While the vast majority of Canada’s top cops are ranged against moves to kill Canada’s Long Gun Registry, Calgary Police Chief Rick Hanson has broke ranks and publicly declared that it’s time to “review” the legislation. “The gun registry has done little to make the streets safer,” Chief Hanson told CTV.ca. “”For the years it’s been in effect, there are more guns on the street today – handguns and prohibited weapons – than I can ever recall, and that’s since the gun registry has been implemented.” By why let a little thing like the facts get in the way of a bigger thing called political correctness, which says that the only reason draconian laws don’t work is because they’re not draconian enough? “Chief Hanson says . . . it’s not about politics, it’s about safety. ‘It’s not helping,” Hanson said, sticking to his talking points. “The guns these people have, they don’t register, they don’t care, they’re probably stolen, they’re probably obtained illegally, in many cases they’re prohibited.” So what IS the answer to gang violence and gun crime in Calgary and around the nation?
Chief Hanson wants tougher sentences when someone is convicted of using a weapon to commit a crime.
He also wants more search and seizure power when police have reasonable grounds to suspect someone may be in possession of an illegal gun.
Interesting. Anyone know what laws stop Canadian police from entering a home for check for illegal guns? Something about, I dunno, evidence? As for the deterrent effect of stiffer sentences for gun crimes, that one’s been proven time and time again. Chief Hansen’s got a powerful message though: hit it Mountie one more time.
Chief Hanson is a realist. I am familiar with his city and he has his hands full with gang turf wars that have turned Calgary back into a Wild West city. Lately a series of key arrests and the deportation of a kingpin player back to Viet Nam have made the streets a little less of a war zone in Cowtown.