Monday, December 29, 2008

Reading passes law when state won’t act

The Issue: Reading passes an ordinance requiring handgun owners to report a lost or stolen weapon within 24 hours of discovering it is missing.

Our Opinion: The issue rightfully should be handled by the Legislature, but since it refuses to act, city officials must do what they can.

We share the frustration that Reading Mayor Tom McMahon feels about gun violence not only in Reading but also across the commonwealth. And in the final analysis, there is no reason why City Council should not have adopted an ordinance that requires handgun owners to notify police within 24 hours of discovering their weapons were lost or stolen.

After all, similar laws have been passed in five other Pennsylvania cities: Philadelphia, Pittsburgh, Allentown, Pottsville and York.

But until the state Legislature adopts a similar law that applies to every resident of the commonwealth, or until every municipality in the state passes the law, it isn’t likely to have much of an impact in the illegal trafficking of weapons.

The law is simple and makes sense. Failing to notify police of a stolen or lost handgun could result in a $1,000 fine or 90 days in jail. It is designed to stop so-called straw purchases, in which someone legally purchases a gun and then gives or sells it to someone, such as a felon, who is not permitted to possess a firearm.

Far too often those guns end up being used to commit crimes, and when that happens, the original purchaser simply claims the gun was stolen, but the theft never was reported.

Making a straw purchase of a gun already is a violation of Pennsylvania law, but it is a difficult law to enforce because it is nearly impossible to prove that a buyer obtained a weapon for someone who is not permitted to have one.

The reporting law is much easier to enforce. A gun is seized by police after the commission of a crime and traced back to the original buyer, who either reported it missing or faces some difficult questions from police and prosecutors.

Most responsible gun owners will report the theft or loss of a gun as soon as it is discovered. A problem arises, however, when a gun is taken and the owner is unaware that it is missing. That is one of the reasons the National Rifle Association has opposed a similar law on the state level: It fears truly innocent gun owners will be prosecuted.

But that is not the intent of the law. The intent is to get the guns out of the hands of people who shouldn’t have them. And that is an effort in which the NRA and every legitimate gun owner should join. It is those thugs who give guns a bad reputation.

And, according to McMahon, most legitimate gun owners support the 24-hour reporting requirement. The mayor cited a poll by Ceasefire PA that found 96 percent of state residents and 92 percent of gun owners back the measure.

If those statistics are accurate, and we have no reason to believe that they are not, it is difficult to understand why state legislators haven’t passed similar legislation that would apply statewide. Indeed, there are few issues facing the commonwealth on which 96 percent of the residents agree. But that hasn’t happened, so the issue falls to cities and other local municipalities.

As a result, Councilman Stephen P. Fuhs is completely justified in asking how effective the reporting would be in decreasing gun trafficking. The answer is, it won’t be nearly effective as it might be if the Legislature had addressed the issue.

But as McMahon pointed out, that is not likely to happen anytime soon, so cities across the commonwealth must do what they can to get weapons out of the hands of criminals without impacting the Second Amendment rights of legitimate gun owners.