12/02 Schumer Not Truthful

Schumer Not Truthful
by
Larry Pratt

U.S. Senator Charles Schumer (D-NY) is one of the most rabid, anti-Second Amendment, anti-self-defense, gun-grabbers in the Congress.

In a recent Associated Press story (10/21/02), Phil Singer, a spokesman for Schumer , defended his boss’ advocacy of a national ballistics database saying such a system would rely on “hard facts.” But, Schumer has relied on anything but “hard facts” in his attack on a preliminary California study dealing with ballistics imaging. In fact, Schumer has played fast and loose with the truth and he has been caught saying something that is not true.

On this issue, if Schumer was Pinocchio, his nose would be roughly the size of the Washington Monument.

Hallye Jordan, Press Secretary for California Attorney General Bill Lockyer, says that Schumer is wrong, that the preliminary findings of a report on ballistics imaging have not been “discredited,” as Schumer said recently on a nationally-televised news interview program. This preliminary report is titled “Technical Evaluation: Feasibility Of A Ballistics Imaging Database For All New Handgun Sales.” It is authored by Frederic A. Tulleners, Laboratory Director, Sacramento and Santa Rosa Criminalistics Laboratories, Bureau of Forensic Services, California Department of Justice.

On NBC’s Meet The Press program (10/20/2002), Schumer was confronted with part of this study which says: “Automated computer matching systems do not provide conclusive results. When applying this technology to the concept of mass sampling of manufactured firearms, a huge inventory of potential candidates will be generated for manual review. This study indicates the number will be so large as to be impractical and will create logistical complications so great they cannot be effectively addressed.”

Replying to these quotes, Schumer said, in part: “That study has been discredited. The head of the department of that study, who discredited it said the man who did it was biased.” But, in an interview, Hallye Jordan, Press Secretary for California Attorney General Bill Lockyer, says this is not true. She says: “That’s incorrect. It has not been discredited. The preliminary report raised some concerns and issues that we are seeking further input on as part of our ongoing evaluation.”

Noting that the preliminary findings in this report are “sound science,” Jordan says these findings “raise concerns about the efficiency and feasibility of this kind of system.” She adds: “Our forensic scientists believe that in these findings that there is going to be some problems with guns eroding and criminals [altering] their guns and markings and images. And we understand that.” In a separate statement, Attorney General Lockyer says this preliminary report is the work of “some of the world’s foremost experts on firearms and database technology.”

Jordan says Attorney General Lockyer has not repudiated any of the findings in the preliminary report. She says the final report will be out in about six months and what is in the preliminary report “could very much be” in the final report.

When Phil Singer, a press spokesman for Schumer, was asked how some of the preliminary findings of this study had been “discredited,” he cited an October 18, 2002, article in The New York Times by Fox Butterfield. This article, however, does not support what Schumer said. Thus, the only thing “discredited” here is Schumer’s own credibility which, on guns, was already zero.