Lots of typical anti-gun quotes. I especially found the shadows they attempt to cast over these evil guns quiite scary. It's a shame these people lost loved ones but the article potrays the guns as the reason the murders happened. As always you can't have a good anti-gun article with a Police Chief's Association chiming in, I think it is actually required. I didn't know the  IACP was also against departments trading-in or selling their service pistols and them getting into the hands of the public, oh the horror

Seeing Crime Guns Destroyed Gives Solace to Victims' Families Published: January 4, 2006 SOUTH PORTLAND, Me. - Kelly DeCambra made her way through a seven-inches-an-hour snowstorm to a dingy Maine State Police garage where, among the brake parts, transmissions and a flat-bed tow truck, she hoped to find a fragment of solace. It would come in the form of a Ruger .44 Magnum Super Blackhawk revolver, caked with blood and the memory of Ms. DeCambra's son, 21-year-old Lionel St. Hilaire, who was shot to death with it last year. The mother had come to watch the gun that was used to kill her son be sawed into pieces in an acrid plume of white-hot sparks. Ms. DeCambra's act of witness was made possible by a law Maine enacted in 2001 that requires handguns used in homicides to be destroyed when they are no longer needed for evidence. Before that, guns were often sold or auctioned by police departments to raise money for other equipment. Gun control advocates, gun rights supporters, and law enforcement officials say they believe that Maine is the only state where the police allow victims' relatives to watch a gun's destruction, and the acts of witness are arranged informally by the police, not spelled out in the law. Supporters of the law, including the Maine Chiefs of Police Association, acknowledge that in a state like Maine, which in the last decade averaged about 20 homicides a year, destroying such weapons takes only a few guns out of circulation. But the requirement that crime guns be destroyed reflects a trend among police departments nationwide. A few states, including New York and Wisconsin, require at least some guns to be destroyed, and others, like Washington, have rescinded bans on destroying guns used in crimes. Several municipalities have passed ordinances to prevent crime guns from being sold, and the International Association of Chiefs of Police passed a resolution six years ago encouraging police departments to destroy guns used in crimes . "It's just a culmination of factors," said Gene Voegtlin, the association's legislative counsel, based in Alexandria, Va. "Did police agencies really want to be in a situation where they were offering guns back to the public? A lot of the weapons that are confiscated aren't necessarily the highest quality, so there are some safety issues involved, liability issues involved." The association's resolution urges police departments not to sell their old police guns or trade them in to a manufacturer for new ones, a practice that began to be common in the 1990's. Efforts to prevent the resale of guns have been spurred partly by highly publicized crimes like those committed by Buford O. Furrow Jr., a white supremacist who in 1999 used a gun that had once belonged to the police department in Cosmopolis, Wash., to wound five people at a Jewish community center in Los Angeles and kill a Filipino-American postal worker. Although some police departments destroy guns, often by melting them down, others, usually smaller departments, still sell them. "You got to use every penny you can get," said Roberto Fulgueira, the police chief in Sweetwater, Fla., who last year traded in his officers' old Glocks and some crime guns, saying he needed about $15,000 for new Glocks for his 65 officers. With the money, he said, "I bought all my men guns, I bought bulletproof vests, and I still have a credit." Maine's law came about because of Debbie O'Brien, a Kennebunk woman whose 20-year-old son, Devin, was shot to death in 1996. When she learned that the state police would probably sell the gun used to kill her son, Ms. O'Brien said her reaction was, "Oh, my God, the police are here to help you and the next thing you know they're turning around and selling a gun, making money off my dead son." Ms. O'Brien lobbied for the proposed law, saying that she told the state police, "Look, if you need money, let's do bake sales." "You're in hell," she said. "You're just struggling to have a life, and then I realized that would include the gun." William Harwood, a gun control advocate in Maine, and Robert M. Schwartz, executive director of the Maine Chiefs of Police Association, said the original proposal was for all crime guns to be destroyed. But because of the state's strong hunting lobby, they said, the final law included only handguns used in homicides. "To be candid," Mr. Harwood said, "the legislation had as much symbolic importance as it does deterrence." But the symbolism is powerful, said Ms. O'Brien, who watched the .22-caliber handgun used to kill her son be cut up six years after his death. "It was just a very important day for my husband and I," she said. "This was a weapon that changed our lives."

http://www.nytimes.com/2006/01/04/national/04guns.html

So, I guess that anything that a criminal touches should be destroyed. That means the place where the crime was committed, the house where the criminal stayed, anyone who had any contact with the criminal, and so on and so forth...

Fucking idiots...

This thread is worthless without pi.....wait,,no no,,please do not post any pics.

UCR for 2004, Table 20:  17 murders in Maine, 9 by firearm.   The total is listed as 18 elsewhere, but either way it's not exactly "newsworthy".   The rate per 100,000 is among the lowest in the country (along with NH, IA, ND, SD).  The highest  per 100,000 was LA (all caused by the Halliburton Hurricane Machine no doubt), with DC and Puerto Rico coming in even higher.  

http://www.fbi.gov/ucr/cius_04/

Check it out folks, you too can put in more research than the average newpaper reporter in just five short minutes!

