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252 Chapter 12 – The Port Arthur massacre

Int roduc tion

massacrethe intentional killing of a large number of people

On Sunday, 28 April 1996, a young Tasmanian man called Martin Bryant ate a meal on the deck of the Broad Arrow Café located at the Port Arthur historical site. When he was finished he entered the café, took a rifle from his bag and started indiscriminately shooting. He then moved to the gift shop and then on to the car park, where he pulled out an automatic weapon, firing at the people there. Driving up the road, he continued shooting. By the time he was finished he had killed 35 people.

The horrific massacre at Port Arthur sentshock waves around the nation. Mass murder on such a scale was something Australians had never experienced before. The Port Arthur massacre also set in motion a chain of events that eventually led to a complete reform of Australia’s gun laws. This reform revealed a significant division in Australian society between those for and against gun control. Not everyone agreed with the reforms, or saw gun control as a solution to the incidence of violence

in society. Other critics even suggested that a conspiracy was in play and that the massacre had been orchestrated as a catalyst for law reform. The swift response of the Australian legal system to the problem of automatic weapons engendered enormous international interest, winning both praise and condemnation. In the United States, anti-gun coalitions took heart and redoubled their efforts towards reform of gun laws, while leaders in the gun lobby thundered out warnings that the United States government might try to do the same as Australia.

The effectiveness of gun law reform in Australia in the wake of the Port Arthur massacre stands in stark contrast to the failure thus far in the United States. In an international context, it also contrasts with the failure to achieve an international agreement on controlling the trade in small arms. Most of the small arms available around the world to every armed group, militia or criminal are used to maim, injure or kill innocent civilians.

PORT A R T HUR MASSACRE

THE EVENTS

The facts of the Port Arthur massacre reveal the deliberate and intentional nature of Martin Bryant’s crimes. On the morning of the massacre Martin Bryant left his home in Hobart and drove to Port Arthur, approximately one hour’s

drive to the east. Port Arthur is one of Australia’s most significant historic sites, as it was the site of one of Australia’s most notorious convict settlements in the


early 1800s. As was common, on the day in question Port Arthur was overflowing with tourists.

On his drive to Port Arthur that day Martin Bryant stopped off at a guesthouse called Seascape Cottage, where he entered and killed the owners, David and Noelene Martin. Bryant then drove to

Port Arthur, arriving at about 1.10 p.m. He parked his car and entered the Broad Arrow Café, where he purchased a meal and ate it on the deck. After eating, Bryant returned the tray and returned to his table where he pulled an AR-15 semi-automatic rifle from his bag. Entering the café, he began systematically shooting people at close range. He moved into the gift shop and did the same. Returning to his bag for additional ammunition, he reloaded and returned to shoot the people in the gift shop who had taken cover behind tables and furniture. In the first 90 seconds, 20 people had been killed and 12 were injured.

Bryant continued into the car park behind the café. People could hear the commotion and had taken cover behind the buses. He shot and killed


Figure 12.1 The Penitentiary at Port Arthur, near where Bryant went on his killing rampage

another four people, wounding others. Bryant continued shooting people on the grounds of the historic site, then got into his car and drove past the toll booth and onto the main road. Before exiting, he had killed seven more people, including Nanette Mikac and her two young daughters, Madeline and Alannah, aged three and six. Bryant chased Alannah behind a tree in order to kill her.

Bryant then drove up the main road to a service station located at a General Store. He used the BMW he was driving – having killed the driver and passenger and stolen it – to block a Toyota Corolla from leaving the pump area. He forced the male occupant into the boot of the BMW, shot the female occupant of the Corolla, dragged her body out of the car. got into the driver’s seat of the BMW and took off down the road with the male hostage locked in the boot. A police officer arrived soon after and went in chase of Bryant a few minutes later.

