Letter: Gun registry could be source of misinformation

Letter: Gun registry could be source of misinformation
Date: Mar 22, 2005 8:49 AM
PUBLICATION: The Windsor Star
DATE: 2005.03.22
EDITION: Final
SECTION: Editorial/Opinion
PAGE: A9
BYLINE: Nestor A. Petriw
SOURCE: Windsor Star

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Gun registry could be source of misinformation

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In the aftermath of the worst mass murder of RCMP officers in Canada's history,
I am angry beyond words that you would publish R. King's letter on the gun registry
and the RCMP killings.

He places blame for this tragedy on Alberta's police force. I would like to take
this opportunity to inform King that Alberta's police force is none other than the
Royal Canadian Mounted Police.

Furthermore, it is not the function of the police to ensure that everyone registered
their weapons. Criminals, as R. King evidently doesn't know, do not register their
illegal guns and the police don't search people's home to see if they're hiding
illegal guns, unless they have just cause.

Among the points that R. King fails to comprehend is the fact that James Roszko
had, for several years, been banned by court order from possessing firearms. Notwithstanding
that prohibition order, he came to illegally possess an illegal firearm with which
he committed murder.

Ordinarily, I would expect that pattern of behaviour to indicate that the man was
evil and a danger to society, but R. King sees the problem as being NRA propaganda.

The gun registry did nothing to protect the four murdered RCMP officers. Significantly,
it does not keep track of over 176,000 persons who are under court orders prohibiting
them from owning guns.

This is a serious defect in the legislation that established the gun registry. It
needs to be fixed, not ignored.

And fixing the problem will require some very hard questions to be addressed.

The ugly reality is that the gun registry may in fact have contributed to this tragedy
by creating a false sense of security for the officers in question. If these officers
had relied on the gun registry to check whether James Roszko owned firearms, an
inquiry which, we keep hearing, occurs 2,000 times a day, they would have been told
"he has no guns."

As a criminal under a court-ordered firearms prohibition order, Roszko could not
have been in legal possession of a gun and he could not have any guns registered
to him in the system.

If the RCMP's guard was down as a result of that false information, the registry
and those who support it have blood on their hands.

In that regard, Canada's gun registry is worse than useless.

Nestor A. Petriw