For all those who tell us we need to get “military style” firearms or “assault weapons” off the streets, or who feel that “no one really needs more than ten rounds” (seven if you’re in New York), I would like to present some facts for your consideration:

- The 1994 ban on semi-automatic rifles and standard capacity magazines was found to have no measurable impact on crime. According to the National Institute of Justice, “We cannot clearly credit the ban with any of the nation’s recent drop in gun violence.” ("An Updated Assessment of the Federal Assault Weapons Ban: Impacts on Gun Markets and Gun Violence, 1994-2003", National Institute of Justice, June 2004).

- They also found in an earlier study that “The ban has failed to reduce the average number of victims per gun murder incident or multiple gunshot wound victims.” and “The public safety benefits of the 1994 ban have not yet been demonstrated.” ("Impacts of the 1994 Assault Weapons Ban: 1994-96", National Institute of Justice, March 1999)

- According to the FBI, Only 1% of police officers murdered were killed using “assault weapons.” They were twice as likely to be killed with their own handgun. ("Law Enforcement Officers Killed and Assaulted", FBI, 1994).

- In a 2006 DOJ study, two years after the 1994 ban expired, no so-called “assault weapons” were used to kill police officers. ("Violent Encounters: A Study of Felonious Assaults on Our Nation’s Law Enforcement Officers", U.S. Department of Justice, August 2006).

- Trenton, NJ Deputy Chief of Police Joseph Constance, testified before the Senate Judiciary Committee in Aug 1993 that: “Assault rifles have never been an issue in law enforcement. I have been on this job for 25 years and I haven’t seen a drug dealer carry one. They are not used in crimes, they are not used against police officers.” and “Since police started keeping statistics, we now know that ‘assault weapons’ are/were used in an underwhelming 0.026 of 1% of crimes in New Jersey. This means that my officers are more likely to confront an escaped tiger from the local zoo than to confront an assault rifle in the hands of a drug-crazed killer on the streets.”

If we are discussing the recent tragic murders in Aurora, CO and Newtown, CT, we need to remember the facts of both incidents. James Holmes drove past several theaters which allowed patrons to carry concealed firearms before targeting one that prohibited patrons from carrying in the theater.

When we look at the Newtown incident, we know that sometime between 9:30 am and 9:40 am Adam Lanza shot his way into school because the doors were locked. At 9:35 am, witnesses reported the first shots fired. At 9:40 am, the Police reported a shooter in the school. According to CNN, the police arrived on scene almost 20 minutes after the first calls were made. If that is true, the shooter could have caused the same carnage with a muzzle loading rifle in that amount of time. 30 round magazines don't make the person holding the firearm any more or less likely to commit murder than 10 round or 5 round magazines.

The Virginia Tech shooter killed more people without using a semi-automatic rifle or "high-capacity" magazines - he used two handguns and reloaded them in the course of his rampage.

These reasons I believe are sufficient to show that the proposed bans will not prevent future tragedies, now I would like to explain why ordinary citizens must keep the right to own these firearms.

I am an attorney and an NRA certified firearms instructor. I’ve worked as a first responder in New Orleans after Hurricane Katrina, Western Louisiana after Rita, East Texas after Ike, the Northeast after Irene and Sandy, and many other disasters. (In fact, I'm still in Connecticut as I write this, and I've been in Newtown several times since the shooting). I believe my background makes me uniquely qualified to assess the utility and usefulness of a semi-automatic rifle for personal self-defense.

In New Orleans, when gangs of armed thugs were running wild after Katrina, the police were unable to handle the situation. In fact, this is not unusual: after any major disaster, the police and other first responders are always overwhelmed with non-criminal related activity, such as search and rescue, providing emergency food and water, assisting with evacuations, and a hundred other tasks. These first responders are true heros - I can't tell you how many Police officers I've met all over the country who work 20 hour shifts, 7 days a week after a disaster, who let their own homes and property suffer while they serve the public. They do amazing things, but they simply can't be everywhere at once, and it's almost always up to the ordinary citizens to defend their homes and family from looters and other criminals. In those types of situations, the semi-automatic rifle (like the AR-15) is the best choice available.

The AR-15 (the AR stands for ArmaLite, the company that came up with the design) was designed and sold on the Civilian market before the US military adopted a fully-automatic version of it as the M16. The AR-15 available to civilians is not a machine gun - it can only fire one time for each trigger pull - just like any modern revolver or pistol available today. It was ergonomically designed, making it easy for new shooters to learn to use competently and safely (one of the reasons the Military adopted it). It fires a lower power cartridge then almost all modern hunting rifles, which makes it a popular choice for beginning shooters, female shooters and competition shooters due to the lighter recoil. Standard magazines for it hold a reasonable ammo capacity for competition and self defense without being too heavy to carry.

Ten rounds is not a sufficient number for self defense. The average law abiding citizen, when confronted with a life threatening encounter may not have the training and skill to execute a magazine change while under assault. Many encounters have multiple attackers against a lone victim. And many times, the criminal committing the assault is intoxicated or under the influence of drugs that make them harder to stop. Handicapping our law-abiding citizens in a manner we wouldn't even consider for our law enforcement officers is totally unacceptable. Even the Police need more than ten rounds to stop a criminal - in a recent highly publicized shootout in New York, two officers confronted a man who had just murdered his former boss. In the ensuing gun battle, nine bystanders were hit - every one of them by the Police. While it's terrible that innocent bystanders were hurt (thankfully, none of the injuries were life-threatening), it also took ten shots to stop the murderer. If the officers' magazines had been limited like some are proposing for the rest of us, they might not have been able to stop that man before he killed more people.

As a firearms instructor who teaches armed self-defense, I highly recommend the AR platform for a home defense firearm, as does almost every other Instructor I know. American Citizens are entitled to own these firearms because it is a fundamental right, and the Federal Government is prohibited from violating that right by the Second Amendment. American Citizens need these firearms because they are the most effective life saving device anyone can have in a deadly encounter with someone who intends to kill, rape or maim them and/or their families. Ask anyone who lives near our southern border what firearms they need to defend their families from drug runners crossing the border. Ask the South Korean immigrants in South Central LA who survived the 1992 riots because they had semi-automatic rifles what they need to defend their families. And then consider the global threats we now face due to terrorism, and ask how can we justify weakening the greatest militia in the history of the world - the citizens of the United States of America.