WPost: Va. data show drop in criminal firepower during assault gun ban

[RamboLiberal]

The number of guns with high-capacity magazines seized by Virginia police dropped during a decade-long federal prohibition on assault weapons, but the rate has rebounded sharply since the ban was lifted in late 2004, according to a Washington Post analysis.

More than 15,000 guns equipped with high-capacity magazines - defined under the lapsed federal law as holding 11 or more bullets - have been seized by Virginia police in a wide range of investigations since 1993, the data show.

The role of high-capacity magazines in gun crime was thrust into the national spotlight two weeks ago when 22-year-old Jared Lee Loughner allegedly opened fire with a semiautomatic handgun outside a Tucson grocery store, killing six and wounding 13, including Rep. Gabrielle Giffords (D-Ariz.). Authorities say Loughner used a legally purchased 9mm Glock 19 handgun with a 31-round clip and was tackled while changing magazines.

Of the seized Virginia weapons, 2,000 had magazines with a capacity of 30 or more bullets. Some states still limit magazine capacity. California, for example, limits them to 10 and Maryland to 20.

Last year in Virginia, guns with high-capacity magazines amounted to 22 percent of the weapons recovered and reported by police. In 2004, when the ban expired, the rate had reached a low of 10 percent. In each year since then, the rate has gone up.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2011/01/22/AR2011012203452.html

Bursts of gunfire
High-profile mass shootings in the United States involving high-capacity magazines:
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/graphic/2011/01/23/GR2011012300266.html?sid=ST2010121406431

[krispos42]

1. Yet homicide rates have continued to drop.

Reality does not match potential.

[sharesunited]

6. Smoothing the curve seems to be your specialty.

A half dozen deaths here and there, but look at the overall trend!

Teardrops into an ocean.

[krispos42]

7. Let's face it; with you it will never NOT be a major problem.

We could drop down to 1,000 homicides a year, but if 15 of those homicides were in a mass shooting, oh lawdy lawdy, when will we get sick of the bloodshed and gun culture and unregistered firearms and magazines that hold more than ___ bullets!

[mwrguy]

18. "oh lawdy lawdy"?

What kind of racist crap is that?

[krispos42]

23. I don't know... what kind of racist crap is it?

I haven't read Huckleberry Finn in a couple of decades.

[shadowrider]

27. Sounds like a slam against older southern white women to me

Who say that all the time.

Wait, that's not the racism you meant?

:crazy:

[old mark]

2. Sorry, but I don't beileve the WaPo about anything. FWIW, the

"Assault Gun Ban" was different from the hicap magazine ban, and actually banned import of rifles that had features that seemed overly military, such as a bayonet lug. According to the FBI data on violent crime, released each year, the number of rifles of all types used in crime in the US is so small as to be insignificant, and the "ban" in istelf did absolutely nothing to reduce crime, violence or death...it just increased cost of the rifles already here and those imported with the "evil" features removed.

FWIW again, there is no such thing as an "assault gun", and the term "assault wearon" has a specific meaning, which includes the ability of the weapon to fire in full automatic mode. It has been illegal to import such weapons for many years and still is. It has been illegal for US citizens without special federal license to own ANY full auto capable weapon since 1936.

mark

[X_Digger]

3. Yet the Clinton DOJ could find no credible drop in crimes committed using them..

http://www.sas.upenn.edu/jerrylee/research/aw_final2004.pdf

Should it be renewed, the ban’s effects on gun violence are likely to be small at best and perhaps too small for reliable measurement. AWs were rarely used in gun crimes even before the ban. LCMs are involved in a more substantial share of gun crimes, but it is not clear how often the outcomes of gun attacks depend on the ability of offenders to fire more than ten shots (the current magazine capacity limit) without reloading.

[kestrel91316]

4. uh oh

:popcorn:

[lawodevolution]

5. So they cherrypicked Virginia because the data matched their pre written conclusions

I want to see the data on the other 49 states.

