Gun Crime Study: 10 States Sell Half Of Imported Guns Used In Crimes

WASHINGTON — Nearly half of the guns that crossed state lines and were used in crimes in 2009 were sold in just 10 states, according to a report being released Monday by a mayors' group.

Those states accounted for nearly 21,000 guns connected to crimes in other states, said the survey by Mayors Against Illegal Guns, an association of more than 500 mayors led by New York's Michael Bloomberg and Boston's Thomas Menino.

The Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives traced more than 145,000 guns used in crimes in 2009 and found that more than 43,000 of those weapons were sold in other states.

Forty-nine percent of those guns were sold in Georgia, Florida, Virginia, Texas, Indiana, Ohio, Pennsylvania, North Carolina, California or Arizona.

States were also ranked by the number of crime guns exported per 100,000 inhabitants. Mississippi led that list, followed by West Virginia, Kentucky, Alaska, Alabama, South Carolina, Virginia, Indiana, Nevada and Georgia.

Those states, the report said, have more relaxed gun laws, suggesting that "criminals and gun traffickers may favor certain states as the sources of guns."

For example, in states that do not require background checks for handgun sales at gun shows, the crime-gun export rate was two-and-a-half times as much as the rate in states that do require such checks.

___

Online:

http://www.mayorsagainstillegalguns.org/

Comments

[Just4]

03:32 PM on 10/06/2010

I'm still waiting to see how California, with their strict gun sales laws, could be in the top 10 "crime gun" exporters for the last four years?

[barefoot2626]

01:20 PM on 10/07/2010

California has 37 million people (37,000,000). Wyoming has 600,000 people.

You can't figure this out?  Really?

[Just4]

04:02 PM on 10/07/2010

That's all fine and well but if California's laws are so great then why do they have any stats at all?

[barefoot2626]

09:00 PM on 10/05/2010

There is no standardization in California regarding this criteria. Jewish, Mormon, or Muslim? A sheriff could deny a permit based on that alone.

Shameless lies.  Still waiting for proof.

[OdinsEye]

09:24 PM on 10/05/2010

You have already been provided cites for Calif. law and a court case where a person may have been denied a permit due to sexual orientation as well as a case in another state with similar CCW laws where a person was denied based on their political speech. Basically, at this point, you are just sticking your head in the sand.

[barefoot2626]

09:42 PM on 10/05/2010

You have already been provided cites for Calif. law

blah blah blah...

NAME OF THE PERSON WHO WAS DENIED THE PERMIT AND NAME OF THE SHERIFF WHO DENIED IT.

[OdinsEye]

12:38 AM on 10/06/2010

BTW, I found something a few minutes ago that you might want to read : http://old.californiaccw.org/files/sf-chronicle-article.htm

[JoeLeland]

12:10 PM on 10/05/2010

Quit debating a law and right that has served us well for two centuries.
Learn how to operate the tool safely.

[barefoot2626]

01:06 PM on 10/05/2010

Quit debating a law and right that has served us well for two centuries

Firearms deaths average 31,000+.

You do not have the right to sell firearms to anyone you please.

[grossmont328]

04:28 PM on 10/05/2010

barefool--no one claims an unlimited right--you really need to learn how to debate

[JoeLeland]

12:05 PM on 10/05/2010

My nephew an I have the best time, at target practice and fishing. :^) It's the Law.

[JoeLeland]

11:58 AM on 10/05/2010

Same old rhetoric and cooked up statistics.
Fact is , I am the 1 st. responder and provider of security for my family and loved ones, not the police or my neighbor. That being said I am, by law, assured the right to own and maintain the tools to do so. Mexico is my backyard.

[OdinsEye]

01:48 AM on 10/03/2010

I also note that in several of the ten areas of law MAIG grades the states on, there are numerous errors, specifically in the areas of:

* Allows Criminal Penalties for Buying a Gun for Someone who Can't
* Allows Criminal Penalties for Buying a Gun with False Information
* Grants Law Enforcement Discretion in Issuing Concealed Carry Permits

[barefoot2626]

11:10 AM on 10/03/2010

How would you notice that there were errors when you can't post a thing that is true in your own posts?

[Old Jarhead]

12:21 PM on 10/03/2010

Personal attacks, again? And you wonder why people are rude to you? How about doing some thinking and actually refute the poster.

