Phoenix Police using federal laws to flush the 2nd amendment down the toilet (I know it has already been flushed down the toilet but i like to bitch) Original Article Gun crime = hard time Armed felons drawing long federal terms Judi Villa The Arizona Republic Feb. 12, 2005 12:00 AM Bruce Lowry went to prison for 19 years for possessing 10 bullets. Joshua Dowling is serving 15 years, not for the burglary he was caught doing but for the gun he had with him when he was arrested. And, in Phoenix, after a jury acquitted Jacob Price of murder, police nailed him for illegally possessing guns, and he went to prison for 23 years. Across the Valley, law enforcement agencies and prosecutors are trying to get a handle on gun violence by cracking down harder on career criminals who continue to possess weapons when they shouldn't. The idea is simple: Identify criminals who are prohibited gun possessors, catch them with guns and prosecute them, whenever possible, under tougher federal gun laws. They get harsher prison sentences, keeping them off the streets for longer and, ultimately, cutting crime. "We can wait until these guys are busted or we can intervene before the bodies start to pile up," said Special Agent John MacKenzie of the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives. "How do you minimize the violent crimes? You get out there and follow these guys around." Nearly two years ago, MacKenzie started Project ARROW, an innovative, pro-active effort to identify violent felons coming out of prison and target those most likely to get another gun. In Phoenix, police recently formed a Gun Enforcement Squad to better utilize federal laws to target traditionally local crimes and bolster sentences for "prohibited possessors," those forbidden from having a gun under any circumstances. Prohibited possessors include felons, convicts on probation, parole or any type of community supervision, undocumented immigrants, the mentally ill and those who have renounced their U.S. citizenship. Included is anyone convicted of domestic violence, even a misdemeanor. Under federal law, a prohibited possessor with three violent felony convictions is considered an "armed career criminal" and can be sent to prison for life, even for having ammunition. The minimum sentence is 15 years. "The guys we're seeing carrying the guns are violent people," Phoenix police Detective Darrell Smith said. "They're not burglars. These are the guys out there doing home invasions, armed robberies and carjackings. Those are the ones we need to target." The Valley's efforts are reflective of a national push to eradicate gun violence and are largely driven by Project Safe Neighborhoods, a nationwide billion-dollar effort to reduce gun crimes. U.S. Attorney for Arizona Paul Charlton called the program "the frontline in the battle against gun crimes." Charlton said it is widely recognized in law enforcement that 80 percent of the crimes are committed by 20 percent of the people. "If you can focus on those 20 percent and find them with weapons and put them away," Charlton said, "then you can go a great way in reducing crime." The cases are pretty simple to make. Catch a guy with a gun. Prove the gun is functioning. Show that he's a prohibited possessor, and there's the case. There's not a whole lot of defense. Police efforts are not a sweep of people who possess guns legally. Authorities are looking for armed career criminals, not law-abiding citizens. "We see these guys get picked up by patrol," Smith said. "They get booked. They get out. We see some guys with five, 10, 15 felonies, and they're still running around with a gun. "They're only carrying a gun for one reason, and that's to hurt or kill somebody." In 2003, gun-related homicides nationwide climbed to a six-year high, with 9,638 such murders. In Arizona, firearms were used in 282 murders in 2003, up 11.5 percent from 2002. Guns are the most commonly used weapons in violent crimes. Traditionally, though, police have rarely thought much about tacking on gun violations in cases of murder, robbery, even burglary and domestic violence. And criminals often escaped stiff federal penalties as authorities routinely pursued the most serious state charges without considering federal ones. But partnerships between police and federal and state prosecutors have spurred landmark changes in how gun crimes are handled. Just having a gun illegally can result in lengthy prison stints or add years to a sentence. And if a suspect is acquitted on the original charge, like Price was, he may not get off on the gun charges. "We're really serious about doing whatever we can and stopping the violence," Phoenix police Lt. Rich Benson said. In the first year of Project ARROW, MacKenzie sifted through the records of nearly 700 felons, evaluating their violent histories and their propensity to use guns in crimes. He identified 96 targets for surveillance, including Lowry, a leader of the Aryan Brotherhood prison gang with a lengthy rap sheet; and Dowling, who also had multiple felony convictions. About 52 percent of MacKenzie's targets were re-arrested, and nearly half of those were prosecuted for federal firearms violations, not for committing new crimes. "We want to catch them before they do it," MacKenzie said. "It's trying to intervene before the violent crimes really get out of hand." Phoenix's Gun Enforcement Squad now evaluates everyone arrested with a gun to see if he or she can be prosecuted federally. If that's not possible, weapons misconduct charges still can be tacked on by the state to extend sentences. The gun squad also keeps tabs on convicted criminals moving into certain areas of the city, investigates gun shop burglaries and tracks crime guns, entering bullets and casings into a national database to try to link them to unsolved crimes. When Ronald Page, 34, was caught burglarizing a Phoenix pawnshop recently, detectives ran a background check to see if he was a felon - he wasn't - then evaluated the case to determine if state or federal charges would wield more prison time. Before the gun squad, Page, who had outstanding warrants, likely would have just been charged with burglary and could have ended up on probation or with minimal jail time. Now, though, he'll also face a federal charge for possessing guns, the stolen ones, while under indictment. "We're not going to let this guy take a plea and get put on probation for a couple years," Smith said. "Those guns would have ended up on the streets in some felons' hands." Gun crime prosecutions in Arizona, like those nationwide, have more than doubled in recent years. In fiscal 2004, 156 cases were prosecuted in Arizona, most involving felons in possession or suspects using firearms during violent crimes or drug transactions. "Our communities are tired of the violence, the senseless violence, the violence that's created by guns," Benson said. "These people are going to get some healthy time, and the community will end up being safer because of it."