Whatever..........

My hometown..........

Quoted: Lots of typical anti-gun quotes. I especially found the shadows they attempt to cast over these evil guns quiite scary. It's a shame these people lost loved ones but the article potrays the guns as the reason the murders happened. As always you can't have a good anti-gun article with a Police Chief's Association chiming in, I think it is actually required. I didn't know the  IACP was also against departments trading-in or selling their service pistols and them getting into the hands of the public, oh the horror Seeing Crime Guns Destroyed Gives Solace to Victims' Families Published: January 4, 2006 SOUTH PORTLAND, Me. - Kelly DeCambra made her way through a seven-inches-an-hour snowstorm to a dingy Maine State Police garage where, among the brake parts, transmissions and a flat-bed tow truck, she hoped to find a fragment of solace. It would come in the form of a Ruger .44 Magnum Super Blackhawk revolver, caked with blood and the memory of Ms. DeCambra's son, 21-year-old Lionel St. Hilaire, who was shot to death with it last year. The mother had come to watch the gun that was used to kill her son be sawed into pieces in an acrid plume of white-hot sparks. Ms. DeCambra's act of witness was made possible by a law Maine enacted in 2001 that requires handguns used in homicides to be destroyed when they are no longer needed for evidence. Before that, guns were often sold or auctioned by police departments to raise money for other equipment. Gun control advocates, gun rights supporters, and law enforcement officials say they believe that Maine is the only state where the police allow victims' relatives to watch a gun's destruction, and the acts of witness are arranged informally by the police, not spelled out in the law. Supporters of the law, including the Maine Chiefs of Police Association, acknowledge that in a state like Maine, which in the last decade averaged about 20 homicides a year, destroying such weapons takes only a few guns out of circulation. But the requirement that crime guns be destroyed reflects a trend among police departments nationwide. A few states, including New York and Wisconsin, require at least some guns to be destroyed, and others, like Washington, have rescinded bans on destroying guns used in crimes. Several municipalities have passed ordinances to prevent crime guns from being sold, and the International Association of Chiefs of Police passed a resolution six years ago encouraging police departments to destroy guns used in crimes . "It's just a culmination of factors," said Gene Voegtlin, the association's legislative counsel, based in Alexandria, Va. "Did police agencies really want to be in a situation where they were offering guns back to the public? A lot of the weapons that are confiscated aren't necessarily the highest quality, so there are some safety issues involved, liability issues involved." The association's resolution urges police departments not to sell their old police guns or trade them in to a manufacturer for new ones, a practice that began to be common in the 1990's. Efforts to prevent the resale of guns have been spurred partly by highly publicized crimes like those committed by Buford O. Furrow Jr., a white supremacist who in 1999 used a gun that had once belonged to the police department in Cosmopolis, Wash., to wound five people at a Jewish community center in Los Angeles and kill a Filipino-American postal worker. Although some police departments destroy guns, often by melting them down, others, usually smaller departments, still sell them. "You got to use every penny you can get," said Roberto Fulgueira, the police chief in Sweetwater, Fla., who last year traded in his officers' old Glocks and some crime guns, saying he needed about $15,000 for new Glocks for his 65 officers. With the money, he said, "I bought all my men guns, I bought bulletproof vests, and I still have a credit." Maine's law came about because of Debbie O'Brien, a Kennebunk woman whose 20-year-old son, Devin, was shot to death in 1996. When she learned that the state police would probably sell the gun used to kill her son, Ms. O'Brien said her reaction was, "Oh, my God, the police are here to help you and the next thing you know they're turning around and selling a gun, making money off my dead son." Ms. O'Brien lobbied for the proposed law, saying that she told the state police, "Look, if you need money, let's do bake sales." "You're in hell," she said. "You're just struggling to have a life, and then I realized that would include the gun." William Harwood, a gun control advocate in Maine, and Robert M. Schwartz, executive director of the Maine Chiefs of Police Association, said the original proposal was for all crime guns to be destroyed. But because of the state's strong hunting lobby, they said, the final law included only handguns used in homicides. "To be candid," Mr. Harwood said, "the legislation had as much symbolic importance as it does deterrence." But the symbolism is powerful, said Ms. O'Brien, who watched the .22-caliber handgun used to kill her son be cut up six years after his death. "It was just a very important day for my husband and I," she said. "This was a weapon that changed our lives." http://www.nytimes.com/2006/01/04/national/04guns.html

LoL, I guess she has never heard of the Death Tax, .gov has been making money of dead people for a long time.  Hell, if the kid had insurance, SHE'S making money of her son, dumb bitch.

ME is ok, but we do have a few real nutsacks in local .gov and some anti-freedom groups that grab as much press as possible, as often as possible, and REALLY turn on the drama.

fuck that.  I'd always pick up the weapon of my enemy and then use it.  It's like sweet justice.

