Automatically charging hunters who accidentally shoot another person will do nothing to reduce the number of deaths, a firearms expert says.I'm not sure what they would call the incredible rationale in New Zealand, maybe bullocks or shite, or something like that. Around here we call it self-serving bullshit.
And moves to make the hunting party as responsible as the shooter is just as problematic, says the Hamilton lawyer of a man accused of such a killing.
The recommendations were among a raft of measures proposed by Coroner Wallace Bain yesterday in his finding on the death of Lower Hutt school teacher Rosemary Ives.
Ives was accidentally shot by Hamilton man Andrew Mears, who was spotlighting with a group of friends. He shot her in Kaimanawa Forest Park near Turangi in 2010 after mistaking her head-lamp for deer's eyes as she was brushing her teeth at a campsite.
He was charged with manslaughter and served 11 months of a two-year jail term. Three others in his hunting party pleaded guilty to breaching their hunting permits by hunting after dark, and on Conservation Department land, and were fined $2500 each.
Not only should the shooter be held responsible for violating the 4 Rules of Gun Safety, but a comprehensive program of One Strike You're Out should be in effect.
The guys who are so irresponsible as to shoot and kill someone in the woods like this guy did are the same guys who drop their guns and have negligent discharges. They're the same ones who brandish their guns in traffic and drink too much. They demonstrate over and over again how unfit they are. The gun right's crowd would have us think they're all first time offenders.
I don't believe it. How about you?
Please leave a comment.
Mikeb, New Zealand has most of the gun control that you want.
ReplyDelete