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Cars jam the parking lot as shoppers leave Hoffman's Gun Center with their purchases in Newington, Conn., Tuesday, April 2, 2013. Customers are packing gun stores around Connecticut following the unveiling of new gun-control legislation, which could take effect as soon as Wednesday evening. (AP Photo/Charles Krupa)

Run on assault rifles in Conn. ahead of ban

Last updated Tuesday, April 2, 2013 - 4:41pm

NEWINGTON, Conn. — Only a few parking spaces were free and customers lined up 50-deep Tuesday at Hoffman’s Gun Center, on what may be one of the last days that stores are allowed to sell assault-style weapons and high- capacity ammunition magazines.

“Whenever the government tells me I can’t do something, I want to do it,” John O’Lenechuck, 32, said after he bought a part for a semiautomatic AR-15 rifle, which would be banned under a proposed bill that could be approved as soon as Wednesday. “I need to get it while it is still legal.”

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National School Shield Task Force Director, Asa Hutchinson speaks during a news conference at National Press Club in Washington, on Tuesday, April 2, 2013. The National School Shield program is a frame work to arm security guards in any school system who want to be part of the program. (AP Photo/Jose Luis Magana)

NRA proposes program to train school staff as armed guards

Alan Fram The Associated Press

Last updated Tuesday, April 2, 2013 - 4:00pm

WASHINGTON -- The Senate gun control debate on the near horizon, a National Rifle Association-sponsored report on Tuesday proposed a program for schools to train selected staffers as armed security officers. The former Republican congressman who headed the study suggested at least one protector with firearms for every school, saying it would speed responses to attacks.

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Utah gun lobbyist has AR-15 rifle stolen from car

Contributed The Associated Press

Last updated Friday, March 29, 2013 - 1:13pm

SALT LAKE CITY -- Police say a semi-automatic rifle belonging to the head of the state's biggest gun lobby has been stolen.

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Herbert signs bill allowing Utahns to turn guns over to police

Contributed The Associated Press

Last updated Friday, March 29, 2013 - 1:14pm

SALT LAKE CITY -- Gov. Gary Herbert has signed legislation allowing Utah residents to temporarily hand guns over to police if they're concerned someone in their home may be a threat.

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Former Tucson, Ariz. mayoral candidate Shaun McClusky poses with a shotgun at Black Weapons Armory in Tucson, Thursday, March 28, 2013. The weapon is similar to those to be given away as part of a privately funded program he is launching to provide residents in crime-prone areas with free shotguns so they can defend themselves against criminals. (AP Photo/Ross D. Franklin)

Gun proponents giving away shotguns in crime-ridden neighborhoods

Cristina Silva The Associated Press

Last updated Friday, March 29, 2013 - 9:31am

TUCSON, Ariz.-- A campaign promising free shotguns for people to protect themselves in Tucson's most troubled neighborhoods has divided some residents in a community still reeling from a shooting rampage in 2011that killed six people, left a congresswoman and several others wounded, and made the city a symbol of gun violence in America.

The Armed Citizen Project is part of a national campaign to give shotguns to single women and homeowners in the nation's crime-ridden neighborhoods, an effort that comes amid a national debate on gun control after mass shootings in Arizona, Colorado and Connecticut.

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President Barack Obama urges Congress to take action on measures to protect children from gun violence, Thursday, March 28, 2013, while speaking in the East Room of the White House in Washington. Standing with Obama are Vice President Joe Biden, and, according to the White House, law enforcement officials, victims of gun violence, and others, who the White House did not want to name. (AP Photo/Susan Walsh)

Obama pushes gun-control agenda

Philip Rucker The Washington Post

Last updated Thursday, March 28, 2013 - 2:37pm

WASHINGTON — President Barack Obama delivered a forceful and emotional plea to lawmakers Thursday to pass his gun-control agenda, saying “shame on us if we’ve forgotten” the elementary school massacre in Newtown, Conn.

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Colo. school district arms super, principal

Thomas Peipert The Associated Press

Last updated Tuesday, March 26, 2013 - 5:48pm

CORTEZ, Colo. -- As lawmakers across the country debate arming teachers and administrators to prevent another deadly school shooting, one Colorado school district has voted to let its superintendent and a high school principal carry concealed semi-automatic pistols on campus - a move some say sidesteps laws meant to keep schools gun-free.

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Colorado Gov. John Hickenlooper brings a folded flag to the family of Tom Clements during the public memorial for the chief executive of the Department of Corrections at New Life Church in Colorado Springs, Colo on Monday, March 25, 2013. Clements was shot and killed on the doorstep of his Monument, Colo. home last week. (AP Photo/The Gazette, Jerilee Bennett, Pool)

Sheriff won't enforce new Colo. gun laws

Jennifer Oldham Bloomberg News

Last updated Tuesday, March 26, 2013 - 2:03pm

DENVER — Days after Gov. John Hickenlooper, D, signed Colorado’s toughest gun-control laws in more than a decade, some sheriffs are denouncing them as unenforceable, even in a state that has seen two of the worst mass shootings in U.S. history.

