By Dave Workman | Senior Editor
Gun owners in the Virginia are concerned that threatened changes in the Commonwealth’s gun laws could mean an uptick in crime, according to a recent report by WTVR News in Richmond.
There may be some credit to their worries, based on what has happened in Washington State in the years since gun prohibition lobbying groups started running multi-million-dollar citizen gun control initiatives. Claiming restrictions on law-abiding gun owners will help reduce crime, Evergreen State anti-gunners have pushed through three measures and may be considering a fourth this year.
After Washington voters passed Initiative 594, a “universal background check” measure in 2014, the yearly homicide numbers actually started creeping up.
According to the annual FBI Uniform Crime Reports, there were 209 homicides in Washington, including 141 involving firearms in 2015, the year after I-594 passed. The next year, 2016, saw a drop in murders overall (195) and those involving guns (127). But in 2017, slayings climbed to 228 with 134 of those gun-related, and in 2018, there were 232 killings, with 138 involving guns.
After Seattle adopted a special tax on the sale of firearms and ammunition in 2015 that was supposed to bring in $300,000 to $500,000 annually, murders actually went up. In 2016, Seattle police logged 59 non-fatal shootings and 11 fatalities, according to data on the department’s website. The next year (2017) saw 67 non-fatal shootings and 16 gun-related slayings, the data shows. In 2018, the city had 67 non-fatal shootings and 13 gun-related slayings.
Adding insult to injury, the actual gun tax revenue never came close to predictions. In 2016, the city collected $103,766.22 and reported 18 murders. In 2017, the revenue shrank to $93,220.74 and there were 28 slayings. In 2018, the city took in only $77,518 with its gun/ammunition tax, and posted 32 murders. By last Dec. 16 there had been 73 non-fatal shootings and 18 gun-related homicides, with complete data not yet posted. There had been 27 homicides by mid-November. TGM has not yet received information on gun tax revenue for 2019.
