Short Tempers, Big Supply of Firearms : A Proliferation of Guns--and Victims--Points to the Need for Stricter Controls

The majority of Orange County residents who favor stricter gun control laws got more support for their position this month at the sentencing of a killer in a Santa Ana courtroom.

Gifford Michael Madden was sentenced to 19 years to life in prison for fatally shooting Daniel Martin Renz. The prosecution said Madden had been tailgating Renz in Huntington Beach. When Renz stopped his vehicle and went back to confront Madden, he was shot. Madden’s lawyer argued that his client was carrying a gun because he had been shot during a residential burglary not long before. He said he thought Renz might be reaching for a gun of his own, but the jury did not buy the self-defense argument.

There are so many guns in Orange County and elsewhere that when the shooting occurred, a Huntington Beach policeman felt compelled to urge motorists that if they are cut off, “let it go.” Calm down. Try to put distance between yourself and the other motorist.

That feeling about guns is shared by many police. Last month, La Palma Police Chief David Barr told his City Council that “there are too many guns out there.” He was right. Barr won the unanimous City Council endorsement of the state police chiefs’ position paper, which included calls for a mandatory registration system for firearms, limits on ownership and possession and smaller ammunition-magazine capacity.

A UC Irvine poll late last year found that two-thirds of Orange County residents supported stricter gun controls. Poll-takers and police were stunned by the results in a county long known for libertarian feelings that the government should leave citizens alone. But the survey results were in keeping with the public’s fear of crime, which for the past two years has been the biggest concern of county residents, according to the Orange County Annual Survey, conducted by UC Irvine.

Judges see the results of gun violence and short tempers too, and one of them had some good, strong words on the matter. In sentencing Madden, Superior Court Judge William W. Bedsworth noted that both Renz’s and Madden’s families had been devastated. He said he wished that before people acted violently “they’d have to come in here first and listen to the destruction wrought on both sides” by such crimes.

Renz was the father of three children, ages 2 to 7. The judge’s tough sentence should serve as a warning to others to get rid of the guns and a reminder that there are too many in our homes and cars.