Quick Reminder: Criminals Do NOT Get Their Firearms from Gun Shows and Legal Private Sales

By Robert Farago

I recently ran a quote of the day from the Boston Globe based on their editorial Close loopholes on existing gun background checks. In it, the anti-ballistic Boston burghers assert that “Gun control advocates point out that 40 percent of all gun sales are exempt from background checks because the seller is a private party operating online or at gun shows.” This is a lie, perpetuated by the anti-gunners to justify gun control legislation for legal gun buyers. There is but one – count it one – scientific study on the source of criminals guns. In 2001, Caroline Wolf Harlow, Ph.D published a survey of convicted criminals in 1991 and 1997 who used a gun. Click here to check it out. Stats above. To repeat . . .

• In 1997 among State inmates possessing a gun, fewer than 2% bought their firearm at a flea market or gun show, about 12% from a retail store or pawnshop, and 80% from family, friends, a street buy, or an illegal source. [NB: the Brady Background Check law went into effect in 1998, after the survey period.]

When it comes to public policy, garbage in, garbage out. If …read more

Source:: Truth About Guns