Bryant returned to the Seascape

guesthouse where he had begun his murderous killing spree earlier that morning. At the house he took a hostage inside and set fire to the stolen BMW. At around 2 p.m. police officers arrived but were forced to take shelter for a few hours in a ditch while Bryant fired on them with an automatic weapon. At 9 p.m. a Special Operations police team arrived from

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Hobart. An 18-hour stand-off ensued because Bryant claimed he had hostages. The following day, Bryant set fire to the house, taunting the police to come in and get him. Eventually, Bryant ran from the house with his clothes alight and was captured by police. He was arrested and taken to hospital under police guard.

During the initial period of his police question- ing, Bryant admitted to hijacking the BMW car but denied having shot anyone. He also stated that he had not visited Port Arthur that day. Bryant also

claimed that the guns found by police were not his. On 20 April, during a bedside hearing in hospital where he was being held because of his burns from the fire, Bryant was charged with just one murder. Police said additional charges would follow. On 22 May, Bryant appeared via a video link from Risdon Prison to the Magistrates’ Court for a remand hearing.

During the following weeks, the police inves- tigated all the events of the day, which resulted in the final charges being laid against him: 35 counts of murder, 20 of attempted murder, four of aggravated assault, eight of wounding, three of causing grievous bodily harm, one of arson and one of unlawfully setting fire to property.

Because of the magnitude of the killings, in a place popular with Australian and international


Figure 12.2 People gather to pay tribute to the victims who died in the Broad Arrow Café during the Port Arthur massacre.

tourists alike, the Port Arthur massacre attracted considerable media attention and debate. There was interest also in Bryant himself. What kind of person would do this? Was he of sound mind? Those who knew Bryant were questioned by journalists eager to paint a picture for the public of who Martin Bryant was. A number of conflicting stories emerged. Distant relatives provided an album full of photographs. Two of Bryant’s ex- girlfriends provided some more. On 30 April the first photos of Bryant appeared on the front pages of the nation’s press. The Australian newspaper enhanced a photograph of Bryant that exaggerated the whiteness of his eyes to give him an eerie, spaced-out look. Debate about Bryant’s early life, history of gun use, state of mind and

motivations remain today, as does curiosity about his life in prison.


)NDICTMENT AND SENTENCINGOn 5 July 1996, a total of 72 criminal charges were filed against Martin Bryant in the Supreme Court of Tasmania, in Hobart. Bryant did not enter a plea to any of these charges.

The police obtained 551 statements from witnesses in their investigations into the events of that day in Port Arthur. In September 1996, Bryant’s lawyer convinced him to plead guilty, and Bryant was convicted on 13 November 1996 of an un- precedented list of crimes. The judge commented that he found it difficult to imagine a more chilling catalogue of crimes that were carried out in a coldly premeditated way, yet whose victims were selected randomly. The judge remarked on the continuing effects of the killings on survivors, the


families and friends of those whom he had killed, the eyewitnesses, and the Port Arthur workers, ambulance officers and police officers who had to cope with the injured and dead.

On 22 November 1996, Bryant received 35 sentences of life imprisonment without parole for the murders, plus 21 years for each of the other counts in the indictment.

)MPRISONMENTAfter his arrest, Bryant was held in hospital under police guard while he was treated for his burns. While on remand for seven months until the conclusion of his trial, Bryant was held in near- solitary confinement in a specially built cell at the medium- to maximum-security Risdon Prison. In 1997 Martin Bryant began his formal prison sentence at the old Risdon prison hospital and became one of its most notorious inmates. He spent most of his time up to 2006 alone in his cell. Though the prison authorities did not consider Bryant to be mentally ill, they held the view that the prison hospital was the safest place for him because he was the most hated prisoner among the inmates. Apparently, he had been the target of a number of assaults and many of the inmates had made death threats against him.

In 2006, the Tasmanian government moved Bryant into the newly constructed Wilfred Lopes

Centre, a mental health facility a few hundred metres from the prison. There are no guards inside the 35-bed unit, only nurses, doctors and support staff, and most inmates are not confined to cells but free to wander around the complex. The centre was substantially a hospital with a therapeutic environment.

