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Monday, June 20, 2005
Surely They're on the Registry?
Toronto had another spate of shootings over the weekend, and no arrests. I don't see what the problem is. We have a gun registry, so certainly we should be able to find the shooters' names engraved on their bullets or something, and call them up to tell them they've broken the law, and that they should come on down to the cop shop and have the guns taken away for a week or a month or something. This should be easy. I mean, we spent enough money on it, so it must be foolproof.
Auditor General Sheila Fraser confirmed in a letter to Conservative MP Garry Breitkreuz her team is following up on the feds to see if they took up the recommendations from her damning December 2002 audit.
In that report, Fraser exposed how the controversial program that was expected to cost $2 million ballooned to a staggering $1-billion or more. The so-called "boondoggle" fuelled cries from Opposition critics like Breitkreuz to demand the program be scrapped.
Scrapped?? Then how will we ever find these guys?
HUNDREDS OF people were nearby when a man was shot in a packed downtown club, but not a single witness has come forward, Toronto Police say.
"It's one of those bizarre things, a crowded nightclub where nobody talks," Staff Sgt. John Martin said. "So we know where he was shot and when, but we don't know who did it or why."
Patrons ducked for cover when the man, in his late 20s, was shot at least twice around 3 a.m. yesterday on the second floor of Club 26 on Lombard St., police said.
Bullets were flying all weekend, with three other men shot in three different shootings early Saturday.
A man was shot in the hand and leg during a home invasion in North York.
Another man was shot in the stomach in the Islington Ave. and Queensway area.
A third man was shot in the chest near Dupont St. and Lansdowne Ave.
I don't understand how this can happen with such a good registry program for our firearms that we're not permitted to carry with us. Ever. I wonder if it has anything to do with the fact that the people we should be worried about are criminals, and therefore don't give a flying you-know-what about registering their firearms.......
Posted by RightGirl on June 20, 2005 in Canadian Conservative Politics | Permalink
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Comments
The purpose of the gun registry is not to stop illegal guns, but to promote responsible gun use for new and existing gun owners.
You do bring up a good point about ballistic finger printing. Good idea. Then we can catch non-criminal gun users after they have decided to become criminals. It does happen you know.
If you can prove to me that nobody who registers their guns will kill or wound somebody then I guess you just bolstered the argument for the gun registry. 12 bucks a year doesn't seem like much to prove you are a responsible citizen with the privalage of owning guns.
Posted by: Gamblog | 2005-06-20 9:25:43 AM
Pistol registry started in Canada in 1934. It has never been used to solve a crime. To do so would require the suspect to use his own registered gun in a crime with no live witnesses, a crime with no obvious association to himself and then leave the gun at the scene.
In 70 years not even the doppiest criminals have been stupid enough to do this.
Posted by: michael shannon | 2005-06-20 9:32:52 AM
Ron Laffin of the National Post,
... Crimestoppers posted photos of the top 20 most wanted criminals in Toronto on its Web site. A majority were young black men. A similarly high ratio may be observed in many of Toronto’s detention centres. Yet black people make up only 8% of Toronto’s population...
Most of Toronto's black community emigrated from the Caribbean over the past 20 years. Immigration is the driving force behind Toronto's crime.
Toronto Police Service...Friday, June 17, 2005...
Suspects #1- #5: Male, black, 15 – 18 years, 5’9” – 6’2”, thin build.
Description of Suspect #1: Male, black, 16-19 years, 5’8”, 141 pounds, medium build, long black afro. Suspect #2: Male, black, 16-19 years, 5’8”-5’10”, 150-161 pounds, medium build, black hair. Suspect #3: Male, black, 16-19 years, 5’8”, 141 pounds, medium build, bald or shaved hair. Suspects #4 - #5: Male, No further description available.
Description of Suspect #1: Male, black, 19 years, 6’1”-6’2”, 180 pounds, medium build, short black hair. Suspect #2: Male, black, 19 years, 6’0”, medium build, long black hair.
