DA candidates spar over gun control priorities
Friday, April 17th, 2009
Six men hoping to become Philadelphia's next District Attorney shared their plans for fighting gun violence with a group of area residents whose loved ones were murdered. Discussion about gun control laws, which have failed to gain traction with state lawmakers, dominated last night's forum which was hosted by Ceasefire PA.
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Democrat Michael Turner says over the decades efforts to pass local gun legislation have failed because the laws have not been correctly identified as a "civil rights issue."
Turner: In 2007, 82 percent of the homicide by gun victims here in Philadelphia were black, a majority of the police officers who have been gunned down here in Philadelphia have been gunned down in African American neighborhoods. The legislators who are in Harrisburg, who are preventing Philadelphia from enacting its own gun laws, are white.
The need to push legislation requiring gun owners to report if weapons are lost or stolen was echoed by the other candidates. The Democrats include Brian Grady, Dan McElhatton, Dan McCaffrey, Michael Turner, and Seth Williams. Republican Michael Untermeyer is running unopposed in the primary.