Refer to Chapter 12 on the Student CD

for information relating to R v Bryant (Supreme Court of

Tasmania, Cox CJ, 22 Nov 1996).


Research Questions 12.1 Read the sentencing report in R v Bryant and write a

report that addresses the following questions.

1 What comments did the judge make

about Martin Bryant’s

intellectual ability and mental health?

2 Evaluate whether the judge’s observations

about Bryant’s upbringing, his social

isolation, his intellectual ability and his mental

health had any effect on the sentence.

3 What comment did the judge make about

remorse on the part of Bryant?

4 What comment did the judge make

about Bryant having pleaded

guilty?

Did this affect Bryant’s sentence?

5 What comments did the

judge make in weighing up Bryant’s crime with

the mitigating factors such as his upbringing,

social isolation, intellectual capacity

and mental state?

6 What was the final sentence?

indictment information presented for

the prosecution of one or more criminal offences; a formal written charge

on remand(of an accused) in custody pending and/ or during his or her trial

Figure 12.3 Who is Martin Bryant?

Some relatives and friends of the slain Port Arthur victims were outraged that Bryant would be serving his sentence in such a facility. First, they objected because they felt they should have been told of the move prior to its occurrence.

Secondly, they believed that it was inappro- priate for someone who had not been declared insane at the time of conviction to be hospitalised. The previous year, the state’s chief forensic

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Figure 12.4 Bryant’s move from maximum security at Risdon Prison (above) to a mental health facility angered survivors and family members of the victims of the Port Arthur massacre.

psychiatrist, Dr John Crawshaw, had stated that Bryant did not meet the criteria for admission to the Wilfred Lopes Centre.

Their biggest objection, however, was the idea that Bryant would be free to move around hospital freely when they believed that he should be confined to a prison cell for the rest of his life.

In a leaked letter from Tasmania’s Director of Prisons, Graeme Barber, to Dr Crawshaw, the reasons for transferring Bryant to the Wilfred Lopes Centre were stated as concerns for Bryant’s health, well-being and

safety, and the need to protect other inmates. Those opposed to the move questioned the validity of these concerns, given the recent $90 million redevelopment of Risdon


Prison. Bryant has been transferred back to maximum security Risdon Prison on at least one occasion, in response to the public outcry about his being housed in the Wilfred Lopes Centre,

Bryant has attempted suicide a number of times during his incarceration. As of May 2009, he was being held at the Wilfred Lopes Centre, but in isolation.

MotiveSince the day of the Port Arthur massacre there has been speculation about Bryant’s motivation for the killing spree, focusing in large part on his childhood and his sanity. In 2006, Bryant’s lawyer,


John Avery, was reported to be writing a book about his former client. Extracts were published in the Bulletin magazine, along with transcripts of conversations between Bryant and Avery, school reports, and psychiatric assessments. Avery’s behaviour and the magazine’s publication of the material were condemned by the legal community and many in the media as both professionally questionable and inconsiderate of the feelings of victims and their families. In 2009, journalists Robert Wainwright and Paola Totaro published Born or bred?: Martin Bryant, the

making of a mass murderer, again delving into his past.One of the ideas about Bryant’s motives, put forward by the defence psychiatrist, Paul

Mullen, was that Bryant was inspired by a lone gunman’s massacre of 16 children and one adult on 13 March 2006 in the Scottish town of Dunblane. Other speculation has focused on Bryant’s below-normal intellect and resulting social isolation and anger, desire for attention, and a long-term grudge against his first victims, who had bought the Seascape property that he had wanted to buy.

#ONSPIRACY CLAIMSFrom the beginning, conspiracy theories have surrounded the Port Arthur massacre. These suggest that the massacre was actually carried out byspecialoperativeswhoframed Bryant. According to some of the proponents of conspiracy theories, particularly those that are strong opponents of gun control, the purpose of the massacre was to provide a platform for the federal government to bring about gun control law reform.

A more recent conspiracy theory is that the Port Arthur massacre was a plot to make it easier for terrorists to take over Australia if all of our guns have been confiscated.

