Canada blames U.S. for gun violence

cnn ^ | 12-27-05

[LouAvul]

TORONTO, Ontario (AP) -- Canadian officials, seeking to make sense of another fatal shooting in what has been a record year for gun-related deaths, said Tuesday that along with a host of social ills, part of the problem stemmed from what they said was the United States exporting its violence.

Canadian Prime Minister Paul Martin and Toronto Mayor David Miller warned that Canada could become like the United States after gunfire erupted Monday on a busy street filled with holiday shoppers, killing a 15-year-old girl and wounding six bystanders -- the latest victims in a record surge in gun violence in Toronto.

The shooting stemmed from a dispute among a group of 10 to 15 youth, and the victim was a teenager out with a parent near a popular shopping mall, police said Tuesday.

"I think it's a day that Toronto has finally lost its innocence," Det. Sgt. Savas Kyriacou said. "It was a tragic loss and tragic day."

While many Canadians take pride in Canadian cities being less violent than their American counterparts, Toronto has seen 78 murders this year, including a record 52 gun-related deaths -- almost twice as many as last year.

"What happened yesterday was appalling. You just don't expect it in a Canadian city," the mayor said.

"It's a sign that the lack of gun laws in the U.S. is allowing guns to flood across the border that are literally being used to kill people in the streets of Toronto," Miller said.

[B Knotts]

I wasn't referring to any particular incident...just wondering about the effect of Canadian immigration (and especially asylum) policy on the violent crime rate in Toronto.

[TexasTransplant]

I don't read CNN Scread (normally)

Not disappointed, they live up to their Standard

Anti-American, Anti-Gun, their Government knows best (sarc)



PS
(Canadians need to remember they are Americans too!)

[FreedomPoster]

>>Any word on the -- er -- uh -- ethnic identity of the shooter?

The only pic I saw, of one of the perps being arrested, showed only the back of the guy's head. You couldn't see face, you couldn't see hands or arms, only hair.

[-=[_Super_Secret_Agent_]=-]

black. Suprise???

[samadams2000]

Lets take over that country one Saturday and begin dumping our garbage there on Monday.

[RFEngineer]

""It's a sign that the lack of gun laws in the U.S. is allowing guns to flood across the border that are literally being used to kill people in the streets of Toronto,"

So close the border and utopia will be restored....sheesh, what's so hard about that?

[Travis McGee]

As I understand it, Jamaican and other imported groups are responsible for most of Canadian "gun crime."

[SkyPilot]

The arrogance of the statements by the Canadians in this article are appalling.

Do they really believe they are a people without sin? What hubris.

They should be ashamed of themselves.

[cake_crumb]

Leave it to a leftist moonbat to blame someone else for a problem THEY caused. I hear Canada is planning to tighten up even MORE on the gun control. Yeah, THAT'LL learn those criminals. Worked so well in Britain.

[Normal4me]

I'd kill people too if I lived in Canada...

[TexasTransplant]

Scread = Screed

[lesser_satan]

LOL!

[McGavin999]

How many years have we been on their southern border? And only NOW we've become a bad influence? LOL, guess they have to blame somebody.

[kingu]

Cradle to grave social programs result in higher amounts of violence by disaffected youth who don't have to look to either the present or the future because someone else will take care of them and their family.

It has happened everywhere these grand social experiments have been tried, and not happened where it wasn't. The guns have nothing to do with it, nor what countries are next door.

Add in ethnic mixes where everyone's culture is supposed to be valid and you have a mini-UN on every block, and we all know how great that worked out.

[M203M4]

This is a problem of gangs, not guns. Violent crime needs much harsher penalties. Bring back the death penalty in Canada and start eliminating these scum from the gene pool. Sorry, but criminals have a tendency to make more criminals, either by association or birthright. Removing my civil liberties because they refuse to deal with criminals properly really pisses me off.

[GianniV]

File this one in the old "I don't give a rats ass" file.

[luvbach1]

Were the guns apprehended?

[Ramius]

John Thompson, a security analyst with the Toronto-based Mackenzie Institute, says the number of guns smuggled from the United States is a problem, but that Canada has a gang problem -- not a gun problem -- and that Canada should stop pointing the finger at the United States.

"It's a cop out. It's an easy way of looking at one symptom rather than addressing a whole disease," Thompson said.

Exactly. And in that way, the same as the U.S. If you take the gang (and even then, mostly inter-gang) violence out of the statistics you will find that violent crime in even the largest U.S. cities is very low-- except for that gang-related crime.

Nowhere in Canada (or the rest of the world for that matter) has there been anything even remotely like the inner city gang culture that has infested our cities. As that cancerous subculture is allowed to take root elsewhere, they'll see similar results.

[Semi Civil Servant]

Toronto has seen 78 murders this year, including a record 52 gun-related deaths -- almost twice as many as last year.

I guess the U.S. efforts to double shooting deaths in one year in Canada have been working. /sarcasm

What logic!

[thathamiltonwoman]

Instead of America perhaps the Canadians should take an honest look at their Jamaican immigrants.