Local News in Brief : County Urged to Ban Semiautomatic Guns
Black community leaders Monday urged the Los Angeles County Board of Supervisors to pass an ordinance that would ban the sale and possession of semiautomatic assault rifles in unincorporated areas of the county.
The proposal, scheduled to be discussed at today’s board meeting, is similar to an ordinance passed last week by the Los Angeles City Council.
“Less than miles from here in Aliso Village, a mother and her unborn child became the latest victims of these weapons,” Supervisor Kenneth Hahn, who proposed the ordinance, said at news conference in the Hall of Administration.
Andrea Garrett, 20, and her 8-month-old unborn child died early Sunday after suspected gang members opened fire with a military assault-type rifle at a public housing project in Aliso Village. Francis Jones, a leader of the South Central Organizing Committee, said he was awakened that morning by a similar sound in South Los Angeles.
“All I could think of is ‘Where did the bullets go? Whose child was killed?’ ” he said.
Father Guy Wilson of Our Lady of Victory Church in Compton said 13 members of his congregation were slain by such weapons last year.
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