GUN EPIDEMIC PRESCRIPTIONS

When a career criminal and self-described "reputed gangster" chooses
to violate a weapons ban and arm himself with an automatic assault
rifle, the public has every right to feel threatened.

Gun violence has become epidemic, as three killings within 24 hours in
Vancouver this week demonstrate. Efforts to deal with the problem have
been ineffective and fragmented.

On the same day as the shootings, Brian Lynn Morrison was sentenced to
three years in penitentiary for weapons and drug offences. The B.C.
Supreme Court in Victoria had heard Morrison posted videos on YouTube
showing him blasting away at a couch with an AR-15 assault rifle.

Knee-jerk get-tough-on-crime policies serve no purpose and are often
counter-productive. The courts need the flexibility to make decisions
that reflect the circumstances of a particular offence.

But Morrison is 37. He has had 36 convictions since he turned 19. He
has been under a lifetime firearms ban since 2003, when he was
convicted of robbery after an armed raid on a Sidney jewelry store.
His criminal career has continued since then.

He is, based on a lifetime of evidence, dangerous. His willingness to
ignore the firearms ban adds to the public danger.

Under those circumstances, the three-year sentence is inadequate,
especially as double credit for pre-trial detention -- considered hard
time -- will reduce the total time in custody to something like 18
months.

The Criminal Code allows imprisonment for up to 10 years for the
offence. The Crown had asked for five to eight years.

Given the deadly and increasing role guns are playing Canadian crime,
this sentence warrants an appeal. The consequences of using firearms
- -- especially after a lifetime ban has been imposed -- must be severe
to deter serious criminals.

Solicitor General John van Dongen promises other measures to deal with
gun violence. Some are obvious, such as introducing a co-ordinated
response to gang activity instead of the current fragmented and
ineffectual efforts.

Others, like increased sentences for gun crimes, are relatively simple
changes that can be made at the federal level.

It's also time for fundamental changes. It is difficult to see any
justification for legal handguns in Canada's urban centres. While
governments have talked about reducing the flow of illegal weapons
across the border, police statistics show about half the guns used in
gang and gun crime in Canada were stolen or diverted from legal ownership.

As long as there are some 500,000 handguns in circulation, many will
end up in criminals' hands.

And it is time to recognize that gangs and guns are linked
inextricably to the huge profits in the drug trade. Those profits are
possible because of a failed, prohibition-based drug strategy. It's
time to begin legalizing and controlling distribution as part of an
entirely new approach to reducing the damage done by guns.