If that were actually the case, however, then we wouldn't see stories like this one from Orange County, California. 

Three students at Vista View Middle School in Fountain Valley were detained after allegedly bringing a gun and ammunition to campus on Monday. 

On May 12, Fountain View police responded to the school to investigate a report of a student possibly in possession of a firearm. 

Authorities searched the backpacks of three 6th grade students and discovered a semiautomatic handgun along with ammunition, police said. 

This was not an active shooter incident, according to authorities.

The identities of the students were not released because they are minors.

Details on how the students obtained the weapon are unclear. 

The motive is under investigation.

According to the gun control group Giffords, California "makes it a crime for a person to negligently store or leave a firearm on premises within the person’s custody or control in a location where the person knows, or reasonably should know, that a child under 18 is likely to gain access to the firearm without the permission of the child’s parent or legal guardian. A person may be found to have violated this law even if a minor never actually accessed or used the firearm." 

So much for the effectiveness of the state's gun storage law when it comes to preventing minors from gaining access to a gun. The state's "universal" background check law on both firearms and ammunition was also ignored by these tweens, who managed to get a gun without filling out any paperwork or waiting a week-and-a-half before picking up their purloined pistol. 

This week's discovery in Orange County is hardly unprecedented. Just two weeks ago a student in Marina Del Ray ran from a classroom after a gun in their backpack discharged. 

In a message to parents, the Los Angeles Unified School District assured that "students and staff are safe" and that there is "no imminent threat to any student." The lockdown was lifted after officers conducted a thorough sweep of the campus. Yahoo News reported that counseling services and additional patrols will be provided for the rest of the week.

A Zoom meeting was held to inform parents about the incident, during which concerns were raised about the lack of backpack searches at the school. Brittany Williamson, a parent, expressed her frustration, stating, "Even though no one got hurt, there should be more safety precautions." The school is considering implementing additional security measures in response to these concerns.

These incidents are far more common than most folks realize, because the vast majority of them never receive media attention. According to the Los Angeles Unified School District, there were more than 1,100 incidents involving weapons in the 2022-2023 school year. While not all of those cases involved a gun, California teens have proven to be more than capable of avoiding the state's restrictive gun laws. Within the first month of the 2024-2025 school year at least four guns were discovered on LAUSD high school campuses, at least one of which was also equipped with a "large" capacity magazine that's also illegal to possess under California law. 

It's clear that California's gun control laws aren't much of an impediment to those who want to get their hands on one, and given the soft-on-juvenile-crime policies that lawmakers in Sacramento have enacted there's little reason for juveniles to be concerned about the consequences if they're caught with a gun, even at school. 

California's draconian gun laws have done a great job of preventing responsible adults from exercising their Second Amendment rights, but when it comes to keeping violent criminals or underage kids from getting ahold of a gun of their own, they're an abysmal failure.