RICHMOND, Virgini — A legislative panel on Wednesday rejected a proposal to require background checks of buyers at gun shows, then sent the bill — supported by families of the victims of the Virginia Tech massacre — on for further study. The referral likely kills the proposal for this year's General Assembly session after a House committee rejected similar legislation last week. Andrew Goddard, whose son Colin was wounded in the April 16 shootings at Virginia... (GunPolicy.org)

RICHMOND, Virginia — A bill that would have restricted certain gun sales in Virginia and that had received passionate support from survivors of the Virginia Tech massacre was defeated by a Senate committee Wednesday, ending the major gun control effort of this year's General Assembly session. The legislation had failed repeatedly over the years but had taken on a greater urgency this year because of the April 16 shootings. Supporters had said this year was their best... (GunPolicy.org)

Twelve members of a notorious crime gang went on trial yesterday in the Guangdong provincial capital. Reading aloud from an 11-page indictment, the prosecution accused Deng Weibo and Gong Nanmin, the two leaders of the gang, and their cohorts of organizing secret societies, illegally producing, owning and trading weapons, gathering to engage in fights, injuring and blackmailing people and other serious crimes between the second half of 2004 and the first half of last... (GunPolicy.org)

Last week, the Bush administration put troubling distance between itself and principled Second Amendment defenders. We refer to the amicus brief that Solicitor General Paul Clement filed Friday in support of the plaintiffs in District of Columbia v. Heller — the D.C. gun-ban challenge, widely expected to be the court's most significant gun-rights case in 60 years when a decision is reached. The brief sides with the D.C. plaintiffs seeking to exercise their Second... (GunPolicy.org)

The fall in the annual crime rate in England and Wales is accelerating, with a drop of 9% recorded by the police in the year to September 2007, according to Home Office quarterly figures published yesterday. The continuing decline in police recorded crime, which includes a substantial 17% drop in robbery, a 16% fall in serious violence and a 9% reduction in sexual offences, is matched by a 4% fall in crime as measured by the British Crime Survey over the same... (GunPolicy.org)

The spiralling problem with gun culture was highlighted by figures that show 28 firearms crimes are committed in England and Wales every day. Home Office figures showed gun crimes rose by four per cent last year, the largest increase for three years. It follows a crackdown unveiled by Jacqui Smith, the Home Secretary, after the shooting of 11-year-old Rhys Jones by another boy in Liverpool last August. Police chiefs said the figures were concerning, while Tories... (GunPolicy.org)

The brother of one of the Real IRA's founders has been arrested in Lithuania while allegedly trying to buy arms for the dissident Irish republican terror group. Michael Campbell, 35, was arrested in Vilnius on Tuesday in a "sting" involving the local police, Garda Síochána, Interpol and British security services. An unnamed Irish woman was detained alongside Campbell as he allegedly tried to negotiate a deal with a police agent who was posing as an international arms... (GunPolicy.org)