Description of Suspect #1: Male, black, 16-19 years, braided hair. Suspect #2: Male, black, 16-19 years, short, shaved black hair. Suspects #3 - #4: Male. NO FURTHER DESCRIPTIONS AVAILABLE.
Male, North American Aboriginal, 16-20 years, 6’0”-6’2”, 200 pounds, heavy build. Suspect #2: Male, North American Aboriginal, 5’9”, 150 pounds, medium build, long curly brown hair. Suspects #3 - #4: Female, 5’5”, long straight dark hair. Suspects #5 - #10: NO DESCRIPTION OF SUSPECTS AVAILABLE.
Description of Suspect #1: Male, black, 18-20 years, 5’4”-5’5”, 141-150 pounds, thin build, short curly black hair, black eyes. Suspect #2: Female, brown, 19-20 years, 4’6”-5’0”, black curly hair, brown eyes. Suspect #3: Male, black, 18-20 years, 5’11”-6’0”, black afro hair, brown eyes, medium build.
Posted by: DJ | 2005-06-20 10:20:36 AM
Sorry I have to jump in again. The purpose of a gun registry is to lay the foundation for gun confiscation. It's sole utility is to allow the police to knock on your door and demand your weapons.
This is happening slowly in Canada through prohibition orders for certain classes and makes of firearms.
The feds have two practical problems in banning ownership of guns. First if they do it all at once there would be a substantial backlash that they might not be able to control. Hence banning "only bad guns" and slowly expanding the definition of "bad guns". Their second problem are the natives. The feds have bought into subsistance hunting/culture arguement and would have a hard time siezing native weapons and living with the political fallout.
They have already written off non-native gun owners as a voting block so they have nothing to lose by further alienating them.
Posted by: michael shannon | 2005-06-20 10:26:48 AM
"12 bucks a year doesn't seem like much to prove you are a responsible citizen with the privalage of owning guns"
12 bucks, 2 billion, whatever.
Posted by: jhuck | 2005-06-20 11:11:27 AM
Robert McClelland -
You can indeed conclude that criminals do not register their guns, but you can't flip that sentence and conclude that 'anyone with an unregistered gun is a criminal'.
The gun registry has not reduced gun crime in Canada. Your equation of an unregistered gun with 'being a criminal' and thus, enabling the police to catch criminals - is empty. In fact, gun crime is increasing exponentially each year. Interestingly enough, so are the costs of the gun registry. And so are the number of bureaucrats who have taxpayer funded jobs thanks to that registry.
In 1995, the year the registry was introduced, the number of bureaucrats dealing with guns was about 100. In five years it increased ten-fold, and now..ten years later..it has increased even more.
What is the result of the gun registry?
More criminals caught? No.
Less gun crime? No.
More jobs for bureaucrats? Yes.
Increased costs to taxpayers? Yes.
I think that sums it up.
Posted by: ET | 2005-06-20 11:39:03 AM
"The primary purpose of the gun registry is to allow the police to arrest anyone who is caught in possession of an unregistered gun."
ET:
Actually, Robert has it about right, for once, although he doesn't go quite far enough. The ultimate purpose is to increase public safety by eliminating private ownership of firearms altogether. That's it. That's all. Arguments about its cost and efficacy are irrelevant to the overall goal. Very simply, the government would prefer that no one own guns. They are dangerous and the less dangerous items there are in the hands of the public, the safer we will all be. No doubt there is more to come. As someone (Jay Jardine I think) pointed out recently on my site, reductio ad absurdum arguments will also not work with these people.They just get new ideas about new registries
Posted by: Occam's Carbuncle | 2005-06-20 12:10:39 PM
Occam-
But the registration of guns doesn't eliminate private ownership of guns - registered or not registered. Furthermore, registration of a gun has nothing to do with use of a gun. Just as registration of a car doesn't prevent an accident or that car's use in a theft. So, can one really claim that the purpose is to eliminate private ownership of guns?
