5,859 Would-Be Gun Buyers Rejected Under New Records Checks

The state Department of Justice reports that almost 6,000 would-be gun buyers--most of them convicted criminals--were denied firearms in 1991, the first full year of California’s beefed-up 15-day waiting period for handgun, rifle and shotgun purchases.

The rejections more than doubled since 1990, when only people who wanted to buy pistols were subject to the delay, to allow time for a background check into whether they had criminal records that made them ineligible to buy guns.

In a year-end report, the department said that under the newly expanded law, written by Assemblyman Lloyd G. Connelly (D-Sacramento), 5,859 people who sought to buy a gun in 1991 were rejected. This compared with 2,437 in the previous year.

“People are alive today who would otherwise be dead,” Connelly said Tuesday of the landmark law, which became the nation’s first of its type. “The waiting period saves lives.”

In Congress, various gun control bills propose a waiting period of up to seven days for buying a handgun, but none of them require a background investigation by law enforcement authorities.

The Department of Justice said that under the new state law, background investigations of prospective gun purchasers last year included 609 people who had been convicted of drug violations, 34 for homicide, 101 for sex crimes, 338 for burglary, seven for kidnaping, 102 for robbery and 2,967 for assault.

The law not only expanded the kinds of firearms covered but also expanded the categories of criminals and others who could be turned down. The department reported that 2,852 people were denied a gun purchase because of a misdemeanor criminal record, 2,500 because of a felony record, and 507 for other reasons, including mental instability and attempted purchase of a handgun by a minor.

Before 1990, only purchasers of handguns were required to wait 15 days and submit to a background examination. The new law extended to shotguns and rifles.

The new law, supported by law enforcement but opposed by the National Rifle Assn. and other gun-owner groups, also made it illegal for anyone convicted of certain violent or weapons-related misdemeanors to purchase or possess any gun. Likewise, those found mentally unstable in a civil process are ineligible for gun ownership for 10 years.

NRA lobbyist Brian Judy said the increased denial rate of 240% over 1990 is meaningless unless it is tied to a reduction in the crime rate. “I’d be willing to bet the crime rate didn’t go down in 1991,” Judy said.

In a related action, the department said that in the first 10 days of a special 90-day period to register semiautomatic assault weapons, only 193 owners of such assault guns had applied to register.

The unprecedented “second-chance” registration, in which criminal penalties for failure to officially report the guns are waived, was sought by Atty. Gen. Dan Lungren and signed into law by Gov. Pete Wilson last year. Lungren sought the legislation after thousands of assault gun owners failed to register by the original Dec. 31, 1989, deadline.

The department has earmarked $335,000 to publicize the special registration program. Spokesman Dave Puglia declined Tuesday to comment on the turnout so far, but said toll-free telephones “have been ringing off the hook and that’s a good sign.”