Free Republic

What is it about statistics and guns? Last year, Michael Bellesiles, a historian at Emory College, came under criticism for his Bancroft Prize-winning book, Arming America: The Origins of a National Gun Culture, which argued that gun ownership was far less common during the 18th and 19th century than is generally supposed. His analysis, which was obviously pleasing to proponents of gun control, was drawn from probate records. But Bellesiles was unable to produce all of his data, owing, he said, to a flood in his office. After a committee of three scholars examined Bellesiles' research, they concluded that "his...

A former senior firearms industry executive said in an affidavit filed in court in San Diego yesterday that gun manufacturers had long known that some of their dealers corruptly sold guns to criminals but pressured one another into remaining silent for fear of legal liability. It is the first time a senior official in the gun industry has broken ranks to challenge practices in the business. The affidavit, by Robert A. Ricker, a former chief lobbyist and executive director of the American Shooting Sports Council, then the main gun industry trade organization, was filed in California Superior Court in support...

A lawsuit filed against the Maine company that made the rifle used in last fall's sniper shootings poses intriguing legal questions, experts say. The lawsuit, filed Thursday in Washington state by lawyers representing relatives of the snipers' victims, alleges that Windham-based Bushmaster Firearms Inc. showed gross negligence that caused injuries and death. The suit, which seeks unspecified damages, also names the Tacoma, Wash., gun dealer that either sold or lost the rifle, as well as the sniper suspects, John Allen Muhammad and Lee Malvo. Muhammad and Malvo are accused of killing 13 people and wounding five others in Alabama, Georgia,...

Investigators say a respected federal prosecutor and gun-control activist who was shot to death in the basement of his Queen Anne Hill home was the target of a hit that sent detectives and FBI agents scouring his private and professional life for a motive and suspects.The calculated slaying of Assistant U.S. Attorney Thomas C. Wales late Thursday night stunned the Seattle legal and law-enforcement communities, where he was known as a tireless and exceptionally fair prosecutor of white-collar crime.Gun-control advocates at Washington CeaseFire, where Wales was president, mourned the death of an articulate spokesman whose position as a prosecutor only ...

Suit Against Handgun Makers Dismissed By Daniel Wise New York Law Journal August 15, 2001 The State Attorney General's novel lawsuit to find the gun industry liable under a nuisance theory must be dismissed, an acting State Supreme Court justice in Manhattan has ruled. There is too tenuous a connection between the way handguns are marketed in New York and the more than 1,000 accidental and crime-related deaths involving the weapons each year to support an industry-wide finding of liability, Justice Louis B. York ruled Friday in People v. Sturm, Ruger & Company, 00-402586. Juanita Scarlett, a spokeswomen for Attorney ...