A closer look at push for stronger New Jersey gun laws raises questions of effectiveness

After eight years of opposition from Republican Gov. Chris Christie, New Jersey Democrats are moving quickly to advance six bills to strengthen New Jersey's already strict gun laws.

Democratic Gov. Phil Murphy has called on lawmakers to send him all the bills his predecessor vetoed. The package includes new restrictions on bullets, background checks and magazine sizes.

But an analysis of the bills by The Record and NorthJersey.com, plus interviews with experts, show that those three measures are unlikely to have much practical impact, if any.

And the bills represent a fraction of the measures Christie vetoed. He rejected at least 16 gun-related bills during his tenure, according to an analysis of his vetoes.

Democrats have signaled that the current package is just the beginning of their effort under Murphy to strengthen the gun laws.

"This is just targeted at law-abiding citizens," said Scott Bach, executive director of the Association of New Jersey Rifle and Pistol Clubs and a member of the National Rifle Association. "Criminals don’t follow these procedures. The big picture, we’re over-regulating people who follow the law."

Bach said he has concerns with technical aspects of some of the six bills, while others, he said, "accomplish nothing but make everybody feel good, make headlines and waste legislative resources."

But Murphy has called the measures "common sense" and indicated he would sign them into law.

"The people of New Jersey have demanded we act, and we must," Murphy said. ​​​​

Assault rifles

Even if the measures pass in Trenton, it would still be possible for a shooter as young as 18 to arm him or herself with a military-style weapon similar to those that have been used in previous mass shootings.

New Jersey banned assault weapons in 1990. In the years since, the state has updated its list of prohibited "assault firearms" to include more than three dozen guns, including the Colt AR-15 that spawned a family of military-style rifles that have been used in some of the deadliest mass shootings in American history, from Newtown to Las Vegas to San Bernardino.

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The AR-15 has become known as "America's Rifle," but it's a catchall term for a class of weapons that bear resemblance to the lightweight, accurate and highly customizable semi-automatics so popular nationwide.

Because of its customization capability, different versions of the weapon still can be purchased in New Jersey. Smith & Wesson, for example, offers what it calls the M&P 15 Sport II, which the company says is "NJ compliant." The same goes for the Barrett Rec-7 and many other companies' versions of the weapon.

There are also guns that look like an AR-15 but do not qualify as one, such as the Colt Match Target Rifle, which, according to the State Police, has substantial changes from an AR-15, including the receiver that houses internal components.

Unlike in Florida, which raised the purchasing age for rifles from 18 to 21 after the shooting at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School, New Jersey's legal age for purchasing a rifle remains 18.

While the AR-15 has risen in popularity on the market, it has also become a symbol of modern American gun culture and a familiar target by political leaders and activists.

On Thursday, after the State Investment Council moved to divest holdings of manufacturers of automatic and semi-automatic guns for civilian use, Murphy tweeted: "Military-grade weapons do not belong in the hands of civilians."

But gun enthusiasts say that despite its military-style appearance, the AR-15 functions just as any other semi-automatic sporting rifle would — one shot at a time.

Magazine-capacity limit

One of the Democratic proposals, A-2761, would impose a 10-round limit on the capacity of gun magazines, down from the current limit of 15. The measure is intended to reduce firearm injuries by preventing gun attacks involving high numbers of shots.

Democratic lawmakers stepped up their support for the measure after hearing from parents of Sandy Hook school shooting victims, who said 11 students were able to escape from a classroom when the shooter in that 2012 attack stopped to reload and encountered an issue.

Assemblyman Lou Greenwald, a Camden County Democrat sponsoring many of the gun bills, also cites as motivation the 2011 shooting in Tuscon that left six dead and injured many more, including U.S. Rep. Gabrielle Giffords.

A 9-year-old girl, Christina-Taylor Green, was reportedly killed by the 13th bullet from the shooter’s 33-round magazine, and onlookers were able to tackle the shooter while he was trying to reload.

But experts disagree on the impact magazine-capacity limits have on reducing gun violence.

Research by Christopher Koper, a George Mason University professor who researches gun violence, suggests that the limits could have a positive, if small, effect.

