Another accident as gun ban extremists continue to oppose gun accident prevention education

On the heels of yet another tragic, preventable accident in Ohio involving a minor child gaining unauthorized access to a loaded firearm, anti-gun State Rep. Bill Patmon (D-10) has once again run to the microphones to promote his Mandatory "Safe" Storage of Firearms legislation. Patmon has been pushing the idea, which has been tried and has failed in other states, for years now. He introduced HB 563 in the 129th General Assembly. That bill was never considered, and it died at the end of the session in 2012. Patmon then reintroduced the bill as HB 31 in the 130th General Assembly. It again failed to be given serious consideration, and died at the end of 2014. Early in 2015, Patmon reintroduced the bill a third time, this time as HB 75. And he is quick to use accidental shootings involving children to push his anti-gun agenda.

From the Columbus Dispatch:

Whether by accident or neglect, someone made it possible for the 4-year-old old boy to find a loaded gun, which he fired, wounding his 3-year-old sister.

Gun-safety advocates cited the shooting last week in the Franklinton neighborhood as another sad reminder of Ohio’s need for a child-access prevention law.

Such measures, enacted in 27 states, generally require adults to store guns safely and securely wherever children could be present, or face criminal liability. State Rep. Bill Patmon, a Democrat from Cleveland, has tried multiple times to enact a so-called CAP law and introduced a bill again this year. But he said too many Ohio legislators listen more to the powerful gun lobby, which calls safe-storage laws unnecessary and ineffective, than to anguished voices in their communities.

“It’s almost as though we’re ignoring a quiet riot,” Patmon said. “It just doesn’t make sense."

According to Everytown for Gun Safety, a national anti-gun-violence movement, at least 174 unintentional shootings involving children 17 or younger have occurred nationwide since Jan. 1, including 13 in Ohio. Five of the Ohio cases resulted in deaths. The group tracks incidents through news reports.

“We know (from surveys) that approximately 1 in 3 handguns is kept loaded and unlocked,” said Jennifer Thorne, executive director of the Ohio Coalition Against Gun Violence. “And most kids know where their parents keep guns.”

The fact that not everyone would follow the requirements of a child-access prevention law doesn’t negate the need and the potential benefits, she and Patmon said. Laws and safety standards eventually seep into the public consciousness, they said, increasing awareness and compliance.

For the Columbus Dispatch to refer to Patmon, Everytown for Gun Safety and the Ohio Coalition Against Gun Violence as "gun-safety advocates" is ignorant at best, and intentionally deceptive at worst. These people do absolutely NOTHING to advocate for the safe handling of firearms, nor do they assist in the effort to teach children what to do if they find a gun - something the NRA, BFA and gun manufacturers do every day. In fact, OCAGV's founder, Toby Hoover, is on record (see below) as opposing the instruction of children in Ohio schools on what to do if they find a gun. "Gun-safety advocates?" Hardly.

As for Rep. Patmon's HB 75, the bill is based on several anti-gun myths, and would be impotent at solving the problems it purportedly seeks to address.

From the publication Gun Facts:

Myth: "Safe storage" laws protect people

Fact: 15 states that passed "safe storage" laws saw 300 more murders, 3,860 more rapes, 24,650 more robberies, and over 25,000 more aggravated assaults in the first five years. On average, the annual costs borne by victims averaged over $2.6 billion as a result of lost productivity, out-of-pocket expenses, medical bills, and property losses. "The problem is, you see no decrease in either juvenile accidental gun deaths or suicides when such laws are enacted, but you do see an increase in crime rates." 271
Fact: Only five American children under the age of 10 died of accidents involving handguns in 1997.272 Thus, the need for "safe storage" laws appears to be low.
Fact: In Merced California, an intruder stabbed three children to death with a pitchfork. The oldest child had been trained by her father in firearms use, but could not save her siblings from the attacker because the gun was locked away to comply with the state's "safe storage" law.273

Myth: Trigger locks will keep children from accidentally shooting themselves

Fact: 31 of 32 models of gun locks tested by the government’s Consumer Product Safety Commission could be opened without the key. According to their spokesperson, "We found you could open locks with paper clips, a pair of scissors or tweezers, or you could whack them on the table and they would open."347
Fact: 85% of all communities in America recorded no juvenile homicides in 1995, and 93.4% of communities recorded one or no juvenile arrests (not convictions) for murder.348
Fact: In 1996, even though there were around 80 million people who owned a firearm, there were only 44 accidental gun deaths for children under age 10, or about 0.0001%.349
Fact: California has a trigger lock law and saw a 12% increase in fatal firearm accidents in 1994. Texas doesn't have one and experienced a 28% decrease in the same year.350 Also: trigger-locks render a firearm inaccessible for timely self-defense.
Fact: Children as young as seven (7) years old have demonstrated that they can pick or break a trigger lock; or that they can operate a gun with a trigger lock in place.351 Over half of non-criminal firearm deaths for children over age seven are suicides, so trigger locks are unlikely to reduce these deaths.
Fact: If criminals are deterred from attacking victims because of the fear that people might be able to defend themselves, gunlocks may in turn reduce the danger to criminals committing crime, and thus increase crime. This problem is exacerbated because many mechanical locks (such as barrel or trigger locks) also require that the gun be stored unloaded.

