A day before the three-year anniversary of the Sandy Hook Elementary shooting dozens of people gathered in a Solana Beach church to remember the victims and call for an end to gun violence.
The 2012 shooting in Connecticut left 26 people dead, including 20 children.
“After three years since that time and many more mass shootings we haven't really seen any movement at all in the federal government to increase regulations to protect us from gun violence,” Ron Marcus of the Brady Campaign to prevent gun violence told NBC7. “We are sick and tired of seeing on the news...this mass shooting that mass shooting, these people shot.”
According to the Brady Campaign 33,000 people are fatally shot every year in the US, but legal loopholes still allow people to buy guns without background checks.
Marcus advocates a set of nationwide gun laws that would “make it harder for bad guys to get guns. We should able to go to movie theaters, restaurants and our school campuses and not worry about someone coming in with semiautomatic weapons with tons of ammunition that can kill lots of people in seconds.”
Marcus and others held a rally just before the vigil, and while their message met mostly with support others disagreed.
“We did have one person drive by and say ‘are you going to get rid of cars too?' And again we're not here to get rid of guns,” supporter Lori Dilley explained.
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By nightfall the focus turned to the victims of the horrific shootings.
“We are not going to forget. We remember the victims of gun violence,” Marcus said.
And while each person was filled with sorrow remembering what has been lost they were also filled with hope that change can happen.
