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| Firmer action needed on gun crime, says MP |
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South Norfolk MP Richard Bacon has called for firmer action on gun crime, as a new report finds that violent crime involving a firearm doubled between 1998-99 and 2005-06. Mr Bacon said: “Gun crime is becoming a more and more worrying problem. The government should be taking much firmer action to deal with gun crime. They now have a plan to establish a ballistic analysis system to link firearms to individual crimes, but you have to wonder why on earth this wasn’t this being done already?”. |
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| The Home Office says
it will establish a ballistics analysis system. American law enforcement agencies have been using such a system for over a decade. |
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Mr Bacon, MP for South Norfolk, was speaking as the National Audit Office published its report on reducing the risk of violent crime today. Over the period 1998-99 to 2005-06, recorded crimes involving a firearm more than doubled from 5,200 to 11,100 and, although this fell to 9,700 in 2006-07, Home Office figures show that gun deaths rose by 18 per cent the same year. The Home Office is seeking to make it easier to track gun usage by introducing a national ballistics analysis system which will use forensic analysis to link weapons to individual crimes. In the United States, Federal, State and local law enforcement agencies have used the Integrated Ballistic Identification System (IBIS) since 1993 to record and compare gun crime evidence. In that time, IBIS has recorded over 1,286,500 pieces of evidence and logged over 20,300 ‘hits’
21 February 2008 There were 59 fatal injuries involving firearms in 2006/07, up 18 per cent from 50 offences recorded in 2005/06. Source: Page 39, Home Office Statistical Bulletin: Homicides, Firearm Offences and Intimate Violence 2006/07. See also: 
NAO REPORT:
Reducing the risk of violent crime
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| © Richard Bacon 2008 | ||||||||