So, if their kid dies in an automobile crash do they sit solemnly by and watch them cut it up into little pieces too? What if their kid drowns in a pool? Do the police cut up the pool? If little Jimmy gets poisoned at a bad sushi place, do they surgically remove the sushi and cut it up for the parents?

This is some of the dumbest $hite I've ever heard.

People convicted of killing someone with a gun should be shot to death with the gun they used in the original crime

Damn antis. ME has some of the least restrictive gun laws in the country, but somehow they have a very low homicide rate of which 10 out of 19 were commited with a firearm. They can't criticize the lax gun laws as being a problem, so they find some other angle to get themselves in the news.

www.maine.gov/dps/Docs/2004DPSANNRPT.pdf Note: PDF file


MAINE’S 19 HOMICIDES DURING 2004

3/10 TURNER James McManus, 82, beaten, stabbed and run over by a car. Shaun Tuttle, 21, and
David Lakin, 22, charged with murder.

4/21 MASARDIS Michael MacDonald, 57, shot, stabbed and beaten in his home. His son, Michael
MacDonald, 25, is charged with murder. DOMESTIC

5/14 PORTLAND Lisa Deprez, 42, dies three days after being found severely beaten in her apartment.
Her longtime boyfriend from whom she has separated from, Gregory Erskine, 50, is charged with
murder. DOMESTIC

5/17 YARMOUTH Julius Petrovic, 60, is shot to death in his SUV in the parking lot of the Yarmouth
Information Center in a robbery attempt. Shawn Hopkins, 28, and his brother, Ryan Hopkins, 22, are
charged with murder.

6/4 WALDOBORO Mark Dugas, 39, is stabbed to death in his home. His wife, Amy Dugas, 32, is
arrested for assault; and is indicted for murder in July. DOMESTIC

6/8 BIDDEFORD Rafael Rosado III, 26, shot to death outside his home. Investigation continues.

7/2 LEE Rosemarie Dyer, 51, is shot in the leg inside her home. She dies of her wound two days later
on 7/4. Her husband, Carl Dyer, 50, is charged with manslaughter. DOMESTIC

7/16 HOLLIS Lionel St. Hilaire, 21, is shot and killed by his friend, Zachary Fenderson, 22, who then
shots and kills himself. MURDER-SUICIDE

/21 BOOTHBAY HARBOR Chevelle Calloway, 41, and Sarah Murray, 71, are shot and killed at
Murray’s home. Jon Dilley, 51, is charged with two counts of murder. Victims were his wife and his
mother. TWO CASES – DOMESTIC

9/5 LEWISTON Jamilah Shabazz, 32, stabbed in his girlfriend’s apartment. Tarino Botelho, 32, is
arrested and charged with murder on 10/22. DOMESTIC

9/8 FORT KENT Stephen Vance Ketzel, 2, dies from blunt force internal injuries. Scott Saucier, 26, the
boyfriend of the boy’s mother is charged with manslaughter. DOMESTIC

9/11 LEWISTON Shawn Fitzsimmons, 24, is shot to death by Brandon Knight, 19, who is handling a
handgun inside an apartment. Knight is indicted in October for manslaughter.

9/20 ELLSWORTH Daniel Wallace, 50, is kicked and beaten and dies from his injuries on 10/9. Jack
Wentworth, 18, a friend of Wallace’s daughter, is indicted on 12/7 for manslaughter and elevated
aggravated assault.

9/29 BROOKS Janet Bacon, 60, is shot to death inside the home of Jerome Reynolds Jr., 54, who is
arrested for murder.

10/21 PORTLAND Jarmaine Ramirez, 16, stabbed to death in the hallway of his apartment house.
Antwane Mills, 18, and his brother, Brandon Mills, 20 are charged with murder.

10/25 ANSON Wayne Crowley, 32, shot to death at a friend’s house. Homeowner Gary Watland, 42,
charged with murder.

11/3 DIXFIELD Nancy Smith, 47, shot to death by longtime companion, Melvin Rocky Bishop, 57, who
shots and kills himself. MURDER-SUICIDE – DOMESTIC

11/30 FARMINGDALE Janet Hagerthy, 74,
beaten to death at her home. Her son-in-law, David Grant,
54, is charged with murder. DOMESTIC

.... she said. "This was a weapon that changed our lives."

All by itself?

kind of reminds me of the Band of Brothers episode when the guy kills himself with the German Luger he took off the guy he shot...  Then accidently kills himself with it hours later.  Then it's given to his best friend a few days later...    If it was me I wouldn't want the gun, looking at it would only remind me of my dead friend and nothing else.   I don't blame the mother for enjoying seeing the gun destroyed... the article is slanted but I don't think there is anything wrong with the act itself or the law...  

Would you want to own a gun that you know was used to murder someone?   Now I'm not talking about an M-1 Garande that has 24 check marks on it for each German killed... but a gun that was used to murder a family of four while they slept?   If you want to own something like this you are fucking warped!!!

If they enjoy seeing the gun destroyed, they should LOVE the death penalty