Yeah, that sounds like something pretty hard to prove and might be more a bias against the act of suicide (which is abhorrent to some).

Suicide is also the leading cause of death amongst police officers. I wonder what the percentage of those gun owners were in law enforcement. In 16 years I've been to my fair share of death investigations (defined as a dead body without numerous gunshot wounds, stab wounds, fatal traffic crash) , half being suicide, a small portion later turn out to be a true who dunnit, the rest natural causes. I can only remember four being self inflicted gunshot wounds (two were fellow police). Some, the running car in the garage, two being defenestration, one accidental auto-erotic axphixyation. The majorty were hangings. The hangings always were found by family, and it was always in the home. 95% of the police suicides that I became aware of were done away from home. It is the second saddest thing to see, I don't what to think about the first. I lost a coworker this morning, shot and killed attempting to quell a disturbance right outside of our station. The savage charged him and during the struggle disarmed him and shot him once in the head. The savage was shot six times by responding officers after the savage pointed the gun at them. The murderer will likely make their court date. Sorry, just needed to pour this weight off my shoulders.

Mentally unstable people are not allowed guns in America, so quit feeling uncomfortable. Any doctor can have your guns removed. Maybe this isn't a good thing. Anyway, only recently, you right wo own a firearm has a course that can be persued to get re-instated. Prior to last year, if some doctor said you couldn't have a firearm (though he may not knowingly have known you had any in the first place and simply said you were mentally unstable), it was pretty much a life sentence.

-S

I thank you for your service Sir and I will remember your co-worker in my prayers.

Would you say your hunting rifle is less deadly than an M-16 or AK-47?

Or do you have some fantasy that your rifle is "ok" because your firearm was "designed for hunting" therefore it is less likely to be stuck with the "stigma" of being a "people killer" rifle?

Let me help him!

Hopefully i am not taking the wind out of your sails - but a hunting rifle is MUCH more deadly than an M-16 or AK-47.

-S

Thank you Sir! That was greatly appreciated.

The courts DID find Cho Seung-Hue mentally ill and incapable of caring for himself.

However, the court system did NOT forward this information to the NICS center which would've denied Cho the ability to purchase firearms with which he committed the VT massacre.

Being declared mentally ill already puts you under jurisdiction of a number of other laws (but the logic of how exactly a person whom is determined to be mentally ill can be trusted to follow the law on their own is beyond me).

Had the system we ALREADY had in place WORKED PROPERLY, the VT massacre would not have been committed with legally obtained firearms. That much I know for sure.


This is the court order I'm talking about:


http://i86.photobucket.com/albums/k8...courtorder.gif

A profiecient rifleman will make any of the above mentioned firearms a deadly weapon in his/her hands.

Could you elaborate a little more on how Frances' system works?

eg. what form does one fill out, what crimes or conditions exactly would forbid a person from being allowed to possess firearms, and do you have a registration/licensing process?


Here in the U.S., in order to procure a firearm you must:

-Be 18 years old to purchase shotguns or rifles from an FFL dealer
-Be 21 years of age to purchase pistols from an FFL dealer
-Not be a convicted felon (committed any violent crimes or grand larceny that would be deemed a felony) unless your record has been cleared and the felony struck from your records.
-Not have been adjudicated mentally insane (unless your record has been cleared and the adjuciation struck from your record)
-Not be an illegal immigrant
-Not be a fugitive from justice
-Not have a restraining order or indictment of domestic voilence against you

You fill out a form called a 4473 which affirms all of the above and declares that you're the person buying the firearm and provide information that will correctly identify you.

Once you fill out the form, I call teh National Instant Check System and play "mother may...." with the FBI for about 2 minutes than you're either cleared to buy the gun or I tell you "there's a delay in the system please wait about 15 minutes" and wait for the cops to arrive. (smile):D

http://i86.photobucket.com/albums/k8...th000_0044.jpg


The whole process takes less than 15 minutes.....unless you want a Class III firearm, that takes about 60 days. Because god forbid that I would take a machinegun costing $25,000 to $30,000 to the local subway restraunt and start a massacre there, it'd be even MORE dangerous if I had a sound supressor mounted on it!!