These theories do not enjoy any credibility in legal or scholarly circles. Their merit may be at least partly determined by noting which organisations hold them. For instance, the Holocaust-denying Australian-based Adelaide Institute continues to peddle the conspiracy line.

Review Questions 12.1

1 From the information above create a timeline of events on the day of the Port Arthur massacre until Bryant’s arrest.

2 Do you think people will ever know why Martin Bryant did what he did? Why are a murderer’s motives a continuing source of fascination?

3 What are the arguments for and against Bryant serving part of his sentence in a mental health facility rather than a prison?

What facts does the answer depend on? Discuss in small groups.

4 If a convicted murderer is found to be sane, what are the aims of the criminal sentence imposed? Justify your answer.

R e v i e w Q u e s ti o n s 12.2 1 Identify the various conspiracy claims that have surrounded the Port Arthur massacre.

2 How valid do you think these claims are?

3 In what ways do these claims dishonour the memory of those who died in the massacre?

Research Questions 12.2

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The articles ‘Bryant is an Overweight Zombie’ and ‘Inside the Mind of a Mass Murderer’ both attempt to provide some insight

into who Martin Bryant is and explain his motivations. Answer the questions below.

1 How does Bryant’s mother describe her son’s imprisonment at Risdon Prison?

2 Do the comments made by the psychologist and defence lawyer shed any light on what motivated Bryant?

3 Is there any way to assess whether Bryant feels any guilt for his actions from the information in these articles?

4 Why is Bryant’s decision to enter a guilty plea considered a controversial one?

5 Does speculation about a murderer’s motivations serve any useful purpose? Discuss.

MECHA NISMS FOR ACHIEVING JU ST ICE AF TER T HE POR T A R T HUR MASSACRE

LEGAL RESPONSES

GUN LAW REFORM INA!USTRALIA BEFORE 1996By the 1980s there were approximately four million privately owned guns in Australia and about 700 gun deaths each year. These guns were owned primarily for hunting and by farmers, who used them to kill pests such as rabbits and feral animals. The majority of gun deaths occurred due to misuse of rifle-type guns rather than handguns. The gun laws were fairly weak and varied greatly among the states and territories.

The gun debate in Australia started in Victoria after two separate incidents in which 14-year-old girls were accidentally killed by sporting shooters. As a result, the Victorian government introduced a shooter’s licence, which, while fairly weak by today’s standards, was nevertheless the first serious attempt to place some control on guns.

Then in 1987, Australia experienced six gun massacres over the course of the year that resulted

Figure 12.5 The Sporting Shooters Association of Australia opposed gun reforms.

in a total of 32 deaths. Each of these incidents was premeditated and all were carried out by people who legally owned guns. The most well-known of these occurred in Melbourne: the Hoddle Street Massacre and the Queen Street Massacre. The Victorian government acted swiftly to introduce tougher gun laws. This action was opposed by the Sporting Shooters Association of Australia, an organisation formed to promote sports such as target shooting and hunting, and which also represents the interests of gun owners. The Asso- ciation organised a protest march by 27 000 of its members through the streets of Melbourne.


However, public sentiment against weak gun laws meant that the Victorian government persevered with its reforms.

These state reforms were complemented at the federal level by the Hawke government’s estab- lishment of the National Committee on Violence, which produced a report in 1990 containing 30 recommendations. Among these recommendations was registration of high-powered rifles. The reforms that followed represented a significant step towards gun control in Australia.

In 1991, a gunman shot six people in a shopping mall at Strathfield, NSW with an ex-military semi-automatic rifle that he had easily obtained. Widespread outrage and debate followed. In 1992, the New South Wales government introduced tougher gun laws. Many pro-gun groups bitterly opposed these laws, particularly since prior to the Strathfield massacre the NSW Liberal government had been ready to introduce softer laws. The tougher gun laws led to the formation of the Shooters’ Party in NSW. The Shooters’ Party has had a seat in the NSW upper house since then. Also in reaction to the tougher laws, the Sporting Shooters Association of Australia (SSAA) began looking to the National Rifle Association (NRA) in the United States for ideas on how to counter the


tougher legal regime for guns that was taking root in Australia. The NRA is a powerful lobby group with the goal of promoting firearm ownership rights, relying on a broad interpretation of the Second Amendment of the US Constitution, which gives people the right to keep and bear arms.