And from your earlier post, where you said I knew you served in the military before me, and were older that other posters had credited you for? I know nothing of the kind. I will give you the benefit of the doubt about that, as I have no idea of your age, or status of your military service. For all I know, you are a 14 y/o sitting in his bedroom thinking it is funny to insult everyone who happens to disagree with you. Not a very adult attitude.

[OdinsEye]

05:40 PM on 10/03/2010

Your personal attacks fail to refute me.

[OdinsEye]

01:35 AM on 10/03/2010

MAIG rates states based on 10 areas of law:

* Allows Criminal Penalties for Buying a Gun for Someone who Can't
* Allows Criminal Penalties for Buying a Gun with False Information
* Allows Criminal Penalties for Selling a Gun without a Proper Background Check
* Requires Background Checks for all Handgun Sales at Gun Shows
* Requires Purchase Permit for All Handgun Sales
* Grants Law Enforcement Discretion in Issuing Concealed Carry Permits
* Prohibits Violent Misdemeanor Criminals from Possessing Guns
* Requires Reporting Lost or Stolen Guns to Law Enforcement
* Allows Local Communities to Enact Gun Laws
* Allows Inspections of Gun Dealers

MAIG claims that the states with the weakest gun laws are the highest exporters per 100,000 inhabitants. But if you actually click through their interactive map, you'll quickly see that any such relationship is tenuous at best. Texas, for example, score a big 0 out of 10 for the MAIG Big 10 areas of firearm laws, yet it comes in below the national average of exports per 100,000 and many states which scored better in MAIG's Big 10 laws scored significantly worse in per capita exports than did Texas.

Oregon, for another example, scored 5 out of 10 on the MAIG Big 10 areas of firearm laws, yet is aproaching twice the per capita rate of exports as Texas and is over the national average. In fact several states score lower on the Big 10 areas of fiream laws and yet have fewer exports

[OldSFMJT]

03:02 PM on 10/01/2010

Way down-thread, DreamWeaver2nd wrote: “What are the "draconian restrictions" of which you allege? Name them.”

Recognizing that the rights to self-defense and to keep and bear arms are Constitutionally-guaranteed civil rights, here are a few of the restrictions that you and your fellow travelers support and that I find draconian (while I am speaking for myself, I think that many pro-rights folks here would be in general agreement with the list):

Any laws or regulations that are generally in the mold of the now-defunct Chicago and DC gun bans or the laws passed there in an effort to circumvent SCOTUS rulings

Any laws or regulations, such as waiting periods, that are found to be ineffective at reducing crime.

Any sort of scheme to register legally-owned firearms or firearms owners.

Any sort of scheme to license firearms ownership or possession.

Any laws or regulations that make the exercise on the above-mentioned civil rights inordinately difficult, cumbersome or costly. For example, if a law or regulation would be inappropriate when levied against the exercise of free speech or the right to vote, then it would be inappropriate when levied against the right to self defense or to keep & bear arms. All these rights are equivalent under the constitution and the natural law upon which it is based.

This brief list is by no means all-inclusive & is only my opinion.

Old SF MJT

[realpolitic]

01:54 AM on 10/03/2010

The Chicago and DC gun bans were "Draconian restrictions", you claim.  They were certainly not. They were knocked down by a 5 to 4 supreme court decision settled along partisan lines. Also, the mayors of the two cities and police chiefs supported the laws. You give new meaning to the term "Draconian."  The rest of the list shows how radical you gun zealots are and how far to the right of the American people and common sense.

[JimInHouston]

09:44 AM on 10/03/2010

"The Chicago and DC gun bans were "Draconian restrictions", you claim. They were certainly not. They were knocked down by a 5 to 4 supreme court decision settled along partisan lines. "

They were also supported by the majority of Constitutional scholarship, including the legendary Larry Tribe.

"Also, the mayors of the two cities and police chiefs supported the laws. "

Police chiefs are generally puppets for the mayors who choose them, so they don't count as having free opinions. The rank and file LEOs often disagree with them.

[OldSFMJT]

12:05 PM on 10/03/2010

The rights to self-defense and to keep and bear arms have a track record going all the way back to the founding of this nation. The right to keep & bear arms, in particular, has been upheld in numerous SCOTUS rulings long before the Heller & McDonald decisions you seem to regard so contemptuously. That a couple big-city mayors and their minions hold those rights in the same contempt as you means nothing. The law of the land holds differently.