After all, gun use in Canada has dramatically increased since the gun registry. Therefore, the pointy-heads in our gov't can't claim that the gun registry has had any function in 'reducing gun crime'. All it has done is increase bureaucratic jobs.
If the gov't wanted to eliminate the private ownership of guns, then, it would have to ban the private ownership AND use of guns. Needless to say, it wouldn't (so far) dare to do that. To think that a gun registry would perform the same function is ..well, a bit far-fetched. Admittedly, an Ottawa bureaucrat with a Liberal mind, could indeed have such 'thought-processes' (I'm being charitable to call them thought-processes').
Nothing like a paternalistic sophist centralist gov't for dimwitted nonsense. I hear that kitchen knives are quite dangerous. They could start a registration on that; think of the income they'd get in Ottawa to register kitchen knives!!!
Posted by: ET | 2005-06-20 12:41:18 PM
The purpose of the registry is secondarily to discourage casual ownership by placing minor bureaucratic hurdles in the way, but primarily to ensure the government knows who has what when it comes time to prohibit successive classes of weapons. Ultimately it is expected that all classes of firearms will be prohibited. There will of course be no compensation for property rendered untransferrable or confiscated outright.
Posted by: lrC | 2005-06-20 12:56:09 PM
I still don't think the registry has ever been sold as a crime fighter. It is to teach people how to responsibly use and store guns. It is to prevent accidents.
Has anyone checked the stats on reduction in gun related accidents?
People who use guns are not criminals. The government knows it and they aren't going to take away your guns. Why is everyone so paranoid about it?
Posted by: Gamblog | 2005-06-20 1:03:18 PM
As much as I am strongly behind the control of guns and other dangerous weapons (if I may be cheeky, "weapons of minor destruction"), and as much as I generally agree with you Gamblog on most of your comments, I end up falling on the anti-registry side on this one. While the purpose seems noble and a logical extension of the proposed aim - register the weapons so we know who is thinking about criminal use and who not, register so we can track legal/illegal weapons more easily - I think this is one where the costs in dollars just so outstrips the end, where the dollars could be so better spent elsewhere.
I do think that the registry has been sold as a means to end gun violence. But even if its aim is as modest as you suggest - "to teach people how to responsibly use and store guns. It is to prevent accidents" - that's a lot of money for not a lot of accidents. I've never had much sympathy for the whingers who complain about the cost per person ($12!!) or the concept of having to be registered with the government before owning a tool whose purpose is to kill or the inconvenience of registering their weapons. But the overall bureaucracy and cost of this registry to me seems wholly disproportionate to any credible evidence of results from the registry. One billion dollars in education programs or policing would have had a far greater success in reducing gun crime. To that end, one billion dollars to feed and house lower income families would have done far more to lower gun crime/deaths.
Posted by: TB | 2005-06-20 1:32:31 PM
Gamblog: I hesitate to say this; I know you are quite young, but you are a perfect example of a brainwashed Liberal Canadian, of someone raised completely within the Trudeapian ideology. You see yourself as 'tolerant, knowledgeable, with a duty to criticize others, including Americans, and an insistence on walking the middle line even if that line wavers over the whole road'. That mindset - slightly smug, slightly superior, slightly ignorant - is uniquely Canadian. It brings to mind the isolation of the pre-WWII upper class in Europe..who could never imagine that 'bad things might happen'.
The Gun Registry has been 'sold' by this government, repeatedly, as a crime fighter. Repeatedly. It has nothing to do with teaching people how to use guns; it has nothing to do with preventing accidents. Here's a quote:
"The Canadian government expects ten positive results from their new firearm regulations:
Reduction in sale of stolen guns.
Increased public safety by keeping guns out of the hands of person who should not own them.
Making it easier to return stolen guns to the rightful owners.
Enhanced charges and prison terms against criminals.
Potential prevention of loss of life.
Higher rate of solved crimes for crimes involving firearms.
Reduced theft, unsafe storage and gun-related accidents.
Overall increased public safety.
Reduction of firearms smuggling.
