From: Michael S. Lorrey (mike@lorrey.com)
Date: Wed Jun 09 1999 - 06:41:27 MDT
Harvey Newstrom wrote:
> I'm sorry, but these numbers for Florida are just not feasible. Looking at
> today's paper, I find half a dozen crimes with legal handguns. There are
> many more handgun crimes for which I can't tell the legal status of the gun,
> or in some cases what kind of gun was used.
>
> I don't see how the study can only find 18 crimes with licensed handguns,
> when I can find eight such crimes in just one day, the first day I looked.
> The cases are: Elderly mother shot daughter because she though she was
> being put in a home, two kids shot dead in Orlando with their parents' guns
> in two separate incidents, five kids arrested for bringing their parent's
> handguns to school in separate incidents assumed to be a copycat of
> Columbine. All of these were legal, licensed handguns.
A kid taking a parent's gun without permission is a stolen gun.
>
>
> The only conclusion I can reach is that this study is carefully wording
> their statements to create misleading statistics. They say "but only 18
> crimes involving firearms were committed by those with licenses". That
> seems to count only those crimes committed by the licensed person themselves
> with their own gun. It ignored licensed gun owners using other guns to
> commit crimes, and it ignores licensed gun owners whose guns were taken away
> from them and used by someone else in a crime. These types of cases are not
> covered in either the pro or con discussions, but are merely ignored. The
> statistic seems to support the idea that licensed handguns are rarely used
> in crimes, but the facts they cite do not really support their case.
Handguns themselves are not licensed. The owners are licensed to carry concealed
weapons. Someone who is not licensed to carry concealed and does is committing
an unlicensed act. If its not their gun and the owner did not give them
permission to have it, it is theft, and is therefore criminally obtained. This
is why gun trigger locks are not a bad idea to promote. Any time a gun is not
under the control of its owner or its legal user it should be locked up, but
mandating any technology that makes it difficult for the owner or legal user to
quickly employ it is not a good idea. Anyone experienced with guns will tell you
that if you are not confident in using that gun in the clutch, you should not
carry a gun. You should not draw it in a crime situation if you are not prepared
to shoot someone with it, and you should be willing to die to prevent it from
getting into the hands of criminals. End of story, anything less is negligence,
and the owner should be held accountable, at least civilly. Suing the
manufacturer for the stupidity, laziness, or cowardliness of the legal owner is
ludicrous.
Mike Lorrey
--
TANSTAAFL!!!
Michael S. Lorrey
Owner, Lorrey Systems
http://www.lorrey.com
ArtLocate.Com
http://www.artlocate.com
Director, Grafton County Fish & Game Assoc.
http://www.lorrey.com/gcfga/
Member, Extropy Institute
http://www.extropy.org
Member, National Rifle Association
http://www.nra.org
"Live Free or Die, Death is not the Worst of Evils."
- General John Stark
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