By the way, what other Constitutionally-protected rights are just hunky-dory about ignoring? Radical? You want to see radical? Look in the mirror! Won't see much by way of common sense there, either!
Old SF MJT

[OdinsEye]

02:01 AM on 10/03/2010

Pretty decent list. I'd also add any law which holds firearm owners responsible for being the victims of crimes.

[Just4]

12:16 PM on 10/01/2010

Can someone from MAIG explain how certain types of gun laws (which remarkably coincide with gun control advocates’ wish lists) result in lower export rates given that correlation does not imply causation? Also please explain the California anomaly in these finding?

[RevJimIII]

04:28 PM on 10/01/2010

I am currently requesting clarification from my local mayor, who is a member of MAIG, on their specific stance on the 'terror gap' and other proposed regulations and how they are authorized.

[RevJimIII]

06:27 PM on 10/01/2010

My local mayor only pads her resume with 'feel good' memberships, is very ignorant of the actual agenda of MAIG, even found my comments and questions 'enlightening'.

[barefoot2626]

07:58 PM on 10/01/2010

Why don't you forward your comments you made here to Kitty  so she can judge for herself the context of exactly how 'enlightening' they were? Particularly where you say she is very ignorant and she is padding  her agenda?

Heck, I 'll do it for you, as a favor.

[DreamWeaver2nd]

06:25 PM on 09/30/2010

Why the Tiahrt Amendment?
Congressman Todd Tiahrt (R-KS)

Claim: “They [the ATF and FOP] asked Congressman Tiahrt to protect the integrity of trace data in 2003 and have supported retention of the Trace Data Language each year since.”

Fact: False. When the Tiahrt Amendment was first introduced in 2003,
Congressman Tiahrt explained his rationale for introducing these restrictions to the
The Washington Post, saying:

“I wanted to make sure I was fulfilling the needs of my friends who are firearms dealers.”

[Just4]

06:31 PM on 09/30/2010

That doesn't alter the fact the MAIG is trying to use faulty statistics and faulty logic to infringe a fundamental right. That is, the fundamental right to keep and bear arms.

[DreamWeaver2nd]

06:47 PM on 09/30/2010

"Rights" for corrupt firearms dealers?

[OldSFMJT]

09:22 AM on 10/01/2010

"Fact: False. When the Tiahrt Amendment was first introduced in 2003,
Congressman Tiahrt explained his rationale for introducing these restrictions to the
The Washington Post, saying:

“I wanted to make sure I was fulfilling the needs of my friends who are firearms dealers.” "

Link to the Washington Post story, please. And NOT a link to the general WaPo site! To the actual story!

Thanks.
Old SF

[Just4]

06:03 PM on 09/30/2010

The wheels are coming off this thing.

"MAIG bases its claim that ten states supply the largest of proportion of “interstate crime guns” by using gun tracing reports from the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives – despite the fact that such reports have long been discredited as a statistical source." “Trace requests are not accurate indicators of specified crimes…traces may be requested for a variety of reasons not necessarily related to criminal incidents.” The reason, of course, is that not all guns used in crimes are traced, and that not all guns traced were used in crimes. Different law enforcement agencies have different policies on gun tracing, making the results useless for statistical analysis. I once had a firearm traced during a routine traffic stop. Is that a “crime gun?” Bloomberg would have you believe that it is.

[DreamWeaver2nd]

06:34 PM on 09/30/2010

The Tiahrt Trace Data Amendment Press Kit

... makes inaccurate statements
about how the Tiahrt trace data restrictions supposedly support law enforcement. In addition, what the Tiahrt Press Kit conveniently forgets to mention are the two additional restrictions in the Tiahrt Amendment that severely limit effective law enforcement.

􀂉 The Tiahrt Amendment’s 24-Hour Background Check Record Destruction Rule:

A second Tiahrt rider requires the FBI to destroy NICS background check records after just 24 hours, which can hamper critical investigations. During the Clinton Administration, these background check records were maintained for 180 days. This unnecessarily quick destruction of firearms background check records prevents law enforcement officials from more efficiently investigating “straw purchasers.”

An ATF study reported that 46% of their illegal firearms trafficking investigations involved straw purchasers or straw purchasing rings, making it the most common conduit for the trafficking of illegal guns. Director Robert Mueller of the FBI said in 2007 that he thought there was a “substantial argument in my mind for retaining [NICS background check] records for a substantial period of time.”

