year-old daughter a weapon in a children's playground? In the country where school shootings are as plentiful as Big Macs and where young children regularly murder one another with guns marketed to kids? Just speculating here.

“I didn’t even think about scaring somebody,” he went on. “We were just shooting at the fence. We were not aiming at the playground. We were in a corner behind it.”

But other parents were less than nonchalant about the whole affair. “I thought I was hallucinating. I literally did not know what to do," one mother told the News. “That man is nuts. He’s dangerous.”

By the time the police showed up an hour later, the father was gone. Probably to go smoke doobies and drag race with a bunch of toddlers or something.

At around 8.30 a.m. today, emergency officials responded to a 911 call from East 56th Street and Farragut Road in East Flatbush.

They found the alleged shooter, Rosette Samuel, 43, lying in bed next to her son Dylan and her boyfriend, identified by reports as Dason Peters, 33, shot to death in the front doorway.

"She shot those two then took her own life," a police source told the Daily News.

Ms. Samuel’s 19-year-old son, Dondre Samuel, escaped unharmed out a back window and called 911 after hearing an argument between the two adults. According to witnesses cited in the News, he fled the scene wearing only a pair of blue boxers and a windbreaker.

"He was jumping from the second floor to the first. He was frantic,”  Anthony Beckford, 18, said to the paper.

"His knees, elbows were scrapped, bloodily. He couldn't really talk. He was running, for his life. He just said, 'Look, look,' and pointed at a body. We saw a body on the first floor, facing up and blood all over."

By the time police arrived on the scene, three people were dead.

Rosette Samuel was an off-duty police offer from Queens’ 108^th Precinct, and a 13-year veteran of the NYPD.

Police are currently investigating the cause of the dispute. No motive for the shooting has been determined.

A Word from LeVar. (ReadingRainbowBlog)

Today's tragedy in Connecticut is not the type of news that makes reporters get out bed and say "Now this is the kind of thing I went to journalism school for!" Yes, we report on it. Yes, we grab screenshots of the "best" (if that superlative is even correct) tweets from the aftermath.

We embed videos of Obama crying, come up with opinion-heavy listicles and try to make some grand thesis about America's history of violence. But it's horrible. The murder of children is not something any of us want to dwell on, even as we understand the necessity of doing so. People went to Newtown today with cameras and crews not because they wanted to, but because when this kind of thing happens, someone needs to be on the ground.

And so it's only fair that after a long day such as this one, we end on a note of--if not exactly positivity--some sort of pick-me-up. Like LeVar Burton of Reading Rainbow taking to PBS's blog to help parents explain gun violence to their own kids.

As Mr. Burton wrote:

If your children hear about this tragedy, it is natural for them to imagine “what if?” and “will it?” happen in my school? Am I safe??? Can this happen to me and my friends? Parents and teachers and caregivers should not shy away from directly discussing this with children who are concerned or anxious or fearful. Let them know their fear is normal, that it’s OK to be sad on behalf of those who died, and even frightened that it may happen to them. Then we must explain how they themselves are safe. That the gunman who caused this incident is no longer a threat to anyone. Tell them that their teachers and principals work every day to make sure their schools are safe, then as quickly as possible, get back to your normal routine! Be aware that for some kids they may never think about this again, while others may have nightmares or manifest their anxiety in other ways. Both are normal reactions.

We kind of wish Mr. Burton was given some special appointment as Secretary of Confusing, Unimaginable Events, who would go on TV every time something terrible happened and tell us that our feelings are natural and okay; it's fine to be scared and sad, but we are safe. We just want LeVar Burton to tell us that we're safe, and we'll believe him.

Photo via WCAX.com

Sad news today: an unidentified man lies in grave condition after being shot at the Occupy , Vermont protest at Burlington's City Hall Park. Early reports say the wound was self-inflicted and may have been a suicide attempt. WPTZ reporter David Schneider reports via Twitvid from the scene.

So far information on this story is scarce, but people have been tweeting what they've seen and heard from the scene. If you have any more information regarding this case, please contact us.