Put more police on the streets by reducing paperwork. "
Now - the above, a quote from a gov't site, shows that the gun registry is ALL about crime reduction. Have ANY of these goals been met?
No.
Importantly, CAN any of these goals be met by a gun registry?
No.
Posted by: ET | 2005-06-20 1:33:52 PM
ET:
I'm a little unusual this way, but I don't necessarily believe everything the government says about itself.
"If the gov't wanted to eliminate the private ownership of guns, then, it would have to ban the private ownership AND use of guns. Needless to say, it wouldn't (so far) dare to do that. To think that a gun registry would perform the same function is ..well, a bit far-fetched."
If you think they wouldn't dare, we definitely disagree on the course public policy has taken over the last 40 years or so. Socialists who are comfortable telling you what to eat, where you can smoke and a hundred other things that are none of their business will have no qualms whatsoever in making a law prohibiting ownership of a dangerous instrument. All that's required is a little more tweaking of the zeitgeist. Maybe one more mass shooting by some lunatic will be catalyst enough. We'll see. I'm not as trusting as you.
"Admittedly, an Ottawa bureaucrat with a Liberal mind, could indeed have such 'thought-processes' (I'm being charitable to call them thought-processes')."
Nothing like a paternalistic sophist centralist gov't for dimwitted nonsense. I hear that kitchen knives are quite dangerous. They could start a registration on that; think of the income they'd get in Ottawa to register kitchen knives!!!"
As I said, reductio ad absurdum probably won't work. This very thing was recently proposed in all seriousness by a group of British doctors.
Posted by: Occam's Carbuncle | 2005-06-20 1:53:52 PM
"It is to prevent accidents."
Accidents will always happen. Perhaps the money would be better spent on the health care system, so that people aren't dying while waiting for treatment?
Pro-gun registry people just don't understand that, for most of us, the issue isn't whether there should be a registry or not (even though there already was), its that our taxes are being wasted yet again on a project that has no benefits for us, the taxpayers.
Posted by: ld | 2005-06-20 3:03:48 PM
Garry Breitkreuz, M.P.
Yorkton-Melville News Release
For Immediate Delivery
April 27, 1999
RCMP NOW ADMIT THEY HAD FOUR SNIPERS ON THE HILL DURING GUN LAW PROTEST
"Documents prove officers had four .308 rifles and seventeen sub-machine guns on the Hill that day."
Ottawa – Today, Garry Breitkreuz, MP for Yorkton-Melville, released RCMP documents listing the firearms that were signed out on the day of the Fed-Up II Rally on Parliament Hill last September 22nd. The documents verify that RCMP officers signed out the following firearms for security on Parliament Hill that day: Four (4) .308 rifles and seventeen (17) – MP5, H&K sub-machine guns. In addition to these firearms, ten (10) Emergency Response Team (ERT) members had their special SIG 9 MM handguns and all regular RCMP officers had their standard issue side arms.
"During the rally everyone was talking about the snipers on the roof-tops of the Parliament buildings. While many were a little surprized at the display of firepower for a peaceful demonstration, I thought it was probably standard operating procedure for any rally with such a huge attendance," said Breitkreuz.
"Then I read a quote from RCMP Inspector Al Nause in the paper the next day and he was denying that there were snipers on the rooftops. Inspector Nause, the man The Ottawa Citizen said was in charge of security during the anti-Bill C-68 (The Firearms Act) protest, was reported to have said, "When someone has binoculars we don’t normally call them a sniper. We call them observers." (The Ottawa Citizen, "Shooting down the conspiracy myth" by Ron Corbett, page A3, September 23, 1998). "Yes, the RCMP documents show that the ERT officers with the .308 rifles were also issued with binoculars that day," clarified Breitkreuz.
"Following the report in the newspaper, many firearms experts came forward willing to testify in court to what they saw. I even received a picture of a police officer carrying a rifle case off one of the Parliament Hill buildings. Based on this evidence, I filed an Access to Information Request with the RCMP asking for copies of all documents related to the numbers and types of firearms signed out by police officers assigned to security on Parliament Hill on the day of the rally," explained Breitkreuz.
