22 and 23 on a Dreadful List : Amid gun-mayhem epidemic, 2 more officers die in L.A. County

This week was supposed to mark a new beginning for James Wayne MacDonald. Instead, it is a week of mourning for the 23-year-old Compton reserve police officer and his partner, Kevin Michael Burrell, 29.

MacDonald was to leave Southern California this week to become a full-time officer with the San Jose Police Department. But late Monday night, with 90 minutes left on MacDonald’s final shift, he and Burrell--a lifelong Compton resident who joined the department at 15 as an Explorer Scout--were added to the list of 21 law enforcement officers fatally shot in the line of duty in Los Angeles County since 1985. They were killed in cold blood after they pulled over a “suspicious-looking” red pickup truck.

How many more brave officers must be shot down, how many more innocent bystanders killed, how many more lives ruined, before this country gets stronger gun laws? A good part of the answer to this carnage lies with federal legislation that would supersede the current hodgepodge of the states’ gun control regulations--many of them laws too weak to even have an impact.

Congressional passage of the Brady bill, which would mandate a national seven-day waiting period between purchase and delivery of a handgun, would be a symbolic beginning. But the government will have to do more.

To that end, President Clinton should direct government officials to freeze the granting of federal gun dealer permits while the government reviews the status of those individuals presently holding licenses.

Congress should also back the President’s plan to put 100,000 more police officers on the street across the country. Once such legislation is passed, states should designate some of those officers to combat the illegal gun trade.

Perhaps among the new police officers will be young men and women of promise. Like James MacDonald and Kevin Burrell.