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But on a more positive note

The world may be two steps away from nuclear destruction, but the good news is that Canadians won’t be able to shoot each other with handguns. Except the ones purchased illegally, of course.

{ 11 comments… add one }
  • DaninVan 12.09.05, 4:44 PM

    As long as the courts are handing out ‘Conditional Sentences’ for everything short of mass murder (those just plain walk…Air India) why would anyone seriously give possession a second thought, especially, you know, if they really need one say for club hopping?

  • John Palubiski 12.09.05, 6:29 PM

    Handguns for club hopping, eh?

    Well every time Bugsey Seigal or Al Capone brandished a loaded handgun the joint really jumped!

    See “Some Like it Hot” for more deatails!

  • DaninVan 12.09.05, 6:50 PM

    I’m not exaggerating, JohnP; it’s endemic here, or so the cops and media would have us believe. In the last year, the cops recovered 250 illegal guns in the Lower Mainland, 90% of which they’ve identified as having been imported through Washington State. If they’ve recovered 250, how many are still out there? It’s not Joe Average that’s buying them.

    Gunmen jailed for 30 months after targeting wrong home in revenge plot

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    Jane Seyd, North Shore News
    Published: Friday, December 09, 2005

    NORTH VANCOUVER – Konaam Shirzad, 23, wanted to get even with a man who had testified against him and helped put him behind bars.

    So while he was in jail, the North Vancouver man phoned his friend and fellow gang member Nam Hoang and asked him to “take care” of his problem, Crown counsel Gordon Matei told a B.C. Supreme Court judge this week.

    Days later, just before midnight, three bullets hit a Fromme Road house in Lynn Valley. Matei said witnesses saw a man crouching in front of the house, holding a gun and firing into the front window.

    But the gunman had the wrong house — his intended victim lived two doors away — and narrowly avoided hitting two residents.

    In B.C. Supreme Court Tuesday, Associate Chief Justice Patrick Dohm sentenced Shirzad to 30 months in prison after Shirzad pleaded guilty to mischief endangering life.

    The violent saga began when Shirzad was charged with assault causing bodily harm and assault with a weapon after beating up Mohammad Ghazi with a set of brass knuckles on Nov. 4, 2003.

    Quinn Tooley was one of the witnesses who testified against Shirzad during a B.C. Supreme Court trial in May, 2004. The day after he testified, Tooley was sitting in the back of the courtroom when Shirzad turned around and mouthed the words, “You’re dead,” Matei said.

    Shirzad was subsequently found guilty of both assault charges. Shirzad then phoned Hoang from jail and asked him to “take care” of the witnesses who testified against him.

    Both Shirzad and Hoang are members of a “Red Scorpions” gang, said Matei.

    In a phone conversation on June 9, Hoang told Shirzad “he was going to take care of the things they had discussed,” said Matei. The shots were fired at the Lynn Valley house after that.”

  • DaninVan 12.09.05, 6:51 PM

    Not a whole lot of Anglo-Saxon names in that mix, eh?

  • John Palubiski 12.09.05, 7:19 PM

    You know Dan, almost no one in the east ever talks about this. I hear a lot of reports from Toronto concerning gang violence and shootings, but virtually nothing about Vancouver.

    You mentioned something the other day, as well, about the number of homocides over the past few years and I found the statistics alarming.

    Then again, so many CBC Newsworld reports center on Toronto.

  • DaninVan 12.09.05, 7:23 PM

    Check this out John;
    BY THE NUMBERS

    7.1 million — number of firearms currently registered (as of Sept. 30, 2005)

    400,000 — approximate number of registered firearms that are handguns. According to a Liberal party spokesman there are 560,000.

    172 — gun-related homicides in Canada in 2004, 112 involving a handgun

    65 — per cent of those homicides committed with a handgun

    44 — number of those homicides committed with an unregistered gun

    19 — number committed with a registered gun

    109 — number committed where registration was unknown or firearm wasn’t recovered

    71 — total gang-related homicides in 2004

    70.4 — per cent of those gang-related homicides involving a gun

    20.7 — per cent of those non-gang related homicides involving a gun

    Two-thirds — proportion of homicides in Canada that have involved a handgun since 2001

    414 — number of prohibited firearms seized at the Canadian border in 2005

    621 — prohibited firearms seized at the Canadian border in 2004

    15,965 — firearms licences that have been refused or revoked for public safety reasons between Dec. 1, 1998 and Sept. 30, 2005

    14 — maximum years in jail a person faces for using a firearm while committing a first-time offence such as manslaughter or attempted murder

    10 — maximum years in jail a person faces for possessing a loaded prohibited weapon without authorization

    319 — shooting ranges in Ontario that are authorized by the Chief Firearms Office

    216 — gun clubs in Ontario that are authorized by the Chief Firearms Office

    3,321 — number of violent incidents involving a handgun in 2004, according to 68 police departments, which represents 46 per cent of national crime levels

    Source: Statistics Canada, Canada Border Services Agency, Canada Firearms Centre, Chief Firearms Office of Ontario, Criminal Code.
    © The Vancouver Sun 2005

    I’ll try to find some stuff about the gang/drug wars out here, to post.

  • DaninVan 12.09.05, 7:35 PM
  • John Palubiski 12.12.05, 2:48 PM

    This is amazing! I just read the Board of Trade article you link to, DinV, and I can’t believe it! So BC is second only to the District of Columbia in terms of crime?

    I lived and worked in Vancouver for a while in the late 70’s, but back then is was a laid-back lotus-land with crime being very low on anyone’s list of priorities. Also, in those days criminal/youth gangs, the most probable reason for the violence, were almost unknown.
    Times sure have changed.

  • DaninVan 12.13.05, 1:37 AM

    John, this can be laid squarely at the Feds front door; they’re f**king deaf!
    The local and Provincial governments have been pleading for both stricter laws and effective Justice (not to mention the huge shortfall in funding for those). What do they get? Conditional sentencing, revolving door arrest-bail-reoffend, often before the cops literally have done the paperwork on the first offence. That’s actually misleading, most of these perps are habitual criminals. The cops claim that between 10 and 20 guys are responsible for 80 -90% of car thefts and similar statistics for other property crime.
    THAT’s largely why we moved out of the city…no regrets there.
    Don’t get me wrong, Vancouver and environs are still really laid back…just make sure you don’t leave anything valuable in your car (or your house if you really don’t want to lose it 🙁

  • DaninVan 12.13.05, 1:40 AM

    ….oh yeh, I meant to add to the list of Feds sins: wide open immigration.
    With it came the gang and drug problems.

  • dady 09.21.07, 4:25 AM

    u guys are a bunch of fuckin goofs
    all talk shit ill fuckin never herd anybuddy disrespect me or anybuddy im with and u guys talk all this shit behind a computer eh? if u see a gangster why dont u speak ur mind to him?

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