New question on 4473 form...

rick_reno

I'm sure you've all seen the report noting that criminals are obtaining guns from friends and family members (text follows). In the coming days expect to see Schumer, Lieberman, Clinton and a few others on the steps of the Senate proposing to add this line to the 4473 formo Are you now or have you ever been a family member or friend? http://www.cnn.com/2001/LAW/11/05/criminals.and.guns.ap/index.html WASHINGTON (AP) -- Friends and family are increasingly the source of firearms used by criminals, a Justice Department survey of prison inmates finds. Nearly 40 percent of state inmates in 1997 who used or possessed a firearm during their crime got the weapon from a friend or relative, up from 34 percent in 1991, said a report released Sunday. Over the same period, the percentage of inmates who bought or traded for their gun at a pawn shop, flea market or retail outlet fell from 21 percent to 14 percent. That shift is due in part to the passage of tougher gun control laws during the 1990s, including the 1993 Brady Bill that imposed nationwide background checks on buyers, said the report's author, Caroline Wolf Harlow of the Bureau of Justice Statistics. The number of state prisoners who used guns to commit crimes rose from 16 percent to 18 percent between 1991 and 1997. Federal prisoners followed the same trend over those years, increasing their gun possession from 12 percent to 15 percent. Opposing sides on the gun-control debate issue found support for their views in the report. "What this shows is that making it harder for stores to sell guns does nothing to deter criminals from getting weapons," said Jeffrey Wendell, a criminal justice professor at the University of Texas. "They just turn to other sources. No one is walking into a store, finding they can't buy a gun and then deciding not to commit a crime." Paul Stevens, a lawyer and professor at the University of Pennsylvania, says tougher laws are needed on all fronts. "We need less guns in society in general," Stevens said. "The problem is that there are so many guns and they are so easy to get that it is impossible to keep the wrong people from getting a hold of them." The data came from interviews with 18,000 state and federal prisoners. The survey found that about 10 percent of federal and state prisoners carried a military-style, semiautomatic weapon when committing a crime. These weapons included the Uzi, Tec-9, AK-47 rifle and several varieties of shotgun. The firearm most favored by inmates was the handgun, carried by more than 80 percent of the inmates who said they used a firearm. Of the prisoners convicted of a violent crime -- murder, rape, robbery and assault -- 30 percent of state inmates and 35 percent of federal inmates said they had a gun when they committed their crime. Young, minority men were the most likely to have been carrying a firearm. The use or possession of weapons resulted in tougher sentences for many inmates -- 40 percent of state inmates and 56 percent of federal inmates reported getting longer sentences because they were armed.

Trader Dave

I have a solution.Why don't these scum sucking, low-life lawyers and cities sue the family member that allowed the criminal to have the gun. Oh, sorry I forgot. They are broke and don't have any money to go after. But sure is easier to go after the innocent which have money (gun industry).Next they will file suit against gun owners who have had their gun stolen and used in a crime. "He should have kept his gun more secure than locking it in his house," they will say.Sorry to all the good lawyers out there who do make an honest living - all dozen of them.