National Post (National Edition)

Stats disprove theory of black market guns

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So much for the theory of a “surge” in guns being sold by licensed Canadian owners into the black market. A widely cited news story — one that has contribute­d directly to the ongoing debate over gun control in Canada amid calls for new draconian laws — has been undone by an unlikely source: the Toronto Police Service.

The story, published by The Canadian Press in July and widely reprinted elsewhere (including by this newspaper), quoted a Toronto police detective saying that the supply of guns being used for crime in Canada was increasing­ly being met by Canadian suppliers exploiting our existing gun laws.

“They go get their licence for the purpose of becoming a firearms trafficker,” Det. Rob di Danieli told the CP. “A lot of people are so ready to blame the big bad Americans, but we had our own little problem here.”

The CP story also notes, “The number of guns obtained legally in Canada but are then sold to people who use them for criminal purposes has surged dramatical­ly in recent years compared to firearms smuggled from the United States, Toronto police say.”

Evidently that’s not true. Last month, the Toronto police released 11 years of detailed statistics to an Alberta-based researcher who filed a Freedom of Informatio­n request. The statistics were published to his website, and were then highlighte­d by Global News this week. The report revealed how the stats released by the Toronto police to the researcher directly contradict the claims made in the CP interview. The Toronto police’s own data do not show a surge in guns being linked to domestic sources. In fact, that trend is generally down. The five most recent years are also the five years with the fewest crime guns traced back to Canadians.

Perhaps there’s an innocent explanatio­n for this. Perhaps it’s a matter of definition­s or data organizati­on? The Canadian Press and the Toronto police apparently did not respond to Global’s request for comment; maybe they will, and all will be explained.

In the meantime, though, the argument that Canadian gun owners are increasing­ly a source of the guns used by organized crime groups in this country is simply not supportabl­e. This runaway narrative was spun out of an assertion by a single source, a source now apparently contradict­ed by the statistics of his own employer. There’s enough misinforma­tion about gun crime around as it is. This correction should give pause to those politician­s in Ottawa and Toronto who have cited that latest dubious factoid to justify their demands for yet wider bans.

But it probably won’t.

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