'Smart Gun' Technology Pitched at Brooklyn Borough Hall Symposium

DOWNTOWN BROOKLYN, NY — A group of gun control advocates, lawmakers, and a gun manufacturer spoke out at a Brooklyn Borough Hall press conference Tuesday, pitching "smart guns" as a way to save thousands of lives in the United States per year.

The call came before a public symposium on the technology hosted by Brooklyn Borough President Eric Adams.

Smart guns are weapons that can only be fired by an authorized user, such as a person wearing a specially made ring or wrist band. (One symposium participant was Ernst Mauch of German gun manufacturer Armatix. As reported by The Atlantic, the company has invented a gun that can't be fired unless the person pulling the trigger is also wearing a watch with a specific chip inside.)

Adams is a proponent of smart guns. As reported by the New York Daily News, in February, he announced a smart gun design competition for local college students, including those attending the Polytechnic Institute of New York University, Pratt Institute and the New York City College of Technology.

The students will design a smart weapon that will then be tested by the NYPD. The winning design will earn the school that produced it $1 million from Adams' budget.

About 33,600 Americans died from gun shots in 2014, according to data collected by the Centers for Disease Control, of which about two-thirds were suicides.

Despite New York City's restrictive gun ownership laws, the NYPD recorded 518 shootings with 621 victims through July 24.

At the press conference, Adams cited a finding from investigative journal Mother Jones that the cumulative direct and indirect costs of gun violence in the U.S. were $229 billion annually.

Leah Gunn Barrett, the executive director of New Yorkers Against Gun Violence, said an audit conducted by the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives found that in 2013, 3,174 guns were lost or stolen from gun shops in New York state, with 4,017 lost or stolen in 2014.

And Ralph Fascitelli, the board president of Washington CeaseFire said that about 1,000 gun suicides each year are committed by third parties, or people who use another person's gun.

Such statistics formed the basis of the symposium's argument: that smart gun technology would save lives by rendering useless stolen weapons or guns that wind up in the hands of unauthorized users, including children.

Those at the gathering called for a greater investment in the technology, while New Jersey State Senate Democratic Leader Loretta Weinberg advocated for legislation making smart guns the only weapons that could be purchased once they are available.

"The universe around guns has changed," Adams said. "The only area that has remained the same are the ways in which we use the gun."

Adams said that he is a gun owner, and emphasized that "there is no call for Americans to abandon their arms. There is a call for Americans to abandon their right to do harm."

Public Advocate Letitia James agreed, saying municipalities "have a moral responsibility to act" in the face of federal inaction on gun violence, while Weinberg asked for gun laws to be moved "into the 21st century."

The Congressional Research Service estimated that as of 2007, 294 million guns were in the U.S.

Leah Barrett, the activist with New Yorkers Against Gun Violence, said that even if smart guns took over the market, a gun buy-back program would be needed to remove "dumb" guns from circulation.

But at least one symposium attendee wasn't buying the day's thesis, describing it as "a subterfuge" enacted by those wishing to strip away gun rights.

Stephen L. D'Andrilli, a former New York City police officer and a founder of the pro-gun rights Arbalest Group, was on hand to distribute an article he'd co-authored critiquing the very idea of smart guns.

D'Andrilli said that smart gun technology isn't proven from a technical standpoint, but added that he would be against the government's promotion of it even if it was.

Americans have an inherent right "to be able to choose if they want a gun or not," he said, including the right to purchase "the most sophisticated weapon of the day" for self-protection.

Responsibility, he said, was with the individual. "If I misuse that weapon," D'Andrilli said, "I should pay the penalty for it."

Pictured at top: Leah Gunn Barrett speaks on Tuesday. Photo by John V. Santore