Assault Weapons

* Re “Guns That Nobody Needs,” editorial, Feb. 26: You call for a ban on “assault weapons,” since they have “no use other than to kill people.” Your generic definition of these firearms has in the past been so broad as to include the target-modified, semiautomatic military service rifles used by thousands of people who have been engaged in high-power rifle target competition. This activity has long been sanctioned by the U.S. Army. One can assume that the majority of the thousands who enjoy this sport have invested several thousand dollars in their firearm and accessories. What have we done wrong to have the government withdraw its sanction and confiscate the investment it has encouraged? Your editorial acknowledges that a ban on assault weapons will have little effect on crime. These target firearms do not cause carnage. Is this not the taking of private property without just compensation, or does the last portion of the Fifth Amendment apply only to the militia?

ADAM COCHRAN

Oxnard

* The Times asks what possible legitimate use could anyone have for a military-style, semiautomatic rifle such as the Colt Sporter. The answer can be found in the Feb. 23 article “Some Gun Owners Take 2nd Look at Fingers on Other Triggers.” In describing a burglary thwarted by an armed citizen, the author states, “Murphy, who lives in Tucson . . . has twice faced down burglars breaking into his parent’s home. The last one he held at bay with his Colt Sporter was 19 years old and had a rap sheet with 34 felonies.”

According to FBI crime statistics, less than 1% of firearms crime is committed by criminals wielding “assault weapons.” The issue is nothing more than a red herring for gun control proponents to advance their agenda of disarming America.

JOHN R. MURPHY

San Clemente

* The NRA, ostrich-like, refuses to accept the problem with weapons proliferation. Just put criminals in jail. But neither Christopher Golly, nor David Fukuto, nor Alan Winterbourne in Oxnard, nor the killer of those lawyers in San Francisco, nor the Long Island maniac, nor countless others are “criminals.”

None had a record. They did have one thing in common--they all had an arsenal of weapons.

LEN ZIRALDO

West Hills

* Bill Boyarsky’s Feb. 27 column offered a responsible message on how citizens can resist crime, but it erred in identifying the murder of Los Angeles police officer Christy Hamilton as an act of “random violence.” On the contrary, it was a predictable outcome of a radical gun user providing his drug-addicted son with a military assault weapon. A similar misstatement appeared in your Feb. 27 story on the murder of 7-year-old Kim Bracey by a playmate, again armed with an assault weapon. The writer implied that it may be open to question “whether anyone in the household had been negligent for leaving the weapon within reach” of a child. Negligent, yes, for owning the gun in the first place, and deserving of a jail sentence now that it has led to a senseless (but predictable) killing.

J. E. POLLARD

Torrance