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Yahoshua, you have a FFL? It takes 15 minutes to do a name check via NCIS? Wow (not being sarcastic) it took me 60 days to get cleared by both ICE (INS) and the FBI to be elgible for a foriegn adoption. That escapes logic, and I support concealed carry laws.

I'm a trained gunsmith but when I run out of things to do I become part-time register-jockey and process 4473s' for customers.

But no I don't have an FFL per se, the business (the building itself to be specific) has an FFL.

It takes about 5 minutes to fill out the form, 2 minutes for me to make the phone call, and the other 8 minutes to talk to the customer and give him basic firearm safety instruction, ring out the purchase and tell him to have a nice day.

If you have a concealed carry license I don't even have to call the NICS center to have you checked!! The background check for Concealed Weapons Permits are very thorough and if you get even a couple of minor infractions like a single speeding ticket (seems a bit harsh) within the last 5 years you can't get one.

I completely understand your surprise at how quickly these things move in comparison to being cleared for adoptions, but that's beareaucracy for ya. Like I can purchase an AR-15, I can repair full-auto machine guns, do quick jobs for local Law Enforcement Officers, and play with sound supressors but god forbid that I try to purchase a pistol or buy a beer (I'm 20 btw).

The logic behind all of the above escapes me too but oh well.

I notice your avatar says you live in Chicago, you've been a LEO there for a long time I take it?

That is true, but military arms primary function is designed to mame, not kill at range. It is a harder task with anything military. A hunting rifle however has one and only one purpose - kill so you can drag the meat home.

-S

Depends on the military rifle in question.

Eugene Stoner designed the XM-15 to wound and therefore take 3 men out of the battle at once (one wounded, two men to drag you out and fix you) and to clog the rear logistics areas.

Mikhail Kalishnikov designed the AK-47 so a chimpanzee could use and maintain the rifle in the field and still perform it's job (killing enemy soldiers).

So it kinda varies (on a shallow range that is) of what the arms' designed purpose actually is, but then I'd just be splitting hairs on a regular basis (that gets old FAST).

You missed the fact that the Geneva convention requires rifles be designed like this. They are designed purposely not to kill - AS a requirement! Enemies like it for the 3 man rule, and combatants like it because they probably won't be killed.

This is not by accident they are not designed to kill.

Problem is, Stoners XM-15 has a habit of killing at short range to to massive internal damage done by a fragmenting bullet when fired from 14.5" barrels or longer. This was by accident.

At any sort of range however, the AR-15 / M-16 performs as designed and will mame instead of kill as intended.

-S

PS. The AK-47 does a much better job at short range than the AR-15/M-16 - entering and exiting like a small calibre weapon with minimum damage.

PPS. Statistics show that crazies that enter a shopping mall toting a 12 guage loaded with buck shot, you've got a less than 30% of survival rate if hit. If these same crazies enter with an AK-47, your chances are 76% even when hit multiple times. You take your pick.

Is there a lever for "None of the above" ?

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I wish. Though life is all about 'chances and circumstance'. You are dealt the cards you get. Somehow, all card decks are dealt evenly - each and every last person on this planet has a problem of some sort that eats at them. This can be family, money, happiness, moral choices, you name it - but all are equally difficult to overcome. In the end, we are all equal and the same.

-S

But hey, we lived this long in our lives.......don't we at least get a cookie for effort?

Very true. And as they say 'we come into this world with nothing, and we leave with nothing".

Of those hangings, in your estimation what percentage of them were suicide and what percentage were accidental (autoerotic asphyxia)?

I am sorry about your loss of your co-worker dying in the performance of duty.

Law Enforcement Officers seldom get the appreciation they deserve.

No medals, no parades, but every day they are out there protecting us.

I am deeply grateful for our LE professionals.

Thank you for your service to our country and society.