Breitkreuz notified The Ottawa Citizen of their mistake on April 21st and had the documents hand delivered to the Managing Editor on Friday, April 23rd. "Now that we have the documented proof, what we’re left with is four unanswered questions: (1) Why did RCMP Inspector Nause make the statements he did to a reporter when the Operational Plan he signed included details of the ten Emergency Response Team members? (2) Why did The Ottawa Citizen reporter take the word of one RCMP Inspector over the word of many honest, peaceful people attending the rally? (3) Why did the RCMP not correct the story as soon as it appeared in The Ottawa Citizen? And finally, (4) Is it standard operating procedure for the RCMP to have sniper rifles and machine guns at peaceful rallies on Parliament Hill or is this type of welcome reserved only for law-abiding, responsible firearm owners?" asked Breitkreuz. "It’s time for the RCMP and The Ottawa Citizen to tell Canadians the truth."
-30-
For more information, please call:
Yorkton Office: (306) 782-3309
Ottawa Office: (613) 992-4394
e-mail: breitg0@parl.gc.ca
SUPPORTING DOCUMENTATION
By Garry Breitkreuz, MP – April 26, 1999
THE OTTAWA CITIZEN QUOTE
The Ottawa Citizen, "Shooting down the conspiracy myth" by Ron Corbett, page A3, September 23, 1998. Here are the key quotes from the article: "I tracked down RCMP Inspector Al Nause, the man in charge of security on the Hill for yesterday's protest, and put the questions to him. Do you have snipers on the East Block and on rooftops along Wellington Street? "No, we don't," said Insp. Nause. "When someone has binoculars we don't normally call them a sniper. We call them observers. Who told you they were snipers? asked Insp. Nause. "Just about everyone." The inspector laughed. Offered to bring me up to the roof to see for myself. Perhaps I should have, just to confirm the story completely, although I took him at his word. Gutless journalist, perhaps."
KEY RESULTS OF RCMP ACCESS REQUEST
Here are the key results of an Access to Information Request from the RCMP with documents dated April 16, 1999. The documents verify that RCMP officers signed out the following firearms for security on Parliament Hill that day: Four (4) .308 rifles issued to RCMP Emergency Response Team members and seventeen (17) - MP5, H&K sub-machine guns issued to 10 members of the Embassy and Diplomatic Protection Section, 4 members of the Parliament Hill Detachment and 3 members of the Emergency Response Team.
OTHER SUPPORTING EVIDENCE - PHOTOS
(1) We have expert firearm witnesses who attended the rally that are willing to testify in court that they observed officers with rifles on rooftops of the Parliament buildings.
(2) We have pictures (click here and here - note that the photos are large downloads) of a RCMP Emergency Response Team member on the rooftop of the Parliament building carrying a rifle case. (Higher resolution versions available on request)
RCMP’S DESCRIPTION OF FIREARMS
1. The ERT [Emergency Response Team] .308 rifle is custom made here in the Armourer shop. We use Winchester Model 70 rifle actions. We mate the receiver to custom barrel, fibreglass stock, custom scope base and a Leupold Vari – x3 Police scope.
2. Heckler and Koch, Model MP5A3 submachine gun, 9mm x 19 calibre with a selection lever for semi-automatic fire only, a multipurpose carrying sling, two 15 round and one 30 round magazines. Barrel Length – 8.85 inches (325 mm), Stock - Retractable butt stock, Sights – Dioptre-Rotary rear sight, adjustable for windage and elevation, rigid front sight.
3. The Sig/Sauer Pistol is a 9x19mm semi-automatic pistol with a 15 round magazine. It fires double action from the first shot with subsequent shots being single action. The Sig/Sauer P226 pistol is being phased out as new members are trained on S&W and join the teams.
4. Smith & Wesson, model 5946 semi-automatic pistol, 9mm x 19 calibre with three (3) 15-round magazines, double action only, and a safety. Operation – recoil operated, locked breech, delay blow back. Barrel Length – 101mm. Overall Length 197mm. Sights – three (3) dot, Novak-style flat black, green coloured, tritium night sights.