[thereismore]

9. Me too. But you also seem to be making some conclusions based on no data... nt

[Hoyt]

8. Gun Forum spin should be wild with more studies like this and a few more massacres.

The gun proliferation crowd likes to quote "data" to obsfucate things and impede reasonable gun controls -- now let's hear/read what they have to say.

Until you guys settle down, it might be good idea to leave em at home.

[benEzra]

25. FBI UCR, Table 20, Murder by State and Type of Weapon

http://www2.fbi.gov/ucr/cius2009/data/table_20.html

Total murders...........................13,636.....100.00%
Handguns.................................6,452......47.32%
Firearms (type unknown)..................1,928......14.14%
Other weapons (non-firearm, non-edged)...1,864......13.67%
Edged weapons............................1,825......13.38%
Hands, feet, etc...........................801.......5.87%
Shotguns...................................418.......3.07%
Rifles.....................................348.......2.55%

Tell me again how modern-looking rifles with handgrips and magazines that stick out are such a sky-is-falling problem.

The 5-year trend 2005-2009, from the FBI UCR:

2005: 442
2006: 436
2007: 450
2008: 375
2009: 348

The U.S. murder rate has declined by half since the 1980's, even as lawful gun ownership has increased, and ownership has shifted toward more lower-powered, higher-capacity firearms. The U.S. murder rate now stands at its lowest level since the 1960's.

[Flyboy_451]

10. a few thoughts...

Keep in mind that they are defining high capacity as any magazine that holds more than ten rounds. This includes magazines that are nothing more than "Standard capacity" in many firearms. Almost any double stack magazine designed to fit flush to the bottom of the grip, will hold more than ten rounds. While the ban was in effect, manufacturers employed various methods to reduce the number of rounds that these standard capacity mags would hold. They are no longer doing so as a result of the ban having expired. Could it be that more "high capacity" magazines, that are truly "standard capacity" are being seized? hmm...

This article has all the look of being written to incite fear, anger, or some other emotional response, rather than to be truly informative. I guess journalistic integrity is not high on the list of requirements at The Washington Post. It truly is sad that this is what many would call news reporting. It is little more than propagating misinformation for an intended effect.

JW

[RamboLiberal]

17. +1 - I think that is exactly what is happening

During the ban if you bought a new gun it came with the 10 round magazine and if your gun could use a higher capacity magazine ala what LEO's got you had to buy it aftermarket. Most criminals aren't going to that trouble.

Now unless you are in one of the few states that only allow 10 round magazines your handgun will now come with a standard capacity magazine just like LEO's get whether it is 6, 10, 13, 15, 17, etc capacity. It will be what your firearm is designed for.

So it only makes sense criminals getting after ban expired are getting the same magazines the rest of the public are getting legally whether the criminal bought it legally, straw purchase, stolen, whatever.

That's why the WPost analysis is so flawed.

[Straw Man]

11. It makes sense that...

...with fewer in the pipeline, sooner or later the scarcity would show up on the wrong side of the law.

All this suggests to me is that criminals were not willing to spend the extra money and effort to get the the pre-ban full-capacity magazines because those aren't necessary for holding up convenience stores or assassinating rival drug dealers.

Crime stats are the truer test of efficacy.

[beevul]

12. A dishonest attempt to set the narrative.

Nothing more.

[X_Digger]

13. *nod* You'll notice it doesn't say 'more shots fired' or 'more victims'..

Merely that there were more of an arbitrarily defined sized magazine seized.

Not actual impact on crimes committed, or the lethality of crime over the same time period.


It's like saying "because we banned red sports cars, there were fewer red sports cars on the streets!" -- it doesn't cover the rate of accidents, or the number of injuries via other sports cars.

Tautalogical balderdash.

[beevul]

14. That is exactly what I'm talking about.

"Merely that there were more of an arbitrarily defined sized magazine seized."

That is exactly what I'm talking about.

It goes farther than that though.

An attempt is being made to define in the hearts and minds of Americans, the meaning of "high capacity".

