The Truth About Mexican Crime Guns

    The often repeated statistic that 90% to 95% of guns seized in Mexico are traced back to the U.S. is an outrageous distortion.  The actual statistic is more like 17% and even that might be exaggerated.

    For several years The Firearms Coalition has been closely monitoring the situation on the U.S. – Mexico border as it relates to firearms.  Our good friend Landis Aden of the Arizona State Rifle and Pistol Association has provided a steady stream of news stories from Arizona and Mexico along with other useful information and blaming the U.S. for Mexico’s crime problems is nothing new.  What is a fairly recent development is the claim by U.S. and Mexican officials and media that 90% to 95% of crime guns traced from Mexico originally come from the U.S.  Anyone who knows anything about guns has been suspicious of that claim from the beginning because the guns described in the news stories are very often full-auto military weapons, rocket propelled grenades, and such; weapons which are clearly not available at your local gun shop in Phoenix or El Paso.

    The answer to the conflicting reports comes – as it often does in firearms related statistics – in the specific terms in which the statistics are couched.  It is true that about 90% of firearms traced by the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives originate in the U.S. but what is left out of that statement is the fact that fewer than half of the guns involved in crime in Mexico are ever traced by the ATF.  Mexican authorities only submit guns to ATF when they believe the guns originated in the U.S.  When all of the guns are included it turns out that some 83% of guns involved in crime in Mexico come from sources other than the U.S.

   So the correct statistic is that about 17% of guns seized by police in Mexico are traced back to U.S. sources – and those doubtlessly include many guns legally sold to the Mexican government over the years and guns acquired by Mexican citizens for self-defense in the face of rampant crime in that country.

    Fox News has finally reported the truth of this matter in this special report.

    Rights activists are encouraged to send copies of this story to any reporter or news outlet they see repeating the 90% lie and to send copies to their elected officials demanding that government officials stop misrepresenting the facts.

DOD Reverses Policy on Destruction of Brass

The Department of Defense, under intense pressure from rights advocates, industry forces, and members of Congress – particularly Senators Baucus and Tester of Montana – has reversed its decision to require that all brass cases be destroyed and sold as scrap metal rather than sold as reloadable cases.

Much credit for the quick resolution of this issue goes to Gary Marbut of Montana Shooting Sports Association.  Gary was the first we saw alerting the public and calling on his Senators to take action, and his calls did not fall on deaf ears as Tester and Baucus responded quickly and helped to snuff the issue in short order.

Thanks Gary!

Our original story is below.

Goverment Orders Destruction of Fired Brass

    There are reports that the Defense Department has ordered that all fired brass from the military be "de-militarized" by crushing or otherwise making it unusable for reloading.

    The Firearms Coalition is looking into these reports and will keep you posted.  In the mean time, there is no harm in contacting Senators and Representatives to ask them to look into the matter.

    Scrap brass metal sells for only a few cents a pound while once-fired brass in popular calibers sells for a few dollars a pound.  Add to that the cost of physically mutilating the cases and the government moves from a net gain in disposing of their fired brass to a net loss.

    A policy calling for the destruction of otherwise usable and resalable brass would be right in line with what we have been expecting from the Obama administration.  We have been on the lookout for bans on importation of various guns and gun parts, bans on importation of ammunition, and expansion of the Attorney General’s lists of guns "not suitable for sporting purposes."

    No such actions or policies should be tolerated and they should be opposed with the strongest legal action possible.

Supreme Court Accepts Broad Definition

    The Supreme Court of the United States (SCOTUS) today ruled that prohibiting firearms from those convicted of misdemeanor crimes of domestic violence is OK even if the actual charge made no mention of a domestic relationship.

    In 1994 Randy Hayes was convicted of simple battery after an altercation with his wife.  The battery charge did not mention the domestic relationship.  In 2005 Hayes was prosecuted, and convicted, for being a "prohibited person" in possession of a firearm – police found a lever-action rifle under his bed.  Hayes fought that conviction based on the specific language of the notorious Lautenberg Amendment which added domestic violence misdemeanants to the list of "prohibited persons."  The argument was one of commas, syntax, and intent questioning whether the charge that a person was convicted of had to include something about a domestic relationship such as "Battery against a Spouse" or "Domestic Battery" as opposed to "Simple Battery" which does not address who the victim was.

    Hayes was initially found guilty of being a "prohibited person" in possession of a firearm, but that conviction was overturned by the Federal Court of Appeals for the 4th Circuit which ruled that the actual language of the Lautenberg Amendment should be understood to require that the "domestic" component be included in the criminal charge.  In a 7-2 decision, the Supreme Court reversed the 4th Circuit and said that regardless of the actual charge, as long as the crime involved violence or threat of violence and the victim was domestically related to the perpetrator, the firearms prohibition applies.

    Chief Justice John Roberts and Justice Antonin Scalia dissented saying that such an interpretation would require authorities to research the details of any conviction for assault, battery, or threatening to determine if there was a domestic relationship between the perpetrator and the victim. 

    Even though there was some buzz about this case within the Second Amendment community and some hope that the Heller decision would cause the Justices to take a more conservative position on any law which arbitrarily abrogated Second Amendment rights, there was no mention of the Second Amendment during oral arguments and none in either the majority or minority opinions.

    Today’s Supreme Court decision means that anyone who has ever been convicted of any misdemeanor crime of violence – to include threats of violence – even if there was no possible way for the threat to be carried out and even if the punishment for the crime was only a $25 fine – is barred from ever possessing firearms or ammunition for the rest of their life if the victim of their crime was a person within the perpetrators household.  This leaves a large number of people at risk of committing unintentional felonies like Hayes did and it means that anyone with any record of battery or assault is likely to face drawn out delays whenever purchasing a firearm as NICS will have to determine the details of the case before approving the sale.

    And of course – as with all gun control legislation – the objective and result of this law is not to keep guns away from dangerous criminals, but rather to make criminals of regular citizens and make gun ownership more cumbersome and problematic.  The passage of the Lautenburg Amendment cost thousands of police and military personnel their careers and often their pensions because they could no longer be in positions that required them to possess firearms, and it has ruined the lives of countless others who, like Randy Hayes, had no idea that they were not supposed to possess firearms and were caught up and prosecuted for being a "prohibited person" on possession of a gun.