From: Ndunlks@aol.com
Subject: SNET: [piml] Lawmakers warn of high-powered sniper rifle sales
Date: 5 May 1999 01:46:01 -0400
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Lawmakers warn of high-powered sniper rifle sales

By JIM ABRAMS
Associated Press Writer

WASHINGTON (AP) - Military sniper rifles like those used to stop Iraqi tanks 
during the Gulf War are now in the hands of thousands of civilians, including 
suspected terrorists and drug dealers, according to congressional 
investigators.

Agents from the General Accounting Office, the investigative wing of 
Congress, found that long-range, armor-piercing .50-caliber rifles are 
readily available through dealers, gun shows and the Internet. Buyers only 
need to prove that they are 18 years old and don't have a criminal record.

The agents also told a Democratic-organized hearing Monday that sellers of 
armor-piercing ammunition used in the semiautomatic weapons were willing to 
do business with them even when the agents, pretending to be buyers, said 
they wanted to attack armored limousines or "take a helicopter down."

GAO agent Robert Hast said the long-range weapons gained popularity after 
they were used to attack Iraqi tanks in the 1991 Persian Gulf War. The 
weapons are highly accurate up to 2,000 yards - meaning a marksman could 
stand at the Lincoln Memorial in Washington and hit a target at the Pentagon 
in Virginia - and can be effective at distances of 7,500 yards.

Most deer hunters, by contrast, shoot at ranges of 150 to 200 yards.

Gast said that because gunmakers are not required to provide information on 
the caliber of weapons they sell, it's not clear how many of the high-powered 
weapons are in circulation. But one major producer sold more than 2,800 to 
civilians in the 1987-98 period, he said.

The Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms has tracked several of those 
sniper rifles to a Mexican drug cartel, suspected terrorists, a mentally ill 
cop killer and the Branch Davidians during the 1993 siege near Waco, Texas.

"There is a subculture growing in this country about the use of these 
weapons," said Tom Diaz of the Violence Policy Center, calling them "the 
ideal tool for assassination and destruction."

Diaz urged Congress to pass legislation putting .50-caliber rifles under the 
same restrictions imposed on machine guns and weapons of war, and banning 
armor-piercing ammunition.

Rep. Rod Blagojevich, D-Ill., who commissioned the investigation with Rep. 
Henry Waxman, D-Calif., plans to offer legislation restricting sales of the 
weapon.

James Schmidt, head of an Arizona ammunition manufacturer and a director for 
the 50-Caliber Shooters Association, said the rifles were not a social threat 
because they were heavy, costly at more than $6,000 and difficult to use for 
rapid-fire shooting. "This is not a rifle that one would carry very far," he 
said.

Diaz said the weapons were being sold in "an increasingly weird cultural 
context" that "glorifies the sniper mystique."

He said two .50-caliber sniper rifles were used by the Branch Davidians in 
the 1993 siege near Waco, Texas, one reason law enforcement officials had to 
use armored personnel carriers.

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