From: [am 3 z] at [andrew.cmu.edu] (Albert Peter Michael)
Newsgroups: talk.politics.guns
Subject: PA Waiting Periods
Date: 11 Mar 91 15:39:24 GMT

From "Waiting Periods: The Pennsylvania Record"  by Alan S. Krug, Ph. D.

...
In Pennsylvania, we have had for many years a 48 hour waiting period.
Obviously, this is not sufficient time for the Pennsylvania State Police
to run their criminal history record check of the handgun purchaser. ...
One might assume that the result is numerous criminals obtaining
handguns with which to commit violent crimes. Actually, the result is
nothing of the sort. The state police are not concerned as to how long
the waiting period is as they find so few would-be purchasers with
crimes-of-violence convictions anyway. The average is something like two
a year. In these cases, a trooper is sent to pick up the gun. The
purchaser always surrenders same when he is informed that he is
ineligible to purchase - there has never been any problem in this regard
- he had no criminal intent, simply did not realize that he was not
eligible to purchase because of some probably long ago conviction.

This situation has resulted in some state police staff advocating that
the Uniform Firearms Act be changed to eliminate the intial
application-to-purchase paperwork. ... Administrative costs to the
Pennsylvania State Police would be substantially reduced. [ Note: This
article is from '88. As of  last Spring, this change has not been
made.]...

Equally interesting is the track record of handgun purchasers in the
years following their purchase. In this connection, a very important
program was begun by the Pennsylvania State Police on January 1, 1982.
This involved the microfilming and automated indexing of all "Record of
Sale of Firearm" submitted to the PSP. A conversion process of
previously submitted records, which dated back to 1931, commenced at the
same time and continues to be an ongoing effort. To date, all such
records of firearms purchased by individuals with a last name beginning
with the letter A through O have not only been microfilmed and indexed
but subjected to a criminal history record check. About 1,500,000
purchasers have now been processedin this excercise.

The result? Only 207 persons, over a period of 57 years, were determined
to possibly have committed a crime that would make them ineligible to
possess a firearm under Pennsylvania law since they made their purchase.
After investigation of 109 of these cases, charges were brought against
14 individuals, of which three have been convicted. Two cases were
turned over to the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, and Firearms.
Investigations in the remaining 98 cases are continuing.

These data ... also refute the claim of the anti-gunners that the
law-abiding gun owner of today is likely to become the emotionally
distraught or intoxicated murderer of tomorrow.

For the past several years, I have been collecting data on the
misbehavior of persons holding licneses to carry firearms on the person
or in a vehicle pursuant to the provisions of the Uniform Firearms Act.
... To date, I have been able to document only a single instance of any
license holder committing an act of violence with a firearm, this since
1934. License revocations are few and far between. ...they are
apparently never for commission of violent crimes...


-----

Keep in mind that here in Pittsburgh, we had like 34 murders in '89,
which was almost twice the numbers for '88. Around here, when we have a
crime wave, it's pretty tame... Please don't be misled by Philadelphia,
it's not part of Pennsylvania... we're waiting for it to be annexed by
Jersey. (Funny that Philly is the only part of the state with it's own
special little gun laws... )  Why could it be that areas with tough gun
laws have high crime? Why is it that the surrounding areas, with their
"easy availability," and all don't seem to have the same crime rates?
Gee, could it be that gun control isn't crime control? (An interesting,
though perhaps only slightly related  thought: Last night on Expose,
some guy in LA said that the gangs were the police forces of the
neighborhoods. Makes sense, you got the Bloods, the Crips, the LAPD,... 
Who runs the place? The gangs, at least as much as the police, if
there's a difference. Seems like Chief Gates needs to try something
new...)

Al

------------------------------------------------------------------------