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Kelly said he planned on turning the gun over to Tucson police. | AP Photo

Ariz. store won't sell assault rifle to Gabby Giffords' husband

Josh Vorhees Slate

Last updated Tuesday, March 26, 2013 - 12:29pm

TUCSON, Ariz. -- Maybe it’s more difficult than we all thought to purchase an AR-15-style rifle.

Well, at least if you make it very clear that you never plan to actually fire it.

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In this photo combo, Wayne LaPierre, left, CEO of the National Rifle Association, makes remarks at CPAC 2013, at the Gaylord National Resort & Convention Center in National Harbor, Md., Friday, March 15, 2013; and at right, New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg speaks to the Economic Club of Washington, Wednesday, Sept. 12, 2012, in Washington. Two of the loudest voices in the gun debate say it's up to voters now to make their position known to Congress. LaPierre and Bloomberg claim their views on guns have the support of the overwhelming number of Americans. (AP Photo, Ron Sachs, Manuel Balce Ceneta)

NRA leader says NYC mayor wants to buy gun control support with ads

Aaron Blake The Washington Post

Last updated Monday, March 25, 2013 - 1:24pm

WASHINGTON — National Rifle Association head Wayne LaPierre said Sunday that New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg, I, is trying to “buy America” by spending millions from his personal fortune to urge key senators to vote for gun control.

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Shanda Smith of Washington, who lost two children to a mistaken-identity shooting, does not believe owning guns is a good way to counteract gun violence. (Washington Post photo by Sarah L. Voisin)

Gun deaths: Whites shoot selves; blacks shot by others

Dan Keating The Washington Post

Last updated Monday, March 25, 2013 - 9:43am

Gun deaths are shaped by race in America. Whites are far more likely to shoot themselves, and African Americans are far more likely to be shot by someone else.

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Why more SWAT-style raids? A 'militarized' world

Tim Gurrister Standard-Examiner

Last updated Sunday, March 24, 2013 - 7:56am

OGDEN — Law enforcement officials agree: Police execute a “door kick” somewhere in Weber County, on average, once every week.

The forced entries range from a welfare check, when neighbors become concerned as newspapers pile up on someone’s porch and the family car is parked in the driveway.

At the other end of the spectrum are the full-on, SWAT-style raids with helmeted officers battering down a door unannounced, such as the Sept. 16, 2010, entry that left the suspect, Todd Blair, fatally shot.

Officials point to the frequency of door kicks, in police parlance, that occur without publicity or complaint as proof they’re benign — only a small percentage go awry. They steadfastly maintain they are crucial, the swift deployment necessary for officer safety and to keep suspects from destroying evidence.

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Gun supporters use of Nazi, Hitler references irritates historians

Adam Geller The Associated Press

Last updated Saturday, March 23, 2013 - 8:56am

When the president of Ohio's state school board posted her opposition to gun control, she used a powerful symbol to make her point: a picture of Adolf Hitler. When a well-known conservative commentator decried efforts to restrict guns, he argued that if only Jews in Poland had been better armed, many more would have survived the Holocaust.

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FILE - This March 14, 2013 file photo shows Gov. Gary Herbert during an interview in his office at the Utah State Capitol, in Salt Lake City. Herbert has a vetoed bill that would have allowed Utah residents to carry a hidden, unloaded gun without a permit. The legislation was one of the most controversial to come out of the Utah Legislature this year. (AP Photo/Rick Bowmer,File)

Herbert vetoes controversial Utah gun bill

Michelle L. Price The Associated Press

Last updated Friday, March 22, 2013 - 1:49pm

SALT LAKE CITY — The governor said Friday he had vetoed a bill that would have allowed Utah residents to carry a hidden, unloaded gun without a permit.

It was one of the most hotly contested measures to come out of the Utah Legislature this year.

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Emilie Parker was killed in Newtown, Conn. Her parents, Robbie and Alissa Parker, graduated from Ben Lomond High School in Ogden, and Emilie was buried in her parents' hometown in December. (Courtesy photo)

Emilie's parents moving to normalcy as 100-day mark since Newtown massacre approaches

Standard-Examiner staff & wire services Standard-Examiner

Last updated Friday, March 22, 2013 - 6:28am

NEWTOWN, Conn. — Robbie and Alissa Parker, the parents of Emilie Parker, one of the 20 first-graders killed in the Sandy Hook Elementary School massacre, were to appear today on the show “CBS This Morning” to discuss meeting the father of the gunman.

Other than that, however, a family friend told the Standard-Examiner that the 100-day anniversary of the shooting will be a normal weekend for the Parkers, who met while attending Ben Lomond High School in Ogden.

Sunday marks 100 days since the shooting took place. Marian Salzman, a friend of the family and New York City public relations executive, said the anniversary won’t have any particular markers for the former Ogden residents.

“They’re just doing what they normally do, moving forward,” Salzman said.

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