The NRA abets gun violence
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Once again, the National Rifle Association's annual convention is coming to Pittsburgh, this time promising "acres of gear and guns." Attendees surely will find all of that and more. But one thing they won't get from the NRA is any sort of dialogue about how to address the problem of gun violence in our country.
As someone whose job it is to investigate and prosecute firearms violations, and as someone who once thought the NRA supported law enforcement, I have come to realize that the NRA takes every chance it gets to stymie even reasonable efforts to combat gun violence.
How else can one view the NRA's opposition to the release of gun trace data, for example?
The Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms maintains a database which could provide a wide variety of valuable trace information with just a few keystrokes. But the NRA's allies in Congress have successfully passed laws which limit the data that may be released to law enforcement agencies.
The catch is that each agency may receive information only about its own gun recoveries and traces. So, for instance, Pittsburgh police cannot view information on gun recoveries and traces in the many boroughs that surround the city. Since gun traffickers and other violators do not respect municipal or state borders, it is puzzling that the NRA would push for laws that serve only to hamper efforts at investigation and interagency intelligence gathering.
The public is even more in the dark. Do you, as a resident of Pennsylvania, want to know how many guns were recovered and traced last year in your state? That's easy -- just gather the chiefs of Pennsylvania's 1,150-odd police departments in a big room and have them cobble together the trace data from their respective agencies.
Want a breakdown of how many handguns, shotguns and rifles were recovered? Ditto. Because, while the NRA is understandably against releasing individual gun owners' names, it also opposes the public dissemination of even the most basic statistical data on gun recoveries.
First Published April 27, 2011 12:00 am