A study published in February that looked at shootings in Minneapolis over eight months found that incidents where 11 or more shots were fired accounted for about 16 to 19 percent of all shootings in the city but 20 to 28 percent of victims. Those incidents were also more likely to involve multiple victims.

“Restricting large ammunition magazines may have greater potential for preventing shootings than previously estimated,” Koper wrote, though he cautioned that more research was needed.

Koper also examined the matter in depth in a 2004 report funded by the U.S. Department of Justice to assess the impact of the federal ban on assault weapons and magazines with more than 10 rounds from 1994 to 2004.

He found that guns with magazine capacities above 10 rounds were used in up to a quarter of gun crimes, but it wasn’t clear how often the outcomes of the attacks depended on the ability to fire more than 10 shots without reloading.

Other research from Florida State University criminologist Gary Kleck suggests that restrictions on high-capacity magazines may do little to slow down gunmen or provide time for bystanders to intervene, at least during mass shootings.

Kleck examined 23 incidents between 1994 and 2013 in which seven or more people were killed and concluded that in every instance, “the shooter possessed either multiple guns or multiple magazines, meaning that the shooter, even if denied [large-capacity magazines], could have continued firing without significant interruption by either switching loaded guns or changing smaller loaded magazines with only a 2- to 4-seconds delay for each magazine change.”

In another report, Kleck noted that 10-round magazines were used by shooters in the massacres at Columbine High School and Virginia Tech.

Kleck said that laws aimed at preventing dangerous people from using any gun, such as universal background checks, are “far more likely” to stop gun crimes than measures aimed at technologies like large-capacity magazines.

Greenwald said the testimony of Sandy Hook parents and survivors of the Tuscon shooting outweighs the findings of any academic research.

“You talk to all the experts you want,” he said. “Those words of those people resonate with me and it makes a difference. I don’t care what anyone says. It makes a difference. And if you’re the 11th person, if you’re the 12th or 13th person, it changes your perspective.”

Background checks

Another bill, A-2757, would require background checks through the National Instant Criminal Background Check System, or NICS, for private gun sales. But anyone trying to buy a gun in New Jersey is already subjected to a background check as part of the process of getting the necessary paperwork.

Christopher Perry, an attorney specializing in New Jersey’s gun laws at The Tormey Law Firm in Hackensack, explained that anyone wishing to buy a gun in New Jersey must first apply for a firearms purchaser ID card and, for handguns, a purchase permit at a police department. The police will review the applicant’s mental health records and run them through NICS before issuing an approval.

Then, although private sellers are not required under current law to run a background check, they are required to check for the necessary paperwork, Perry said. And the only way buyers can have that paperwork is if they’ve already been run through the database.

The legislation would require all private gun sales to be facilitated by a licensed retailer, who would be required to perform a NICS check at the time of sale — a change Perry said would have “limited applicability.”

“It may have the benefit of finding one or two people out there who had something pop up on a NICS check in between the time they obtained their documents from the police department and the time when they’re actually engaging in a private sale,” Perry said. “I don’t think it’s going to have any effect on people who are looking to the grey or black markets to purchase illegal guns.”

Greenwald said because of the bill, “gun shows are going to be hesitant to come to New Jersey because they’re not going to want to go through this extra step.”

But Perry said local gun dealers could simply get booths at gun shows for the sole purpose of facilitating purchases.

Armor-piercing ammunition

Nothing would change immediately under another bill in the package, A-2759, which seeks a ban on armor-piercing ammunition in New Jersey. Federal and state law already ban such ammunition, and the bill would simply update the language in New Jersey’s statute to mirror the existing federal prohibition.

However, should Congress ever repeal that law, New Jersey would be covered. That’s what happened when Congress allowed the federal ban on assault weapons and magazines with more than 10 rounds to expire in 2004. New Jersey’s assault weapons ban stayed in place and remains in effect to this day.

Greenwald said rather than looking at the gun control bills individually, they should be viewed as part of an effort to make New Jersey's gun laws "part of a patchwork quilt that starts to connect state by state until the federal government acts."