THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Thursday, August 3, 1995 TAG: 9508030528
SECTION: LOCAL PAGE: B2 EDITION: FINAL
SOURCE: ASSOCIATED PRESS
DATELINE: WASHINGTON LENGTH: Medium: 76 lines
A Virginia law limiting handgun purchases to one a month has disrupted illegal trafficking along the East Coast, a gun-control group said Wednesday.
The study by the Center to Prevent Handgun Violence was based on gun-tracing data from the federal Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms.
The law ``had a real and substantial impact on gun trafficking patterns along the East Coast of the United States,'' said its principal author, Douglas S. Weil. ``Gun traffickers now are having to go to their next best source of firearms.''
But an official of the National Rifle Association, which had lobbied against the Virginia law, called the study ``bogus.''
Tanya Metaksa, the NRA's chief lobbyist, said the ATF tracing data did not support the study's conclusions. ``Firearms selected for tracing do not constitute a random sample,'' she said in a telephone interview.
Sarah Brady, head of the anti-handgun group, said the study shows that the law ``is working to keep guns out of the illegal market.''
``Who needs more than 12 guns per year? Only drug dealers and other criminals who rely on concealable guns in their daily, deadly operations,'' Brady told a news conference. ``Law-abiding citizens are made safer by limiting the number of firearms available for purchase at one time.''
When he signed the law, then-Gov. L. Douglas Wilder said it would end Virginia's reputation as ``the gun-running capital of America.''
Police said drug dealers from New York, Washington and other Northeast cities recruited Virginians without criminal records to buy guns for them in exchange for drugs.
Brady said a similar law is needed nationwide. But she conceded that, given the Republican majority in Congress, ``we don't see very much of a chance of being able to get'' any gun-control legislation passed this year.
Only Virginia and South Carolina have laws limiting the number of handgun purchases.
By contrast, another law took effect in Virginia last month that allows all nonfelons to carry concealed weapons with a license without showing need. About 40 other states have similar laws.
The nation's busiest gun-trafficking route, according to law enforcement officials, is from the Southeast up Interstate 95 to New York and New England.
Metaksa said the Virginia law was ``aimed at propping up a handgun ban in (Washington), D.C., and a virtual ban in New York City'' and can have an effect on law-abiding gun owners ``who want to buy a gun they just found in a gun store.''
John Limbach, a spokesman for ATF's Washington field division, which includes Virginia, said ``Virginia used to be one of the leading gun-running states, but we are not making the same kind of gun-trafficking cases as before.''
The new law ``has forced people to change the way they do business,'' Limbach said. For example, he said, some gun traffickers have been forced to rely on the private, ``secondary'' market rather than dealers as a supply source.
Jerry Kilgore, Virginia's state secretary of public safety, said the law ``may have had an effect in reducing guns going to northeastern states but has not reduced Virginia's crime rate.'' ILLUSTRATION: GUNS TRACED TO VIRGINIA
Before the Virginia law took effect in July 1993, 35 percent of
all guns recovered by police in the Northeast and traced to dealers
in the Southeast came from Virginia, according to data from the
federal Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms. That fell to 15
percent after the one-gun-a-month law took effect.
KEYWORDS: GUN PERMIT by CNB