Monday, November 16, 2015

How Gun Traffickers Get Around State Gun Laws

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NYT

In California, some gun smugglers use FedEx. In Chicago, smugglers drive just across the state line into Indiana, buy a gun and drive back. In Orlando, Fla., smugglers have been known to fill a $500 car with guns and send it on a ship to crime rings in Puerto Rico.

In response to mass shootings in the last few years, more than 20 states, including some of the nation’s biggest, have passed new laws restricting how people can buy and carry guns. Yet the effect of those laws has been significantly diluted by a thriving underground market for firearms brought from states with few restrictions.

About 50,000 guns are found to be diverted to criminals across state lines every year, federal data shows, and many more are likely to cross state lines undetected.

In New York and New Jersey, which have some of the strictest laws in the country, more than two-thirds of guns tied to criminal activity were traced to out-of-state purchases in 2014. Many were brought in via the so-called Iron Pipeline, made up of Interstate 95 and its tributary highways, from Southern states with weaker gun laws, like Virginia, Georgia and Florida.

16 comments:

  1. You're right. It is obvious that gun control hasn't worked.

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    1. What we have, the mish-mash of some weak, some strong and some non-existent laws, doesn't work and arguably cannot be called gun control.

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    2. By the way, notice the big red arrow indicating the gun flow from Indiana to Chicago?, the one that you always say has nothing to do with anything?

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    3. MikeB: “the one that you always say has nothing to do with anything?”

      What? Are you making up stuff that I supposedly said again? Look, I don’t deny that Chicago has a lot of guns, and that those guns come from outside of Chicago. Considering that Chicago banned gun dealers, I’d be an idiot to think Chicago’s guns originated in Chicago. I’ve also been pretty damn clear that gun control is useless, so why would I ever suggest that Chicago’s laws somehow stop guns from coming in? Oscillating 180 degrees on a position is your bag, not mine.

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    4. MikeB: "What we have, the mish-mash of some weak, some strong and some non-existent laws, doesn't work and arguably cannot be called gun control."

      Why do we argue so much, Mike? I think our gun laws are useless, you think they are nearly useless. We’re not off my much.

      Again I must point out that you are saying what we have “doesn’t work”, yet you happily ask for more of the same. You have no problems with Chicago keeping their “strong” gun laws even though they don’t work, and you advocate for other cities to go full-chicago despite there still being a mish-mash that doesn’t work. You also advocate for states to keep adopting the same policies that haven’t worked for other states. All this will do is screw over good gun owners. Is that all you care about?

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    5. "yet you happily ask for more of the same. "

      Do you really think that what I call proper gun control is "more of the same?"

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    6. You support just about every piece of gun control proposed at the national, state, and local levels, even though it is way short of what you call "proper gun control". One more state proposing banning magazines that hold more than 10 rounds is more of the same. We've done that. It just expands the definition of criminal without actually reducing any violent crime or death. Like you said it is a "mish-mash" that "doesn't work and arguably cannot be called gun control." So why do you support more of the same?

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    7. Two reasons. because more of the same is moving us in the right direction and to do nothing is obviously not working.

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  2. I'm wondering what it is about reporters that keeps them from keeping up with events. After all, it IS their job.

    "Some larger traffickers use more elaborate techniques. Buying a gun in Puerto Rico requires an expensive permit and a lengthy application process, but Florida has no such restrictions."

    Actually, since June Puerto Rico, which had an even higher homicide rate than DC, now has none of the restrictions the article mentions. In fact, they now are even more liberal than Florida since they now have Constitutional carry. It will be interesting to see where crime rates move as a result on this change.
    As for Illinois, the majority of the guns seem to be magically drawn to Chicago. Perhaps a start to finding a solution to Chicago's violent crime problem could be found if they followed the example of the city of Baltimore. They fired their Chief of Police.

    "The Baltimore mayor fired the troubled city's police commissioner Wednesday, saying that a recent spike in homicides weeks after an unarmed black man died of injuries in police custody required a change in leadership."

    http://www.foxnews.com/us/2015/07/08/baltimore-mayor-fires-police-commissioner/

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    1. About Puerto Rico, does Constitutional carry render a place more lenient? Aren't there a number of other aspects of the law to consider, for example, SYG?

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    2. About Puerto Rico, does Constitutional carry render a place more lenient? Aren't there a number of other aspects of the law to consider, for example, SYG?

      I would consider SYG to be pretty small potatoes (microscopic potatoes, perhaps), compared to Constitutional carry.

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    3. Prior to the court ruling their laws were on par with New Jersey and Hawaii from what I've seen. However, it didn't seem to have an effect on the homicide rate of 19.2 per 100k which was actually higher that DC's rate of 15.9 per 100k.

      https://www.fbi.gov/about-us/cjis/ucr/crime-in-the-u.s/2014/crime-in-the-u.s.-2014/tables/table-5

      Here is what Puerto Rico looked like prior to June,

      "Prior to this ruling, a person had to be 21 to get a weapons license along with several other requirements. A person was required to present a sworn statement attesting to compliance with fiscal laws, purchase a $100 internal revenue stamp, submit 3 statements from community members who aren't related to them attesting to their good reputation, submit a signed application that is notarized, be fingerprinted and photographed, and submit a negative certificate of debt to the child support administration. That process was just to be able to purchase firearms to store in a residence or business and not for a concealed carry permit. In order to acquire a concealed carry permit a person had to first have a Target shooting license and then appear before a Judge and present proof of a strong reason for a permit. Due to this process, in many cases concealed carry permit applications were denied. As such Puerto Rico was considered to be an effective "No Issue" territory for concealed carry permits except for in exceptional cases despite the official "may issue" policy."

      https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gun_laws_in_Puerto_Rico

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    4. Using facts from an area that isn't even a State of the United States. Tell us about the gun laws in Costa Rica, or Cuba. Laughable.

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    5. "Using facts from an area that isn't even a State of the United States."

      Well Anon, I haven't heard anyone else criticizing the authors of the article for using Puerto Rico. But then, they're use of it supports your side of the issue. I was just pointing out that they are using old data.
      And Mike asked a cogent question in regards to it. You however seem to use this argument that it negates the credibility of my data would equally do so to what was talked about in the article.
      And as for the Puerto Rico isn't a state thing, an argument you also like to rely on to discredit the high crime rates of DC, perhaps we should keep in mind that for some reason the FBI chooses to include both when listing violent crime statistics by state,

      https://www.fbi.gov/about-us/cjis/ucr/crime-in-the-u.s/2014/crime-in-the-u.s.-2014/tables/table-5

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  3. 50,000 of 350,000,000 or 1 in 7,000 so what?

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  4. The right to a gun is a federal right. The feds should have all say on any restrictions on guns. All States should have to follow federal gun laws and rules.

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