Harm reduction

Common-sense gun-control measures will save lives

On May 7, 20-year-old Gerard Wynn became the latest victim of gun violence in Boston when he was fatally shot while arguing with his killer over a fender-bender the two had been involved in more than a month before. Outrage over thousands of such senseless deaths -- as well as high-profile killings such as those at the Jewish Community Day Care center in Granada Hills, California, last August -- prompted a response last Sunday: the convergence of hundreds of thousands of mothers on the Mall in Washington to advocate for national handgun-control measures.

These measures are desperately needed. Wynn's homicide brought the number of shooting deaths in Boston this year to 12. Last year, 19 people died of gunfire in Boston. Since 1990, 483 people have been shot to death in this city, according to the Boston Police Department. Nationally, 32,436 people were killed by firearms in 1997. This includes deaths from intentional homicide, suicide, police shootings, and accidental shootings, according to data from the National Center for Health Statistics compiled by the Washington-based advocacy group Handgun Control, Inc.

It gets worse. There are approximately 65 million privately owned handguns in the United States, presumably retained for self-defense. But in 1998, when 7361 handgun murders were committed, there were only 148 instances of justifiable handgun homicide -- the killing of a felon either by a police officer in the line of duty or by a private citizen while a felony was being committed. In the meantime, households with guns are five times more likely to be the site of a suicide than households without guns. And every day the United States sees more than 11 people under the age of 20 die from bullet wounds -- be they self-inflicted, accidental, or inflicted by another. For every young person who is killed, four others are wounded.

Much can be done to prevent some of these deaths. Surely a country that's figured out how to keep children from opening bottles of aspirin can get gun manufacturers to install child-safety locks on firearms. Yet Massachusetts and Maryland are the only states that have enacted legislation requiring safety locks. In addition, Congress should bring back the mandated waiting period it let expire in November 1998. Law-enforcement officials need time to conduct background checks on gun buyers. Waiting periods also deter impulse gun purchases that lead to suicides or crimes of passion.

Handgun purchases should be restricted to one weapon per person per month. Just four states -- Virginia, Maryland, South Carolina, and California -- have placed such limits on the number of handguns that can be bought at one time. And yet it's easy to see the benefits of this law: it prevents people without criminal records from purchasing handguns and reselling them to those who are restricted from buying them. This legislation doesn't affect other firearms, such as rifles used in hunting.

But surely the most efficient method of gun control would be gun registration and gun-owner licensing -- a system like the one we use to regulate cars and car owners. "We should have a system in place that makes sure you know how to properly store your gun, how to transport it, the legal ramifications of gun ownership -- when can I use it in self-defense legally?" says Nancy Hwa, spokeswoman for the Washington-based Center To Prevent Handgun Violence. "Gun owners have to know the rules."

Yet the National Rifle Association is fiercely opposed to any such measure -- particularly the registration of gun owners and guns. Such measures won't make a bit of difference, according to the powerful gun lobby, because the only people who will follow through with them will be the law-abiding ones. Besides which, as the bumper sticker says, guns don't kill people; people do.

But consider just a few more statistics. According to figures from the Department of Justice and foreign law-enforcement agencies, compiled by Handgun Control, Inc., just two New Zealanders were murdered with firearms in 1996. In Australia, there were 13 gun-related homicides. Japan saw 15; Great Britain, 30; Canada, 106; and Germany, 213. The number of homicides committed with guns that same year in the United States? An astounding 9390.

The difference? Other countries make it extremely difficult to obtain handguns. Without national background checking, gun registration, or gun-owner licensing in place, it's much easier to obtain firearms in the United States than anywhere else in the world. It's possible that gun registration and gun-ownership licensing regulations would have saved Gerard Wynn. If his killer hadn't had a gun with him when the two argued, Wynn would probably be recovering from a broken nose today and not dead of a bullet through his chest.

What do you think? Send an e-mail to letters[a]phx.com.