Overall, the effect of the gun massacres that occurred in Australia between 1987 and 1991 was the development of public concern about guns, which coincided with leaders who were willing to enact the necessary legal reforms to put the nation on the path of a sensible gun control regime.

GUN LAW REFORM AFTER THE 0ORTARTHUR MASSACREBy the 1990s, Tasmania was the odd state out in terms of gun law reform. This made it quite easy for Martin Bryant to purchase the guns that he used to kill 35 people. In response to the publicoutcry about gun control after the massacre,

Figure 12.6 When John Howard spoke to a hostile rally of pro-gun enthusiasts he was wearing a bullet-proof vest.

Prime Minister John Howard initiated a discussion on tougher gun law reforms. He was backed by Deputy Prime Minister Tim Fisher. By the end of 1997, the state governments and federal government signed the National Agreement on Gun Laws. This agreement stated that:s gun ownership is a privilege and not a rights semi-automatic weapons must be

strictly controlleds all guns must be registereds guns must be stored securelys there must be a 28-day cooling-off

period when buying guns.

NON-LEGALRESPONSES

ALANNAH AND -ADELINEFoundationThe deaths of 35 people at the hands of Martin Bryant shocked Australians. Of the stories that emerged from that day, the murder of Nanette Mikac and her two young daughters, Alannah and Madeline, aged 6 and 3 respectively, were particularly devastating. Australians

Review Questions12.3 1 Make a list of Australian

gun law reforms from 1980

to 1997.

2 Investigate the gun

massacres that occurred in Australia in 1987.

3 Evaluate the effectiveness of the government’s

response to public concern about gun use.

Such proposals seemed sensible to the average Australian; however, some

National Party parlia- mentarians and pro-gun lobby groups, such as the SSAA, were horrified and did everything they

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could to stop the proposed new laws. It was in this context that conspiracy theories about the Port Arthur massacre sprouted. Some gun enthusiasts began to argue that the Port Arthur massacre was a government conspiracy and that Martin Bryant was set up, all with the aim of using it as an excuse to take guns away from all the law-abiding gun owners in the country.

were reminded of the fragile nature of human life and the destructive potential of guns.

Walter Mikac lost his wife and daughters. These events had a profound effect on another Australian father of two young girls, Phil West, who along with a small group of volunteers established the Alannah and Madeline Foundation. The Foundation’s goal is to keep children safe from violence. It does not receive government funding, but relies on fund-raising events, private grants and individual donations to continue its work. The Foundation runs programs to assist with the recovery of


children who have witnessed or experienced violence, and to prevent violence and bullying in schools. It also acts as a children’s advocate before

federal, state and local governments. HRH Crown Princess Mary of Denmark is the International Patron of the Alannah and Madeline Foundation.

RESPONSIVENESS OF THE LEGAL SYSTEM TO THE PORT ARTHUR MASSACRE

suicidethe intentional taking of one’s own life

homicidethe act of killing another human being

GUN LAW REFORM INAustralia

From 1998, Australia experienced a marked decrease in gun deaths when compared to the 1970s and 1980s. Handguns, however, appeared as a new menace in 2002. In a shooting that occurred at Monash University in Victoria that year, two people were killed and five injured when a student, who was a licensed pistol shooter, fired handguns in an econometrics class, killing two students and injuring four students and a lecturer.

After the Monash shootings the Australian Crime Commission was formed. It is a statutory body that, in partnership with other law enforcement agencies, develops strategies for dealing with serious and organised crime. One of the first things on its agenda was illegal trafficking in handguns. It had become apparent that there was an increase in illegal handgun use.

