For Immediate Release

CeaseFire Maryland welcomes the introduction of us senate legislation to strengthen the federal assault weapons ban and will work toward its enactment

July 30th, 2003

CeaseFire Maryland Joins Broad and Growing Coalition of Support for Bill Introduced by Senator Lautenberg to Match McCarthy/Conyers House Bill

Baltimore, Maryland, July 30th, 2003: CeaseFire Maryland, formerly Marylanders Against Handgun Abuse, announced its strong support for S.1431, the "Assault Weapons Ban and Law Enforcement Protection Act of 2003" introduced several days ago by Senators Frank Lautenberg (D-NJ) and Jon Corzine (D-NJ). This legislation, which matches House Bill HR.2038, will not only make the assault weapon and high-capacity magazine ban permanent, but will significantly strengthen current law.

The Federal Assault Weapons Ban (AWB), enacted in 1994, will expire in September 2004, unless renewed by Congress and signed by the President. The AWB was intended to cut off the manufacture and sale of assault weapons. However, as Leah Barrett, Executive Director of CeaseFire Maryland said: "The existing ban cries out for strengthening. The gun industry has cravenly circumvented the intent of the law and continues to make assault weapons despite the 1994 ban, by making slight, cosmetic design changes in their ‘post-ban’ guns to evade the law. We in Maryland know only too well that the Bushmaster, a post-ban AR-15 clone used by the Washington area snipers to kill ten and injure three last October, is a perfect and deadly example of the way the gun industry has skirted the 1994 law." Besides the Bushmaster, many other ‘post-ban’ versions of AK-47s and AR-15s, guns banned by name by the 1994 law, are flooding the civilian market.

Let’s be clear - assault weapons are designed for war and have no place on our streets or in our neighborhoods. These guns, civilian versions of military weapons, are made for one purpose only, to kill as many people as possible as quickly as possible, and are favorites of cop-killers, drug dealers, militias, gangs and even terrorists. Al Qaeda training manuals advise terrorists to take advantage of liberal American gun laws to obtain such killing weapons. Assault weapons are particularly dangerous to police officers. A Violence Policy Center study released in May, 2003 revealed that 1 in 5 police officers killed in the line of duty between January 1,1998 and Dec. 31, 2001 was killed with an assault weapon.

Matt Fenton, President of CeaseFire Maryland, said: "While the gun industry has cynically evaded the intent of the law and continues to make assault weapons for civilian sale, scores of Americans continue to die, including law enforcement officials, and our country is endangered by the ability of terrorists to stockpile such weapons. We are thrilled that Senators Lautenberg and Corzine have introduced a bill to not only make the Assault Weapons Ban permanent but also to strengthen it, closing the loopholes that make possible the manufacture of AR-15 clones like the Bushmaster. We are pleased that this bill matches the McCarthy/Conyers bill in the House. Congress must pass these bills to get these weapons of war off American streets and to keep them out of the hands of potential terrorists."

Leah Barrett concluded: "We welcome the President’s and Attorney General’s support for an assault weapons ban. We expect them to support these bills to outlaw these lethal guns, particularly at a time when everyone is concerned about the safety of our police officers and the security of our homeland."

For evidence of the slaying of law enforcement officers by assault weapons see http://www.vpc.org/studies/officecont.htm.