What can be done to prevent criminals from obtaining firearms easily?

[Sfrandolph]

Choot 'em

 

[Tombs]

You simply cannot make laws because people break them...I know this sounds simple but it applies to every level of leadership, both private and public.

You make laws to have a grounds for prosecuting individuals for an act that deprives the rights of others.

Amazing how many laws we have now that weren't written with any concept of the purpose of law. Especially how many of them are just considered tax evasion, to snag people on a technicality.

You can't make laws to stop a crime, this is the point. It's solely a means to prevent the individual from committing more crime. Innocent until proven guilty, does it ring a bell?

Apparently now days, people have this illusion that laws can prevent crime... Worse yet, they write laws with the intent of it preventing a crime. To do so, you must consider everyone guilty until proven innocent, which is a violation of everything this country stands for.

 

[Trooper]

You make laws to have a grounds for prosecuting individuals for an act that deprives the rights of others.

Amazing how many laws we have now that weren't written with any concept of the purpose of law. Especially how many of them are just considered tax evasion, to snag people on a technicality.

You can't make laws to stop a crime, this is the point. It's solely a means to prevent the individual from committing more crime. Innocent until proven guilty, does it ring a bell?

Apparently now days, people have this illusion that laws can prevent crime... Worse yet, they write laws with the intent of it preventing a crime. To do so, you must consider everyone guilty until proven innocent, which is a violation of everything this country stands for.

Laws also give revenge to someone who was wronged.

 

[UncleMike]

As has been stated before.
Keep them in Prison for the FULL extent of their sentence.
Repeat offenders are a large part of crime in this country.
If a criminal knows that, without fail, they will be kept under lockdown for the full term of their sentence they may be less likely to repeat their stupidity since life behind bars would be a real possibility.

 

[Trooper]

As has been stated before.
Keep them in Prison for the FULL extent of their sentence.
Repeat offenders are a large part of crime in this country.
If a criminal knows that, without fail, they will be kept under lockdown for the full term of their sentence they may be less likely to repeat their stupidity since life behind bars would be a real possibility.

No, a felony should be five years to life. Anything less than a felony would be dealt with at the local level with a maximum of five years of supervision.

If you are judged to be a felon then you are not worth the trust of your fellow citizens. You have to prove to the rest of us that you can be trusted again. A felon would be supervised in degrees from near total freedom to supermax confinement. If it is determined that a felon could be trusted then he is given a bill of redemption and then made to go through the process of regaining citizenship (just as naturalized citizens do).

Many of our felonies should be misdomeaners, not felonies. That is why misdomeaners should be able to put them under supervision for up to five years.

 

[Birds Away]

Look its already illegal for felons to possess firearms, I'm not arguing that. This thread IS NOT about overturning this, its about POSSIBLY altering the way guns are transfered so easily. And that might be literally something as simple as looking at a DL or LTCH.

Now let me see...You say you have passed a bunch of laws but they haven't stopped people committing crimes with guns? You say the answer to this is to pass more laws? You want to know what laws should be added to the ones criminals ignore now? Hmm, I think I'm beginning to see the problem.

 

[raptrbreth]

Cut the trigger fingers off all felons.

 

[KoopaKGB]

Now let me see...You say you have passed a bunch of laws but they haven't stopped people committing crimes with guns? You say the answer to this is to pass more laws? You want to know what laws should be added to the ones criminals ignore now? Hmm, I think I'm beginning to see the problem.

I'm quoting this post ^ but others apply as well.

I just think that we as gunowners should be something of a community and police our own. We should CARE who we sell guns to. Some gun laws make sense, some don't. Take 922r for instance, what a silly law that probably a handful of people have been charged with violating. My 30 round AK is illegal if it's aftermarket pistol grip isnt American made?!
Now look at the way firearms are transfered to complete strangers daily. Strangers coming from Chicago looking for easy guns to buy up for other criminals, strangers that might have mental problems or are looking to score a gun to shoot up their school (statistically very rare indeed but every time makes the news, and makes gun owners look like the bad guys).

I feel like its safe to say folks with LTCH are "good to go" or even folks that are a part of this INGO community whom might be a stranger but are at least somehow established in some kind of familar way, in this case via a online forum... Folks that are your brother, sister, son, best friend, fellow competent gun owners, or other folks that you're comfortable around are folks that should be armed if the so choose. Mentally insane, violently criminal felons, those under 18, are all people in my opinion who should not own firearms at all. There are 300 million firearms in the country. We as gun guys (and gun gals) should strive to try and figure out what might help and what might hurt when it comes to who we tranfer firearms to. Thats all I'm suggesting that we come up with some sort of solution, rather then say "oh just lock every bad guy up and throw away the key" We as gun guys and gun gals are the gun custodians of America, you have a firearm that is manufactured from the factory, it is distributed to gun store where one of us good gun guys buys it. Owns it for awhile and wants to try out something else, so that do we do? Sell it to recoup some of the costs. And now its gone from a FFL transfer only world, to a world in which it is bought sold traded where the only rules are cash only.