While handguns were emerging as the new threat in crime, the total number of deaths per

year from suicides, unintentional killings and homicides had dropped dramatically. In the 1980s the deaths per year from gun-related causes averaged 700. By 1999 they were around 300 and by 2003, gun-related deaths had dropped to 290 per year. This trend has continued since.

While Australia has directly addressed the problem of gun deaths, other countries, such as the United States, have not been as effective in meeting this challenge. Political leaders in the US have not been successful in countering the strong pro-gun culture supported by the extremely effective lobbying of the NRA. Gun massacres remain a feature of life in the US, and the sale of firearms continues to grow every year.

Refer to Chapter 12 on the Student

CD for information relating to death

tolls of the world’s worst shootings.

argued that this led to a more rational

philosophy of gun control, which is

more effective in reducing the number

of firearm-related deaths.

This can be downloaded from

the following web address: www.

A paper written in 2000, titled ‘Australia’s

New Gun Control Philosophy: Public

Health Paramount’, by Rebecca Peters

and Roland Browne in The Drawing Board: An Australian Review of Public Affairs, argued that Australia took a public

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T

Accident


Figure 12.7 Firearm related deaths in Australia, 1991–2001


Read the article ‘Death tolls of the world’s worst shootings.’ Despite Australia’s Port

Arthur massacre holding the number one spot for the world’s worst single non-

wartime shooting, the United States can be said to have the most frequent occurrence

of shootings.

1 Draw up a table showing country,

gunman, location, weapons, killed and wounded.

2 How does Port Arthur compare with other similar massacres?

3 Identify similarities in location, motivation of the killer, and the

availability of weapons.

4 Investigate the Second Amendment to

the Constitution of the United States. Why do you think gun law reform might

be more difficult to achieve in the US in light of this clause?

5 Visit the website of the National Rifle Association (NRA) at www.nra.org/. See

what information you can find about how the NRA can continue to oppose gun law

reform even in the face of a massacre like the one at Columbine High School.


1 View the 2002 documentary Bowling for Columbine. What are the main points it makes about guns in the United States?

2 For further information about the film and about

the issue of guns in the United States, go to the

website for the film: www. bowlingforcolumbine.com/

3 For further information about the issue of guns in

the United States, go to the website of the Brady Center

to Prevent Gun Violence (an NGO) at www.bradycenter.

org/

4 Research other media

reports and academic reports about the gun issue

in the United States. What arguments and tactics are

being used by those groups arguing for gun law reform?


Go to the Australian Institute of Criminology website, read the

abstract for ‘Firearm related deaths in Australia, 1991–2001’,

www.aic.gov.au/publications/ tandi2/tandi269.html, and

answer the following questions:

1 What has been the

percentage decrease in firearm-related deaths in the

period 1991–2001?

2 What proportion of deaths

involved males?

3 What age group has the

highest risk?

4 What was the most common

weapon used?

5 What other weapon has seen

increased use?

6 Which accounted for the

most deaths: homicide, accident or suicide? What

are the implications of this finding for health

professionals?

700

argued that this led to a more rational

philosophy of gun control, which is

more effective in reducing the number

of firearm-related deaths.

This can be downloaded from

the following web address: www.

A paper written in 2000, titled ‘Australia’s

New Gun Control Philosophy: Public

Health Paramount’, by Rebecca Peters

and Roland Browne in The Drawing Board: An Australian Review of Public Affairs, argued that Australia took a public

600

500

1991 1992 1993 1994 1995 1996 1997 1998 1999 2000 2001

400

300

otal

Suicide

Homicide200

100 Other

0

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Figure 12.8 Guns handed in during the buyback scheme in 1997 were destroyed at scrap-metal yards.

