New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg suffered a crushing defeat for his gun control political agenda last week. Upstate legislative support for a plan to microstamp bullet casings disappeared in the eleventh hour. Just like Massachusetts Governor Patrick, who resurrected his his pet bill to restrict gun buyers to one gun per month, Bloomberg reckons the fat lady was just warming up. And so he’s penned this rant (after the jump), using the standard MS Word gun control editorial template: Tragedy > gun crime > new police technique > cops love it > call your legislator. Strangely, Bloomberg doesn’t say if the crimes cited yielded spent bullet casings. Or counter any of the bill’s many criticisms. The fact that it won’t work, for example. (File this one under filing down numbers.) Or how the bill would reduce gun choice (manufacturers would bail on the Empire State) and raise gun prices. Thank God for the Internet.
Every day, kids and criminals with illegal guns threaten our neighborhoods.
Last October, 92-year-old Sadie Mitchell was killed when a stray bullet screamed through a first-floor window in her house and hit her in the back. An 18-year-old with a criminal record – who never should have had access to a gun – confessed to the shooting.
A month later, 15-year-old Vada Vasquez was shot in the head after she was caught in the crossfire in a gang-related shooting. Fortunately, she survived.
In 2007, Police Officer Russel Timoshenko was shot and killed by a career criminal armed with an illegal gun brought in from out of state.
In 2003, Detectives James Nemorin and Rodney Andrews were murdered on Staten Island while investigating illegal gun trafficking.
Tragically, the list of innocent victims goes on.
Though there are far fewer guns on the street than there were years ago, one gun in the wrong hands is one too many.
We’re working to persuade the state Senate to pass a microstamping law that will give our police officers a new tool to solve gun crimes.
Microstamping is a new technology that imprints a unique mark on every bullet casing, helping officers to connect guns – and their owners – to crimes.
More than 80 police departments and law enforcement groups from around New York have endorsed the legislation, but unfortunately a first attempt to pass it in the Senate failed last week.
It was disappointing that the Senate ignored the pleas of so many law enforcement leaders, including Police Commissioner Raymond Kelly, Staten Island District Attorney Dan Donovan, 83 police organizations and more than 100 mayors from around New York State – as well as heartfelt pleas by Timoshenko’s mother.
The good news is that the bill, which has passed the Assembly two straight years, may get another chance in the Senate.
I encourage all New Yorkers to call their state senators and ask them to support microstamping because we need all the help we can get to take illegal guns out of the hands of criminals.
To find out your senator’s number, just call 311.
