Gun control laws

[BPowderkeg]

i hope no one finds this post offensive.., also i know there are some very intelligent folks here on The Firing Line, therefore i have a question to ask,

can anyone show proof were just one local/state/national anti-gun law has stopped a criminal from fulfilling his/her intentions ?

my OPINION, there is no law currently on the books and/or a future anti-gun law, including a total ban that will stop any person from picking up a gun and committing a crime against humanity, may it be simply "brandishing" e.g., bank robbery, back street holdup etc., or actual firing that gun to intimidate and/or wounding or killing another human.

please think and reply with reason and logic.., as stated, i do not want to offend anyone, i am just curious as i have searched high and low for proof that a law has stopped a criminal or the average Joe who just got upset over something minor.

P.S., i have personally experienced shooting violence in my lifetime, it was frightening, yet i love my guns.

 

[Spats McGee]

While I agree with the notion that "gun laws do not prevent crime," I have to admit that I believe your question to be flawed. First, it's kind of a broad and vague question. We'd have to know what the criminal's intentions were in order to know if said intentions were thwarted, and we'd have to know whether a gun law played a role in frustrating them.

With respect to prohibited persons attempting to purchase firearms, I do not have any proof, but I do suspect that there are several instances in which background checks had prevented a prohibited person from purchasing a firearm from an FFL. Whether or not that prevented said PP from getting hands on a firearm, I doubt it, but that's a different question.

With respect to other crimes, such as bank robbery, murder, etc., you are, in essence, asking for proof of a negative. IOW, if the criminal did not complete his or her objective, there could be plenty of cases for which there is simply no proof, at least theoretically. For example, if Bobby the Bank Robber decides not to do The Bank Job because he: (a) can't buy a gun from an FFL; and (b) can't find his buddy Aaron the Arms Dealer, it just means that Bobby sits home on Friday afternoon. We're unlikely to find any proof of that.

 

[BPowderkeg]

Sir, what you are saying is exactly my point.., we do not know if any crimes were thwarted by a gun law, we do not know if any person ever gave thought to NOT committing a crime, we have laws against robbing banks, convenience stores etc., we also do not know if Bobby was prevented from buying a gun legally.

according to the

The Brookings Institution• Research Brief, Center on Urban & Metropolitan Policy.

Twenty Thousand Gun-Control Laws?

Jon S. Vernick, Johns Hopkins University
Lisa M. Hepburn, Harvard University

there are approximately 20,000 active anti-gun laws in the United States of America, these include all local, State and Federal jurisdictions, therefore i submit these laws are totally useless. they cost us billions, if not trillions of dollars, they cost us many lives e.g., kicking in doors of innocent citizens and shooting them, killing the family dog, just because someone saw another person entering a house carrying a gun. we all have heard these stories of wrong house address, so i don not need to belabor that point.

we need to get in touch with our representatives and get just one of them to introduce a bill that will review ALL gun/anti-gun laws and eliminate the ones that are repetitious, those that violate our Constitutional rights.

i am in favor of preventing known "nut jobs", if any law is needed it is one that requires qualified persons (psychiatrists, doctors, lawyers etc.) to report abnormalities in an individuals make up.., just look at the things that have been dug up on J. H. since his murderous rampage, none of the 20,000 ant-gun laws could have stopped him, but a law requiring known professionals to report his known mental problems, THAT law could have stopped him in many, many ways.

we need people control more so than gun control !!

 

[Tom Servo]

This isn't a punitive action, but a consolidation. We already have several threads open in the Law & Civil Rights subforum, so let's keep the discussion focused there.