4HE GOVERNMENT BUY-BACK SCHEMEAs part of the reform of gun laws and culture in Australia, a buy-back scheme and amnesty were introduced by the Howard government in the aftermath of the Port Arthur massacre. Money was given to people who willingly handed over guns that appeared on a list of prohibited weapons –

in particular, semi-automatic rifles and shotguns. Approximately 640 000 guns were collected under the scheme. Victoria was the state to hand in the greatest proportion of its registered weapons that were on the ‘prohibited’ list.

The long-term effectiveness of this scheme has been closely monitored, with conflicting reports emerging. Some have indicated that because Australia has not had a mass gun-related shooting since Port Arthur, the buy-back scheme was a success. Other reports have indicated that the scheme has had no real effect on overall murder rates. The only area where the National Firearms Agreement – the collective name for federal and state gun reforms – may have had some impact is in suicide rates. Part of the difficulty in measuring the success of the buy-back scheme and its impact on crime rates is that 90 per cent of homicides are committed with unregistered firearms.

Research Questions 12.6 The following newspaper articles from the Sydney Morning Herald in 2006 give

two different perspectives on the effectiveness of the guns buy-back scheme since 1996.

Locate the following articles at www.smh.

com.au and answer the questions below:s Matthew Moore, ‘Buyback has no effect on

murder rate’, 24 October 2006

s Don Weatherburn, ‘Study no excuse to shoot down the law’, 26 October 2006

1 Read the two articles listed above and

summarise their key points.

2 Find the commentary of the Gun Control

Australia on this debate by searching

for ‘Recent Reports on Australian Gun


Laws’ (Wednesday 10 January 2007) on the Gun Control

Australia website (www. guncontrol.org.au).

3 Write a one-page report discussing the effectiveness of the

guns buy-back scheme.


Research Questions 12.7 Search the internet to find the following articles about a tragic shooting:

s Michelle Fenech and Rebecca Senescall, ‘Boy, 14, charged with murder over friend’s shooting’, Camden Advertiser, 8 December 2008

s ‘Man charged after Josef Cruickshank’s shooting death’, The Australian,

9 December 2008

1 What are the implications of this shooting

for gun laws, the policing of those laws and the education of young people?

2 What has been the outcome of this case? Locate the outcome by searching

for further media reports and court transcripts.

3 Go to the Australian Institute of Criminology website (www.aic.gov.au) and find out how many people die from

accidental discharge of a firearm each year.

4 Evaluate the implications for the legal

system in dealing with accidental death from firearms. Suggest legal and non-

legal ways that this type of tragedy could be minimised. For instance, is it a case

of further reform of the relevant laws, greater police powers, education, or some

other means?

Research Questions 12.8 The problem of guns, or small arms as they are known in international law, is one that plagues

the whole world. The main problem is that too many guns are sold (both legally and illegally)

to people in poor countries characterised

by civil unrest and poverty. Many of the

thousand people killed by firearms each day are innocent women and children. There is an

attempt to establish an effective UN treaty on small arms, but without the United States’

backing, there is little chance of success.

1 Research the issue of the gun violence

around the world by going to the website of the International Action Network on

Small Arms (an NGO) at www.iansa.org and download its report titled ‘Gun Violence:

The Global Crisis’.

2 Go to the United Nations website (www.

un.org) and find out about progress on the small arms treaty.

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Concl us ionIt can be argued that Australia’s legal system has been effective in dealing with the issue of deaths from firearms since tough measures were introduced in the aftermath of the Port Arthur massacre in 1996. The dangers posed by both legal and illegal guns, however, are something that we can never become complacent about. Tragic accidents and suicides will continue to occur and there will still be homicides committed with firearms. Since 2002, the proliferation of handguns, both legal and illegal, has gained the attention of our nation’s lawmakers. It seems that gun-related issues are never far from resurfacing.

Our gun laws and enforcement measures need to be constantly revisited to ensure they stay abreast of changing trends in the use of firearms, both nationally and internationally. This is an issue in which there is always room for further law reform.

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Intlawinpracticeuhsmraziz.weebly.com/.../port_arthur_massa… · Web viewHe then moved to the gift shop and then on to the car park, where he pulled out an automatic weapon, ﬁring