Ex-3 Doors Down bassist gets 10 years on gun charge

This is an example of extremism. The Canadian Press is reporting that "The founding member and former bassist of the rock band 3 Doors Down has been sentenced to 10 years in Mississippi state prison for possession of a firearm by a felon. News outlets report Jackson County Circuit Court Judge Robert Krebs gave Todd Harrell the maximum penalty during a hearing Thursday."

"Authorities responded to Harrell's home after an alarm went off in June. Harrell's wife told deputies they had got into an argument that turned physical. While deputies were talking to the couple, they noticed guns and drugs in the home. Harrell had served two years in prison for causing a fatal crash in Nashville in 2013. He testified in 2015 that he had been addicted to prescription drugs and was speeding.'

Here's the deal. In the United States it is a Constitutional right to bear arms. Except for felons. Felons aren't allowed to vote or posses guns. One can conceivably rationalize a firearm ban if someone had used a firearm to commit a criminal offense but not for a DUI. A guy gets a DUI and he's banned from voting or owning a gun for the rest of his life? That's a bit extreme as is giving him a ten year sentence for exercising his constitutional right to own a gun. That's more than someone gets in Canada for manslaughter less mandatory statutory release.

Here in Canada criminals who have used a firearm to commit a criminal offense can get a lifetime firearm ban but that means absolutely nothing because it is never enforced. Blaze had a lifetime firearm ban before he committed two subsequent criminals acts with firearms and virtually nothing is done about it. Especially after he started lying for, I mean cooperating with, the police.

If we want to reduce gun violence we need to enforce firearm bans on criminals who have used firearms to commit criminal offenses. Not on law biding citizens. Stephen Harper was wrong. Mandatory minimum sentences for the simple possession of a firearm is not right. Mandatory minimum sentences for using a firearm to commit a criminal offense is. There's a huge difference.

Addressing gun violence with the New York Model