Bell Campaign Seeks an End to Gun Toll

Victims of gun violence, convinced that their united voice can be effective in the firearms debate, launched their own national organization Tuesday with simultaneous news conferences in eight cities.

They call their group the Bell Campaign and expect to open chapters in all 50 states.

“We love our children more than the gun lobby loves its guns,” said Mary Leigh Blek of Trabuco Canyon, a founder and western regional director of the Bell Campaign.

The organization is so named because the bell symbolizes peace and freedom. Among its goals are tighter firearms regulations and registration rules.

Blek and her husband, Charles, were two of the speakers at the Southern California news conference, held at St. Mary’s Medical Center in Long Beach. Their 21-year-old son, Matthew, was shot to death five years ago in a New York robbery by three teenagers toting cheap handguns. Soon after that, the Bleks founded Citizens for the Prevention of Gun Violence, based in Laguna Hills. It lobbies for gun control legislation and provides research materials on gun sales and dealers.

That group will continue, but the Bleks believe the new organization can help put pressure on Congress and state legislators to adopt what they see as reasonable gun control legislation. It is buoyed by a $4.3-million grant from the private Richard and Rhonda Goldman Foundation, based in San Francisco. Besides covering lobbying expenses, part of the funds will go toward providing victim resource coordinators. Susan DeVoss, resource coordinator for Southern California, said the aim is to create a support network for gun victims.

Mary Leigh Blek said that those who have lost loved ones to gun violence suffer “a pain so intense you feel it will surely kill you.”

Other speakers at Tuesday’s Long Beach news conference were Joy Turner, a perinatal nurse from Lawndale, and Lacreta Scott, who teaches English at Cerritos College. Her husband, Assemblyman Jack Scott (D-Altadena), is the sponsor of numerous gun control bills.

Both Turner and the Scotts lost sons to gun trauma.

Turner’s son Hank, 19, was shot to death in 1989 near the family home in Compton. Turner was further scarred by gun violence when her son’s funeral had to be postponed because gang members driving by the church opened fire while visitors gathered outside.

“One would think after 10 years that this would be easier,” Turner told the media. “But a part of you is missing forever.”

The Scotts’ son Adam, 27, was killed in 1993 when the host at a party brought out four guns to show his guests. One was loaded and accidentally fired.

“A simple trigger lock and our son would be alive today,” Lacreta Scott said.

St. Mary’s spokesman Steve Sibilsky said the hospital agreed to host the press conference as a show of support for the Bell Campaign.

“We care about the things that affect the health of our community; guns are one of them,” he said.

Other members of the Bell Campaign were present, among them the Rev. Karen Stoyanoff of Huntington Beach, whose stepson committed suicide with a revolver in 1986.

“He’d tried to kill himself twice before by other means,” she said. “It wasn’t until he managed to get hold of a gun that he succeeded.”

Stoyanoff said she sees the Bell Campaign as a vehicle for people like herself to get involved in the gun control debate. Though not all members will be victims, the group’s charter requires that victims dominate the national board.

Besides Long Beach, press conferences were held Tuesday in Atlanta, Chicago, Honolulu, New York, Denver, San Francisco and Washington, D.C.

Information on membership is available from the group’s San Francisco headquarters at (800) RINGING (746-4464).