We have the most lax gun laws in the world. We certainly don't have the most lax prision system in the world, yet poorly educated criminals are everywhere and thus we have the highest rates of gun violence of all the civilized nations combined. We have the right to protect ourselves with firearms. Thank God and the Framers for that. But to me it doesn't mean we should have unrestriced access of all firearms to every person with cash. If we're doing that then might as well put guns in vending machines or something similarly completely irresponsible.

 

[Kirk Freeman]

If we're doing that then might as well put guns in vending machines or something similarly completely irresponsible.

I got no problem with that.

Thats all I'm suggesting that we come up with some sort of solution

Punish those that abuse the right, just as we do with speech.

 

[KoopaKGB]

I got no problem with that.





Punish those that abuse the right, just as we do with speech.

I knew I wouldn't have been the first one to think of that. Oh man would that be a bad day if the machine ate your money and failed to drop the item.

 

[Bill of Rights]

John Hopkins or not, that report is erroneous from the first sentence, so it has ZERO validity. Just another anti-gunner propaganda piece, nothing more.

Sure, the Seller should take due care to whom he's selling a weapon. And, fine if they wanna make folks accountable for that.

Let's start with mandatory term limits for politicians and other elected positions, including Judges. 8 years total. No jumping from position to position, or community to community. They get 8 years and then out they go. NO appointed and / or permanent positions, including SCOTUS. 8 years.

So even if we have someone good in office and NO ONE good interested in taking over, we should still boot the good guy out? And if we have a bad one in office, if they're in their last term, where we have nothing to hold over their heads, too bad? Not to mention the removal of politics from the SCOTUS? The Founders had a great idea with doing the only Court they mentioned as a lifetime appointment. The fact is that the Justices *CAN* be impeached, if they violate their oath. I don't know the procedure, though; to my knowledge, it's never happened.

As some others noted, start REALLY cracking down on crimes. Someone convicted of using a gun to perpetrate a crime? Say, a mandatory 20 years. And mandatory MEANS 'mandatory'. No plea bargains, no time reduction for 'good behavior', no early parole nothing.

Convicted and someone was injured in that crime? Mandatory life sentence. And again, that means no parole.

Convicted and someone was killed in that crime? Mandatory death sentence. No automatic appeal, and requested appeals are limited to ONE. Their attorney gets ONE bite at the apple, and has 1 year, (365 days) from the date of convict, to make that appeal. The decision MUST be made within 15 months of conviction. Appeal fails? That death sentence is executed immediately at that point.

You have much more faith in our court system than I do. A conviction is not always the same thing as guilt.

That will move the system a long much, much, MUCH faster. And force those lazy-azzes in the court system to be on the ball, as well. And if the defense attorney loses, say 10 in a row? Disbarred permanently. If he / she is that bad of a lawyer, the system doesn't need them, anyway.

Great way to make lawyers not take a case, anyway.

Convicted of a major felony, violent or non-violent? Lose their right to gun possession permanently. Screw that 'they have the RIGHT!' malarkey. They gave up that right when they perpetrated a felony. And they lose that right in EVERY State, not just the State of conviction.

You do realize that "felony" is just a word, right? If the "felony" tag meant that it really was a heinous crime against a person, with a real, identifiable victim who actually suffered an irrevocable loss, I might agree with you. I've told the story before of a young woman I know who, as a distractable teenager, was munching on some corn chips as she walked through a store, talking with a friend. She had the folded up bag in her pocket as she left the store, and money to pay for it in another pocket. She offered to go back and pay for it, but the store in question had her arrested for felony theft, over a 99 cent bag of Doritos. Now... you did say "major felony", true, but there are many who would consider a thief a major felon. (Fortunately, the judge saw the facts and dismissed the case, which the prosecutor had bumped down to a misdemeanor conversion.)

If they don't like those rules, how about NOT committing a crime. I know people, and you do too, that have went their entire lives and NEVER perpetrated a felony. So, I have zero sympathy for those that CHOOSE to do so.

For those 'bleeding hearts' out there it probably sounds like we're not giving the criminal much of a 'second chance'. That's TRUE. But, did he / she give his / her VICTIMS a 'second chance' NOT to be victimized? Not in a single case. So, the felon GETS the same 'second chance' he / she GAVE. That's fair.

Now, start building those prisons!

I'm no bleeding heart. I don't want retribution, which you seem to be seeking. I want justice. The IN Constitution defines the purpose of imprisonment as being rehabilitation, not retribution. I'd agree with you that a known killer forfeits his own life, but I want a hell of an ironclad case in place before I give government that can't manage a dollar without spending $15 the authority to define who lives and who dies at their hands.

Blessings,
Bill

 

[Kirk Freeman]

Have you been in the Middle East? They sell all kinds of stuff in the airports there in vending machines.