Con't

[Just4]

06:39 PM on 09/30/2010

Wait! I thought gunshows were the problem. Now it's straw purchases. If you want to get off track then explain how the Sacramento County Sheriff's office is suddenly issueing Concealed Carry Permits on a "Shall Issue" basis. Appointments are now booked to December...

[DreamWeaver2nd]

06:36 PM on 09/30/2010

Con't

􀂉 The Tiahrt Amendment’s Interference with ATF Efforts to Detect Guns Lost or Stolen from Licensed Dealers:

A third Tiahrt rider blocks ATF from requiring licensed firearms dealers to conduct an annual inventory check. This is despite the fact that based on 2007 compliance inspections of 9.3% of the nation’s gun dealers, ATF found more than 30,000 guns that were missing from those dealer inventories.

This means that, because of resource limitations, ATF could not inspect the rest of the 90.7% of licensed gun dealer inventories in America.

Furthermore, since ATF is prevented from requiring an inventory check, these dealers have no requirement to police their own inventory, creating further opportunities for more guns to go missing.

These lost or stolen firearms present a major challenge to the enforcement of gun trafficking and as ATF acknowledges, these missing weapons “post a threat to public safety.”

[Willbill]

06:50 PM on 09/30/2010

“A second Tiahrt rider requires the FBI to destroy NICS background check records after just 24 hours, which can hamper critical investigations.”

The law allows the FBI to keep approved gun purchase records for 24 hours to allow them to conduct audits of the NICS. Why does the FBI need permanent records of LAWFUL firearms transactions?

Here is the dirty little secret that gun ban extremists don’t tell you:
The National Rifle Association fully supported the provision that allows the FBI to permanently maintain the records of those who failed the NICS check. Why? Because all of agree that disqualified purchasers who attempt to purchase firearms should be investigated and prosecuted.

[realpolitic]

01:40 PM on 09/30/2010

"Obama's ascendancy unhinged the radical right, offering a unified target to competing camps of racial, nativist and religious animus. Even Patriots who had no truck with white supremacy found that they could amplify their antigovernment message by "constructing Obama as an alien, not of this country, insufficiently American," according to Michael Waltman, an authority on hate speech at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. Perennial features of extreme-right scare lore — including imagined schemes to declare martial law, abolish private ownership of guns and force dissidents into FEMA concentration camps — became more potent with Obama as the Commander in Chief."

Read more: http://www.time.com/time/nation/article/0,8599,2022516-2,00.html#ixzz112HAayn4

[Just4]

02:01 PM on 09/30/2010

That's all pretty funny considering that gun ownership is bipartisian and the original gun laws were to disarm blacks.

[realpolitic]

02:24 PM on 09/30/2010

The murder of a law enforcement officer at the Holocaust Museum by a white supremacist was funny?

[DreamWeaver2nd]

02:37 PM on 09/30/2010

American gun owners support gun control to prevent gun violence and to keep criminals from getting guns.

[DreamWeaver2nd]

02:39 PM on 09/30/2010

Your summary is accurate and well-stated.

[realpolitic]

03:38 PM on 09/30/2010

Thanks, but it is entirely transcribed from Time magazine!  I did provide the quotation marks!

[realpolitic]

01:36 PM on 09/30/2010

"Within a complex web of ideologies, most of today's armed radicals are linked by self-described Patriot beliefs, which emphasize resistance to tyranny by force of arms and reject the idea that elections can fix what ails the country. Among the most common convictions is that the Second Amendment — the right to keep and bear arms — is the Constitution's cornerstone, because only a well-armed populace can enforce its rights. Any form of gun regulation, therefore, is a sure sign of intent to crush other freedoms. The federal government is often said in militia circles to have made wholesale seizures of power, at times by subterfuge. A leading grievance holds that the 16th Amendment, which authorizes the federal income tax, was ratified through fraud."

Read more: http://www.time.com/time/nation/article/0,8599,2022516,00.html?xid=huffpo-direct#ixzz112FySn7D

[realpolitic]

01:40 PM on 09/30/2010

"Some groups, though not many overtly, embrace the white-supremacist legacy of the Posse Comitatus, which invented the modern militia movement in the 1970s. Some are fueled by a violent stream of millennial Christianity. Some believe Washington is a secondary foe, the agent of a dystopian new world order."