Librano$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$
RCPM motto: Maintiens le Droit.
"tritium night sights"? The demo was during the day, no?
Posted by: maz2 | 2005-06-20 3:05:22 PM
Gamblog wonders why everyone is so paranoid about the gun registry. Gamblog why don't you go read about the case of one Jack Carleton, registered gun owner, whose home was searched because he sent a harshly worded email to Dalton McGuinty. If that kind of thing doesn't make you a little uncomfortable, there's not much hope for you.
http://www.northernalliance.ca/news/canada/mcguinty.html
Posted by: TimR | 2005-06-20 3:19:41 PM
I think the gun registry just needs to be given a chance. The government should embark on a massive advertising campaign explaining the benefits of the registry.
As long as they spend enough money on the campaign, I'm sure that within a year or two all criminals would make a point of registering their guns before using them to commit any offenses.
And having farmers with unregistered gopher-rifles fill out a form and pay a fee to the government will make us all safer in the end.
Adieu,
Marie of Romania.
Posted by: EBD | 2005-06-20 4:36:57 PM
Sorry, anyone who supports the gun registry is an idiot - pure and simple. It's like saying you support your money being flushed down the toilet because maybe, just maybe, a homeless person will fall into a drain and find a five dollar bill and buy breakfast with it.
Posted by: Michael Dabioch | 2005-06-20 6:45:32 PM
"It's like saying you support your money being flushed down the toilet because maybe, just maybe, a homeless person will fall into a drain and find a five dollar bill and buy breakfast with it."
Yeah we tried that already. Then the eggheads at NRC came up with a supersonic helicopter which could drop millions of dollars over the areas where homeless people live. But the Americans didn't feel comfortable with the idea of us owning such an advanced aircraft so we shut the project down. In the end we decided to simply send envelopes stuffed with cash to our friends in Quebec and hope for the best. The beauty of it is, in Quebec they're mostly French, so anyone who doesn't like the idea is nothing but a bigot, right?
Posted by: Social Welfare Think Tank | 2005-06-20 7:14:36 PM
Hey Dabioch: I was joking.
Posted by: EBD | 2005-06-20 9:30:36 PM
"It is to teach people how to responsibly use and store guns. It is to prevent accidents."
Well, no. it's not. It's to provide the means to effect eventual prohibition, but let me address this point anyway. If it were all about "teaching", wouldn't a brochure do the trick? How does the compulsory disclosure and registration of personal property lead to its responsible use?
All the provinces have hunter safety courses available already. No amount of education will make an idiot safe from himself. We are not children. We do not need the government looking over our shoulders. This concept seems so simple to me, yet it is so hopelessly ungraspable for so many. Unfortunately, I have to live with the rules made to "protect" the permanently infantilized from themselves.
It's...ah...mildly frustrating.
Posted by: Occam's Carbuncle | 2005-06-21 7:52:48 AM
I just think that it's funny to see trouble in paradise. Ontarians promote themselves as a perfect utopia, free from the social problems of others, especially the US. (It was always a lie, but sometimes the truth takes a while to sink in for Ontario people).
While I think the registry is a total waste of resources, it is also a great way to solve Ontario's gun violence problem. This totally ineffective method will allow Ontarians to kill each other off without legal interference, thereby the problem can solve itself. Neat, huh.
Thank God Alberta is a little better than this, but we should be taking extra measures to deal with our own problems. Edmonton has had a bad year so far with 19 murders. For our people's sake, Alberta has to do something and we can't wait for the stupid federals to do anything about it.
Posted by: Scott | 2005-06-21 8:08:51 AM
If the gun registry exists in order to ensure/promote safe and responsible usage, storage, and transportation, then it is redundant, given the plethora of existing law.
http://www.cfc-ccaf.gc.ca/media/guide/default_e.asp#crossing7
Posted by: Darrell | 2005-06-23 8:23:54 AM
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