Nevermind that "standard capacity" (flush fit mags) does have a definition, based on fact.


They're trying to play the shell game here.

[Euromutt]

24. In addition, note also the examples cited

The Post found that 200 guns with high-capacity magazines figured in Virginia homicides, including these incidents:

* In Richmond in 2003, Michael Antoine Wilson, 21, used his semiautomatic rifle with its 30-round magazine to shoot his 17-year-old girlfriend to death in front of children and relatives. Then he went to a nearby convenience store, killed two workers and stole a van before turning the gun on himself.

* In Roanoke in 2004, Marcus Jerome Nance, 22, used his legally purchased 9mm Glock 17 handgun with a high-capacity magazine to spray 33 bullets into a crowd that had gathered outside a Roanoke gas station after a nightclub closing, killing one and wounding two.

* In Newport News last year, Antonio Johnson, 34, began shooting at police during a traffic stop with a 9mm semiautomatic handgun outfitted with a 15-round magazine. "Subject shot police officer and then killed himself with weapon," state records say.

I think it's fair to assume the WaPo writers used the most severe incidents they could find, and yet, in all three incidents presented, there is absolutely no reason why it wouldn't have been physically possible to inflict the same amount of injury with a firearm equipped with a mag holding ten rounds or fewer.

And geez, while I don't want to trivialize the harm done, when 33 rounds are fired but only three people are hit, the guy was hardly "spraying bullets into a crowd"; he was, at worst, spraying bullets in the general direction of the crowd. Talk about sensationalist language.

[Callisto32]

26. Who do you think you are?

Using ANALOGIES to discuss firearms policy. We (all us REAL Democrats) all know that guns are totally different from EVERYTHING else on the planet and no fair comparison can be made to any other tool or situation.

SHAME ON JOO!!1!

[virginia mountainman]

15. LOL Talk about cherry picking data!!

Gun control in Virginia has been getting weaker and weaker EVERY YEAR since the mid 1990's...

We have had CCW, State wide open carry, state wide preemption, and a very good "self defense" law among other very good changes to Virginia Gun Laws since then... I know, I have been busting my butt to CHANGE THEM myself.

I wonder if they took THAT into account???

[Doctor_J]

16. Impossible! We all know that gun laws only take guns from law-abiding

citizens!!!!

And Fox News is Fair and Balanced, too!!!!

[friendly_iconoclast]

19. Are you familiar with the term "sampling error"?

[aikoaiko]

20. But about the same on average....

Really, this is understandable and predictable given that many normal, standard capacity magazines would be considered the evil high capacity type that are no good but for killing lots of people indiscriminately.

[Kennah]

21. So the threat of 5 years in jail ...

... for illegally possessing a banned high capacity magazine is so much scarier than the penalties for committing murder or attempted murder?

Really?

[benEzra]

22. Since those guns and those magazines *WEREN'T BANNED* 1994-2004,

I suspect that other factors were at work here.

BTW, that chart is full of crap. The Federal "assault weapons" ban only banned manufacture of new over-10-round magazines for the civilian market; it did not ban sale of over-10-rounders and it did not ban possession of over-10-rounders, and more were probably sold 1994-2004 than in all the decades prior, as a direct result of the ill-advised law.

Sec. 110103(a)(w)(2) and (4) of the Violent Crime Control and Law Enforcement Act of 1994 completely and unconditionally exempted the entire extant worldwide stockpile of 30-round magazines from the ban, with no restrictions whatsoever, as of the date of enactment. As a result, the 1994 law did not, in fact, ban the purchase of 30-round magazines; it paradoxically encouraged such purchases 1994-2004.

When it was clear that the law had a good chance of passing, manufacturers ramped up and produced several decades' supply prior to the ban's enactment, so that after the initial buying spree wore off, there were few shortages that I can recall. Purchase of 15- and 30-round magazines was just as legal (and probably just as common) as purchase of 10-round magazines, and unrestricted in any way.