From: [75321 3407] at [compuserve.com] (Charles Zeps)
Newsgroups: talk.politics.guns
Subject: Feds Join In DC Gun Crackdown
Date: 11 Mar 1995 08:28:51 -0600

AP 10 Mar 95 15:40 EST V0039
 
Copyright 1995 The Associated Press. All rights reserved.
 
The information contained in this news report may not be published, broadcast or
otherwise distributed without the prior written authority of the Associated
Press.
 
   WASHINGTON (AP) -- Federal officers are teaming with local police in a
crackdown on illegal guns in the nation's capital. 
   The plan, dubbed "Operation Cease-Fire," calls for special anti-weapons teams
to be dispatched to six of the city's seven police districts, U.S. Attorney Eric
Holder said Friday. 
   Each team will have at least one agent from the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco
and Firearms assigned to trace confiscated weapons. Some teams will include U.S.
marshals to allow them to cross from the district into suburban Maryland and
Virginia to pursue suspects. 
   "We have stressed the need to address this problem in a regional way, and I
think this represents an unprecedented amount of law-enforcement talent," Holder
said after a closed meeting of more than 70 federal, local and state
law-enforcement officials. 
   Last year the Metropolitan Police Department and other agencies confiscated
more than 4,200 illegal guns in the District of Columbia, which has one of the
nation's highest murder rates. 
   Illegal guns are assumed to far outnumber legally registered weapons in
Washington. In practice, no gun licenses are issued in the district except for
law-enforcement officers, said Kevin Olson, a spokesman for the U.S. attorney's
office. 
   "Operation Cease-Fire" include traffic stops and what Holder calls "special
enforcement operations" to get illegal guns. Holder pledged the seizures would
be "proper and constitutional," but did not elaborate. 
   The plan includes a proposal for upgrading possession of an illegal firearm
from a misdemeanor to a felony. The proposal is now before the city council,
where its fate is uncertain. 
   Holder pledged to appoint a firearms prosecutor to handle cases developed
during the operation. 
   He also has endorsed a citywide curfew for teens under 16, an idea that has
been revived in the city council after being rejected last year.