Safety Measures

Let's redefine gun control.

by Michael Washburn

Here in Philly, where curbing the gun-violence epidemic was a staple of Michael Nutter's mayoral campaign, we are witnessing a furor that may reach a national scale. A city judge last week granted the National Rifle Association's restraining order that forestalls Nutter's package of gun control measures, passed by the City Council, and the NRA is calling for Nutter's arrest on the grounds that he's a tyrant practicing "official oppression." Measures that broaden cops' authority to confiscate guns and otherwise limit gun rights may come under discussion in other cities; many agree with Nutter on their utility in curbing crime.

But before dissing the Second Amendment, let's give some thought to those who've had run-ins with violent thugs and used guns in self-defense, or people who wish they'd been able to. On March 5, in New Cumberland, a homeowner used a handgun to drive away two invaders after surprising and struggling with them in his kitchen, as reported in the local Patriot News and the Civilian Gun Self-Defense blog. On March 1, in Pittsburgh, a cab driver fatally shot a man who tried to rob him after the driver picked up the man downtown, as reported in the Inquirer.

Or consider the family of Tammy Zywicki. That name might not mean much to you, but people at truck stops throughout the Midwest know who she was. A Grinnell College senior, Zywicki was traveling from Evanston, Ill., to the Iowa campus in August 1992 when her car broke down. Shortly after that, someone abducted Zywicki, took her to an isolated place, raped and stabbed her repeatedly, and then dropped her body by the side of a road in Missouri. It was a tragedy that marred the lives of Grinnell's class of 1993, Zywicki's family and many others.

A 1993 article by Richard Griffiths, written for Independence Institute, a Colorado think tank, compares the Zywicki case with that of another abducted woman, Kate Petit. After Petit's car broke down on a highway outside Tampa, Fla., a strange man stopped and got out of his car to offer help, then pulled a knife, forced Petit into his trunk and drove to an isolated spot. Petit could have wound up like Zywicki, but when the psychopath opened the trunk, he got a dose of lead from the licensed .38 handgun Petit kept in her purse. It's one more example of how responsible gun owners exercise their Second Amendment rights.

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After I wrote about gun rights for City Paper last September, an Old City resident wrote to refute my argument, because no one was talking about banning private ownership of guns, only about sensible restrictions. That's not quite true. In the aftermath of the Virginia Tech tragedy last year, New Yorker staff writer Adam Gopnik wrote an editorial calling for doing away with most gun ownership, arguing that there is "no reason" for citizens in a democracy to own guns. Kate Petit would likely disagree.

Gopnik did, however, raise an important point. How do we prevent tragedies like the one at Virginia Tech? One answer is to redefine gun control so that it's not something we inflict on good, law-abiding people, but rather, part of the package of punishments that we impose on those who have shown criminal and antisocial behavior. If local police had properly penalized Virginia Tech shooter Seung-Hui Cho for the repeated incidents of stalking and other menacing behavior preceding his rampage, and deprived him then of his right to buy and own guns, along with other appropriate measures, they would have nipped the awful developments in the bud. The same approach will work for other types of criminals.

Michael Washburn is a local writer who has covered criminal justice and Second Amendment issues for City Paper.