Police deaths give leverage to toughen gun laws On the East Bay

If history repeats itself, the fatal shootings of four Oakland police officers on Saturday afternoon will become the next benchmark in the national debate on a federal law to ban assault weapons.

If there is a grain of hope to be gathered from a loss so tragic, it's that last weekend's horrific events will help end the debate on an unresolved policy issue that has resulted in thousands of deaths and helped sustain veritable demilitarized zones in some of our nation's largest cities.

In Oakland, a city already struggling with high crime and gun violence, the deaths of two officers gunned down with an AK-47 qualify city officials to lend their voices to any national debate on the issue.

While the tragedy in Oakland lacks the scale of the shootings at Virginia Tech in 2007 and Columbine High School nearly a decade ago, the deaths of four officers in a single incident is a significant event that sends shock waves across the nation.

The use of the deadly weapons - which can fire hundreds of rounds per minute - has become an all-too-familiar feature in the gun violence being played out.

Frank Rose, a community activist who chairs two citizens advisory committees in his East Oakland neighborhood, witnessed the results of such an attack no more than two weeks ago.

Rose watched in utter disbelief as a car drove to the front door of the Oakland Police Department substation at the Eastmont Mall as he sat outside waiting to attend a community meeting.

"The driver jumped out of the car, and the passenger just kinda fell out and crawled around the side of the car," he said.

The driver pounded on the front door until a police officer answered. He immediately came out to help the wounded man.

When Rose stepped from his car to take a closer look, he saw a body motionless in the backseat - and matching bullet holes on both sides of the vehicle.

"How in the world did this happen?" Rose, 70, later asked an officer.

"The guns they got on the street now, Frank, you wouldn't believe it," the officer replied.

Oakland City Council President Jane Brunner said she will seek support from colleagues to pass a resolution calling for federal assistance in finding ways to remove the deadly weapons that leave officers outgunned.

"We don't want officers facing guns they cannot protect themselves from," Brunner said.

Former state Senate President Pro Tem Don Perata, who wrote a state law in 1999 that banned sale of the weapons, said President Obama's case to seek a federal ban on a wide array of automatic weapons is only strengthened when they are misused in such horrific ways.

"Maybe this will be enough to rally the California delegation to ask the federal government for help," Perata said. He cautioned that gun control laws remain a hot-button issue in suburban enclaves and rural communities in California and across the nation.

"With a Democratic administration and Congress, there is little political threat, and who knows when we're going to have an opportunity like this again?" he said.

For Perata, it's a question that was asked and answered in his mind more than 20 years ago when he proposed similar legislation as an Alameda supervisor.

"There is a big difference between taking someone's handgun away and taking away an AK-47," Perata said. "They didn't want to ban .50-caliber guns either, but these are weapons of war with no application in civilian life."

In anticipation of the new White House administration's tough stance on assault weapons, gun dealers, advocates and manufacturers reported significant sales increases in handguns, rifles and ammunition soon after Obama's election.

In the Washington office of U.S. Sen. Dianne Feinstein, a spokesman said the California Democrat had received many calls about the shooting in Oakland. Feinstein helped craft legislation that banned the sale of assault weapons, but that ban ended in 2004.

Callers have encouraged Feinstein to sponsor tough new anti-gun laws, said Gil Duran, a press spokesman. But, he said, Feinstein believes it's appropriate to honor the families' mourning period before she proposes new gun legislation.

"Right now she is mourning with them," Duran said of the officers' family members.

As we wait to see what Feinstein does, Brunner has taken a good first step in asking her colleagues to help pass a resolution to call for stricter gun laws.

Oakland, its residents and leaders would be remiss if they did not use their voice and experience to pressure federal legislators for more gun regulation.