Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: FRIDAY, July 9, 1993 TAG: 9307090259
SECTION: VIRGINIA PAGE: B1 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: MARGARET EDDS STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: RICHMOND LENGTH: Medium
The group, commissioned by Gov. Douglas Wilder, expects to draft a final recommendation in August and to hold a public hearing on it this fall.
Wilder, who plans to run for the U.S. Senate after leaving office in January, could make the recommendation his parting act as governor of a state where gun control was once anathema but recently has enjoyed wide public support.
As the seven-member task force was hammering out a proposal, however, data submitted to the committee underscored the potential difficulty in building a public case for banning assault weapons.
Assault weapons are popularly defined as military-style weapons with the ability to rapidly spray out a large number of bullets. This type of weapon accounted for only about 6 percent of the weapons connected with homicide cases last year that were evaluated by the central division of the state's Consolidated Laboratory, said task force member Ann Jones.
Jones, a forensic scientist in that laboratory, cautioned that the figures cover only one region of Virginia and the lab is not involved in all homicide cases even in its area.
Of the 138 firearms evaluated by the lab in homicides in 1992, the largest number were .38- and .357-caliber Magnum revolvers (38), non-assault type 9mm pistols (15) and shotguns (14). Eight of the weapons were categorized as assault weapons.
Other information given the committee revealed that 75 of the 1,458 weapons (5 percent) recovered in Richmond crimes last year were assault weapons, as were 39 of 550 (7 percent) through May of this year.
Despite these numbers, several task force members termed the figures "substantial" and argued that assault weapons pose an abnormal threat to public safety.
by CNB