How Many Guns Are Enough? : We Have 210 Million, but Security Is as Elusive as Ever

Not everyone agrees, but many people still seem to think that the best way to fight crime is to be prepared for it--by owning a gun. It’s a pretty silly concept when you consider the odds. It is as if members of this fully armed citizenry expect to be alert and prepared, with the weapon right at hand at the moment of truth.

That’s ridiculous, and here is a case in point. Consider the retired judge who dutifully loaded his pump shotgun and his .357 magnum revolver and left them at his bedside every night. One can safely assume that he felt fully prepared to defend hearth and home against criminals on the prowl. So what happens? Our former judge subsequently slept soundly through a nearby magnitude 4 earthquake. That’s readiness for you.

The home of this same alert citizen, by the way, had been burglarized repeatedly. The thieves escaped with more of the guns the ex-judge had bought to replace those that had already been stolen from him. You could say that the guns were an expensive mistake providing little more than a false sense of security. You could also say that he had exercised his Second Amendment right to inadvertently arm the neighborhood crooks to the teeth.

In truth, there has never been more evidence that crime and gun violence, while down overall in the San Fernando Valley and its environs, can strike anywhere, at any time. There is no place where you can be fully safe from it, and there is no way to be prepared for it. It’s also never been more apparent that something must be done to try to reduce the incredible number of guns in circulation. Consider the following recent examples:

* Brothers from Van Nuys take a Russian friend, Armen Shakhkaramyan, on a fishing trip to Big Bear Lake. A gunman fires into their station wagon, killing the friend and wounding another vacation companion from North Hollywood.

* Security company telephone operator Jim Voshall of Chatsworth is carjacked and kidnaped at gunpoint. His assailants direct him on a frightening drive around the area. He escapes with his life by leaping from his moving car after his assailants allegedly tell him they are not going to kill him, “yet.”

* A 22-year-old Panorama City mother is shot and killed after making a purchase at a convenience store. A bullet barely misses her baby. The suspect, a gang member, was apparently aiming at a rival gang, and missed.

* A 23-year-old Canoga Park man is shot and killed in Lake View Terrace; circumstances and motive unknown.

* A 60-year-old security guard from Lancaster, on duty outside a store, is wounded by gunfire and hospitalized. Two assailants remain at large.

These criminal acts were committed with some of the more than 210 million guns in circulation in America. The toll: three killed, two wounded and one who barely escaped death, all in four days of news touching residents of the Valley and its environs.

It is the easy availability of firearms that facilitates the violence and perpetuates such madness. What we ought to be willing to pay for is not more guns for ourselves, but for a larger police force, better trained and more suitably equipped with all manner of investigative tools, and perhaps better armed. But such incidents also speak to the need for more comprehensive and effective gun control, something that more than 50% of Americans now favor.