Data from the federal firearms registry, obtained by the Ottawa Citizen in 2007, showed that individuals and businesses had registered more than 3,800 semi-automatic AR-15 rifles or variants of the same design.
The massacre at the Sandy Hook elementary school in Newtown,reportedly committed with a Bushmaster version of the AR-15, has put the status of firearms like it back in the legal crosshairs as lawmakers struggle with a response to the killings.
The same model of rifle was also used by a gunman in the theatre shootings in Aurora, Colorado in January, and in an infamous 1995 mass shooting in Port Arthur, Australia, that lead to major changes to that country’s gun laws.
The AR-15 available to consumers is a version of the M-16, the standard rifle used by the U.S. military. The description of it as an “assault rifle” is subjective and not entirely accurate, however.
It is not legal for hunting and clearly has military heritage, but the AR-15 is functionally different than the military-issue variants, which are capable of fully-automatic continuous fire and three-shot bursts.
The semi-automatic versions fire a single round with each pull of the trigger while another round is automatically moved into the chamber.
In Canada, the semi-automatic AR-15 is classified as a restricted firearm and may be purchased only by people with a restricted permit. It can be legally fired only on shooting ranges.
Many other semi-automatic rifles in Canada are not restricted and, since the Conservative government scrapped the long-gun registry, no longer have to be registered. But the AR-15 must still be registered.
Yet the rifle, seen often in film and on television, remains popular with Canadian sport shooters and gun collectors.
Andrew Tyler of Victoria, B.C, says his collection of military firearms includes eight versions of the AR-15. He says the modular design makes it attractive to collectors.
“It’s one of those things where you buy one and you see another and think, ‘Oh, that’s kind of cool. I want that, too,’” Said Tyler, 31, who is formerly of Ottawa.
Although he is a member of the National Rifle Association, Tyler thinks it is too easy to buy guns like the AR-15 in the U.S. and questions why the mother of the gunman in Newtown had the rifle in her home.
“I don’t think you should be able to go and buy not just an AR 15, but any gun on the spur of the moment,” he said.
“I feel no shame in owning an AR-15. But his mother should have thought long and hard about bringing guns into that house.”
Tyler is also concerned by the popular culture craze for zombie-killing programs like Walking Dead, in which guns like the AR-15 or AK-47 are often depicted killing the undead in trivial or even humourous ways. He notes that some manufacturers have started making “zombie killing” ammunition and selling zombie targets for shooting ranges.
“They’re treating it like it’s a kids toy. It’s shooting people but you don’t feel bad about it.”
In Ottawa, 78 AR-15s are registered to owners other than police or military, the data show. In the downtown area defined by the K1 postal code zone, 36 AR-15s were listed.
Reports from Newtown say the shooter used magazines of 30 rounds. After the 1989 Polytechnique massacre of engineering students in Montreal, new restrictions were placed on the size of magazines legal in Canada. Most AR-15s are limited to five round magazines and it is illegal import larger magazines.
And while it is illegal to use the AR-15 anywhere but on a gun range, the restriction is unlikely to discourage someone with access to the weapon who is intent on doing harm — such as Kimveer Gill, who took his entirely-legal Beretta Cx4 Storm, also a restricted semi-automatic carbine, to Dawson College and killed 18-year-old Anastasia De Sousa and wounded many others in 2006.
The Dawson College shooting could have been much worse without the magazine capacity restriction put in place by the Mulroney government, or if Gill had used a more powerful rifle.
The gun registry data showed that 32 AR-15s had been reported stolen in Canada and another eight were reported lost. Only one was later recovered.
Original Article
Source: canada.com
Author: GLEN MCGREGOR
No comments:
Post a Comment