1. There are 350 million firearms in the USA already.

2. The federal government cannot stop 11,000,000 illegal aliens from walking across the border to work and live there. Just go to any courthouse in Indiana and see the utter failure of the federal government. It parades before me every single day.

3. If you converted 11M illegal aliens to an equivalent weight of TT-33s or AK-47s that is hundreds of millions of guns. Next convert the weight of drugs shipped into the USA into an equivalent weight of AK-47s.

4. 3-D printing will soon allow any gun you so desire to be printed off.

5. Gun control has been an utter failure wherever it is tried.

6. Prior restraint is unconsitutional.

If you want to prevent mad dogs from shooting people, then abolish the laws that prevent people from arming themselves so they can shoot back.

If you are worried about criminals committing crime with arms, then as the Arkansas Supreme Court said the proper remedy is the gallows not depriving citizens of rights.

If you are worred about criminals, then shoot back.

If you are worred about mad dogs, then shoot back.

Like the remedy to bad speech, the remedy to bad guns is good guns.

 

[canav844]

It's not about keeping them from getting the guns it's about making it so there is nothing that they want to use them on. Russia and the US sat with Nukes for 40+ years, didn't use them once when MAD was the likely outcome, Prohibition lasted all of 13 years because all the criminals had all the booze they wanted and in the last 30 years they've clearly gotten all the drugs out of the hands of criminals.

I do believe that violent felons (not the parent with an LTCH that was carrying at work got a call johnny was sick and locked it in the glove box but parked on school property before picking up johnny, and got the D felony because someone saw it getting locked up) can be imposed a sanction of being denied ownership, and additional sentencing enhancements to future crimes if a weapon is used.

But the real answer is to make it so anyone looking to commit a crime, especially one with a gun knows that the majority of the people around them will turn and each individually offer a matching force. There's a reason not too many people try and hold up a patrol officer for the money in his wallet (and it's not because he is underpaid by the city). Make every target a hard target, make people aware of the realities, encourage them to increase their SA, encourage them to take steps toward self defense and the defense of others, and allow firearm ownership for that purpose be common. Right now the prospect of owning a gun for purposes other than hunting, including self defense according to Joe Biden (who I think much of the American public is so indoctrinated by the MSM, the will trust him on this) is a taboo within the gun community. We need people to understand the routine activities theory and stop creating thousands of high value unprotected targets every single day, and expect that criminals won't exploit that.

[ame]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Vt7FDTpzGvo[/ame]

 

[KoopaKGB]

Have you been in the Middle East? They sell all kinds of stuff in the airports there in vending machines. .

Yes been to the middle east but never been through a civilian airport.

2. The federal government cannot stop 11,000,000 illegal aliens from walking across the border to work and live there. Just go to any courthouse in Indiana and see the utter failure of the federal government. It parades before me every single day.

Thats kinda my point, we've got all these undesirable folks living amongst us, say criminals, illegal aliens, mentally deranged that SHOULDN'T have firearms. Yet it is silly easy to obtain one, all one needs in this country is some cash. Unless you're trying to get one thru an FFL in which case you need a valid ID and a clean record. If a man told you he was a convicted felon would you sell him a gun? I think most of us here wouldn't. Is it because its the law? Or because we think its a bad idea for bad guys to own guns?

4. 3-D printing will soon allow any gun you so desire to be printed off.
.

So because some folks can file down sears, and convert semi auto guns to machineguns there should be no laws on the books about illegal machineguns? Or put another way, building bombs are illegal, yet the knowledge to build one using hardware store supplies is easily obtainable, so there should be absolutely no laws restricting bomb making?

If you want to prevent mad dogs from shooting people, then abolish the laws that prevent people from arming themselves so they can shoot back.
.

I agree GFZ are terrible ideas.

Right now the prospect of owning a gun for purposes other than hunting, including self defense according to Joe Biden (who I think much of the American public is so indoctrinated by the MSM, the will trust him on this) is a taboo within the gun community.

I disagree, I think self defense use with a firearm isn't Taboo in the gun community. Just check out the magazine racks at book shops or wherever. The vibe I get when I walk thru a magazine rack at a grocery store is not that self defense is Taboo. Look at all the firearms publications with big lettering on the front saying "Best pocket size powerhouses for self defense" or "DON'T BE A VICTIM stop violent attacks with such and such weapon" flipping thru my American Rifleman magazine seeing ads like "the guy with the laser survived" and "dont let your family be a statistic" with pictures of a man standing in front of his family with gun drawn. Articles titled "What you need to do after a self defense shooting has occured." and bunch of other types of articles are geared exactly for self defense. Def not a Taboo subject within the gun community. Heck we talk about it all the time on INGO and nobody is shocked. I own several firearms specifically FOR self defense, and let family, friends, co workers know it and talk about the use of a firearm for self defense all the time.