Myth: More children are hurt with guns than by any other means

Fact: Barely more than 1% of all unintentional injury deaths for children in the U.S. between ages 0-14 are from firearms.362
Fact: The Center for Disease Control, a federal agency, agrees. According to them, in 1998, children 0-14 years died from the following causes in the U.S. 363

Myth: If it saves the life of one child, it is worth it

Fact: Firearms in private hands are used an estimated 2.5 million times (or 6,849 times each day) each year to prevent crime;372 this includes rapes, aggravated assaults, and kidnapping. The number of innocent children protected by firearm owning parents far outweighs the number of children harmed.

If Rep. Patmon truly wishes to make a difference in the lives of children, he should start by supporting efforts to educate children on what to do if they find a gun.

"STOP! Don't Touch! Run Away! Tell a Grown-up!"

These simple commands have been taught to over 28 million children via the the Eddie Eagle GunSafe® Program. When children are taught what to do if they find a gun, accidents like these are much less likely to happen.

While I believe this important material should be mandated to be taught in every classroom in Ohio, the ultimate responsibility for teaching children what to do if they find a gun rest with parents. Parents must teach this to their children whether or not they keep a firearm in their home, for the simple fact that the child will not always be in the home. As this latest example shows once again, the potential exists for children to come into unauthorized, unsupervised contact with a firearm, and only proactive education by their parents can prevent a negative outcome when they do.

Teaching children what to do if they find a gun is no different than teaching a child that ovens should always be considered hot, that matches and lighters are not to be played with, or that they should not talk to strangers. Most of us do not make a habit of keeping strangers in our homes, yet no one would debate the importance of educating our children about potential predators.

Believe it or not, there is actually a group of people involved in fighting against efforts to educate children on this important information: gun ban extremists (or as the Columbus Dispatch likes to call them, "gun-safety advocates").

In 2001, a group of nurses evaluated more than 80 gun accident prevention programs designed to help kids learn what to do if they find a gun, and published the results of their study in the Journal of Emergency Nursing Online. The study named The Eddie Eagle GunSafe® Program as one of the very best. Additionally, Eddie Eagle has been endorsed by the National Safety Council, the U.S. Department of Justice and the National Sheriff's Association. Yet because this program was devised by people involved with the National Rifle Association (NRA), gun ban extremists do everything they can to make certain that children are not taught the important lessons this curriculum contains.

The Eddie Eagle GunSafe® Program has no agenda other than accident prevention - ensuring that children stay safe should they encounter a gun. Despite the fact that the program prohibits the use of Eddie Eagle mascots anywhere that guns are present, gun ban extremists have taken to disparaging Eddie Eagle as "Joe Camel with feathers".

Indeed, because of her hatred for the NRA, the OGACV's Toby Hoover either lied or betrayed her ignorance about gun safety (a topic about which journalists insist on presenting her as an expert) about the proven effectiveness of this program to The Columbus Dispatch in 2007, saying "There isn't a program out there that has proven effective."

"There isn't a program out there that has proven effective." The nurses behind the Journal of Emergency Nursing Online study heartily disagree.

Unfortunately, the myth created by the gun ban crowd, who claim to be proponents of safety ("if it saves the life of just one child..."), has taken root in many places.

In 2003, when the Ohio legislature had the good wisdom to set aside funds for elementary schools to purchase curriculum materials for The Eddie Eagle GunSafe® Program, the extremists were deeply critical:

"Just like the alcohol and tobacco industries have worked to find ways to reach out to underage consumers, Eddie Eagle is one component of the NRA's efforts to reach out to underage gun consumers," [Violence Policy Center Executive Director Josh] Sugarmann said.

Evidence that the lies told by gun ban extremists' had taken root was revealed when the funds the General Assembly set aside for schools were pulled after one budget cycle - too few schools took advantage of it.

It is because of comments like Hoover's and Sugarmann's that I place a large share of the blame for accidents on gun ban extremists, who are putting their desire to weaken a political enemy ahead of children's lives.

It is important to note that while voluntarily choosing to lock firearms should certainly be among the safe storage options parents consider, efforts by the state to mandate such a practice are dangerous and ineffective. According to analysis by Dr. John R. Lott Jr. and as published in his book The Bias Against Guns:

Safe storage laws have no impact on accidental gun deaths...

The impact of safe storage laws is consistent with existing research indicating that the guns most likely to be used in accidental shootings are owned by the least law-abiding citizens and thus are the guns least likely to be locked up after passage of the law. The safe storage laws thus increase crime, yet fail to produce any significant change in accidental deaths or suicides.

The answer truly is education, and if Rep. Patmon is truly concerned about helping prevent accidents, he would drop gun control measures like HB 563 HB31 HB 75, and instead work to ensure that Ohio schools be required to teach all children what to do if they see a gun.

Chad D. Baus is the Buckeye Firearms Association Secretary, BFA PAC Vice Chairman, and an NRA-certified firearms instructor. He is the editor of BuckeyeFirearms.org, which received the Outdoor Writers of Ohio 2013 Supporting Member Award for Best Website, and the proud father of two Eddie Eagle GunSafe® Program graduates.

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