Read more: http://www.time.com/time/nation/article/0,8599,2022516,00.html?xid=huffpo-direct#ixzz112GKHArY

[Berettasskeeter]

01:51 PM on 10/01/2010

Our Founders also knew that centralized government is ALWAYS a threat to liberty, or hasn't your reading gotten you to that part yet?!
Semper fi

[grossmont328]

02:20 PM on 09/30/2010

RP--you must be desperate--the gun control you support is unpopular and unConstitutional

[realpolitic]

02:26 PM on 09/30/2010

Wanting commonsensical gun control laws is far from desperate.  It is what the families of those killed on city streets for no reason or those who take their own lives in suicides want. The whole society supports commonsensical laws, except the extremes right.

[DreamWeaver2nd]

02:50 PM on 09/30/2010

The poster's understanding of the enormity of the problems in our nation today is articulated with reason and clarity.

[Just4]

11:11 AM on 09/30/2010

California law says that any sale either private or otherwise, is illegal without a background check and 10 day wait whether in a gun show or not. Yet they are a top 10 EXPORTER and has been for several years. Why isn't California listed as a top 10 in the article but is in the report? How would making the other states comply to a California type law change anything if it didn't change anything in California?

[Lord Brian]

12:10 PM on 09/30/2010

California's example should exempt other states from background checks? That makes sense.

[Just4]

12:26 PM on 09/30/2010

Yes, when a law doesn't work and restricts a fundamental right, then it doesn't pass scrutiny tests under constitutional law and is therefore unconstitutional. Now if it helped, at all, that would be one thing. California is the example of why the other states shouldn't and haven't bothered. Back to the real point, why is this "report" taken seriously at all when they ignore their own data when it doesn't help to make their point?

[CelticMajic]

12:30 PM on 09/30/2010

Guff, how obtuse. An ineffective solution does not demand everywhere else adopt that same ineffective solution. Stop blaming the object and work on the real problem.

[DreamWeaver2nd]

03:08 AM on 09/30/2010

Mayors Against Illegal Guns website: Boston billboard mockery in blazing neon of the gun show loophole:

U.S.A. GUN SHOWS

***WE SELL GUNS***
NO I.D. REQUIRED
NO BACKGROUND CHECKS
CRIMINALS & TERRORISTS WELCOME

TELL CONGRESS TO CLOSE
THE GUN SHOW LOOPHOLE



Check it out:
http://www.mayorsagainstillegalguns.org/downloads/pdf/boston_gun_show_billboard.pdf

[Dana1982]

07:45 AM on 09/30/2010

and it's just propraganda to suck in those ignorant about gun laws. No gun dealer can sell a gun without filing the proper paperwork with the federal government. If they don't do the paper work when they sell a gun, they face yeasr of jail time, and justifably so.

[barefoot2626]

10:24 AM on 09/30/2010

The ignorant people are those that have known about the gun show loop hole for twenty years and have then decided it is a good strategy to pretend it doesn't exist.

Though  many states do (finally) require background checks,  many gun sellers and gun buyers - including criminal gun buyers- get around the background check  because the background checks are not required on ALL sales.

The obvious solution is to require background checks on all gun show sales.

A second step - also obvious- is to restrict the number of sales one person can make in a year to a reason number before requiring FFL.

E.G Ten.

[DreamWeaver2nd]

12:13 PM on 09/30/2010

Your post defines propaganda by twisting facts. Private, occational, and "hobbyist" gun sellers (the loophole in the law) sell lethal weapons to persons with CASH in hand - no requirement for I.D. (the loophole in the law).

[eljefefx]

08:29 AM on 09/30/2010

If that isn't propaganda I don't know what is.

[DreamWeaver2nd]

12:06 PM on 09/30/2010

It's anti-propaganda.
In other words, it's intent is to inform and educate the public about the lethal danger of selling guns at gun shows because of the gun show loophole, which permits private individuals at a gun show to sell to other individuals without any I.D.

How can anyone in their right mind accept cavalier laissez-faire private sales of lethal weapons to strangers without I.D.? That's definitely not protecting "rights" : it is endangering our lives.

As loopholes in the tax code are abused by those gaming the system, so can criminals and others use the gun show loophole.