GUNS and violence: Russians Mob in Vancouver

Every year around the world, more than 115,000 civilians are killed by small arms and automatic weapons. Almost 32,000 people die from guns in the U.S. annually if you include suicides and accidents, 85 people every day, or 3.5 dead every hour.

There are about 11,700 murders in the U.S. and about 200 in Canada where victims are targeted during crimes, in domestic assaults, and at the hands of mentally unstable gunmen. Some are killed accidentally, innocent bystanders with a kismetic curse.

The incidents of homicidal crazies killing dozens of people to get their moments of infamy are almost commonplace. There have been 934 people murdered in mass killings in the U.S. alone in the past seven years.

School children, theatre goers, and people in shopping malls have become easy targets. Of the top 10 school massacres documented around the world, five took place in the U.S., claiming 131 victims. Canada is in the top ten, too: Mark Lepine killed 14 women at a Montreal university in 1989. Click the link: See the grim list of school shootings.GUNS, GUNS, GUNS

Americans own 310 million guns, Canadians about 15 million, so with nearly one gun for every man, woman, and child living in North America, it’s no surprise that these efficient death dealers are killers’ common tools of choice.

Some relevant facts:

The United States, with a population of about 314 million people, has the highest gun ownership rate in the world. About 88 of every 100 people own a gun or guns.

Contrary to what some think, the U.S. doesn’t top the list for the highest firearm murder rate. That honor goes to Honduras. Incredibly, with only 8.4 million citizens, Honduras has 5,200 firearm murders each year. Brazil has 192 million citizens and 35,000 gun murders, Columbia 12,500 killings, Mexico 11,300, South Africa 8,300, and Venezuela 11,000.

A Guardian newspaper article, July 2012, detailed gun killings by country. Click the link: Gun deaths by country 

Add in suicides with guns, and people who are wounded but who don’t die, and the number of people impacted by bullets surpasses half a million. The socio-economic costs of gun killings and injuries have been estimated at more than $100 billion per year.

Click this to see article about international gun trafficking.

As suggested in the Prologue, guns are favored by gangs, too, and this is a particularly toxic mix. Merge ethnic and cultural rivalries with power, money, and hate, and the results are especially brutal.

Gun killings are made more gruesome now because shooters are no longer restricted to the guns of yesteryear: the .22’s, shotguns, and hunting rifles that still gather dust in tens of millions of homeowners’ closets. Modern weapons are death on steroids; they have new purposes, and putting food on the table isn’t one of them.

READ ABOUT GUNS IN CANADA IN A NEW EBOOK Now on Amazon.

“Gritty, nonstop action end to end. Steve Bareham weaves another action book that is a cut above the plethora of cop and crime thrillers that have swept the reading hemisphere. He adds new twists to publishing with color photos and live Internet links to provide a multi-media experience. You won’t put this one down.”

–Steven D. Cannon, the Innovators

In GUN, horrific gang violence drives a good cop over the edge. Once sworn to justice, he’s now alone, blind with grief, and without a gun or badge. What he does have is the irresistible, seductive allure of retribution.

Enter billionaire industrialist John Isaac Newton. Death has marked him, too, but his motives for payback are different. He does need people capable of blood rage, though, so Newton, master strategist, orchestrates a complex scheme befitting his famous predecessor’s third law: For every action there is an equal and opposite reaction.

With the help of a unique team of specialists, he will exact justice. One of the people he enlists is Riggs Becker, a SWAT-trained Vancouver cop on a mission that will get him killed if he’s left on his own. The story begins with him.

EXCERPT:

“All cities are mad: but the madness is gallant. All cities are beautiful: but the beauty is grim.”  —    Christopher Morley

Vancouver is a picture-perfect city, its high rises standing like sentinels on an ocean peninsula. Ubiquitous cafes with sidewalk patios and marinas with yachts and colorful sailboats add maritime charm and an atmosphere of casual leisure. The postcard tableau completes as the metropolis spreads at the feet of coastal mountains.

Bustling but orderly, Vancouver is a destination for millions of international travelers, both tourists and business people. Most get exactly what they seek: a safe trip in a beautiful setting.

Beneath the surface, though, people who look and live more deeply, see warts, its mounting tally of murders, bank robberies, and assorted violent crimes bringing to Canada a reputation much undesired. Not long ago, a woman alone was probably safe walking the streets at 3 a.m. But that was then. Today, websites post dire warnings for naive visitors:

“…steer clear of the east end unless you’re a practicing drug addict in need of a fix, or someone looking to become one. If you’re neither, don’t go. The desperate denizens there can smell a tourist a block away, and you’ll be lucky to only get mugged. It’s not a zoo where you go to see the downtrodden. If your idea of entertainment is seeing how the underbelly of society lives, tune into an episode of Intervention.”

Crime and violence happens when you cram three million residents, visitors, and ne’er-do-wells together in tight geography and then toss in the influences of a busy ocean port.

Detective Sergeant Riggs Becker loved the city, warts and all, from caviar riches of the West Side to pickled herring fare on the east. Today, though, he wasn’t happy watching a television report about gangs killing people with guns.

Becker, a member of the city’s Organized Crime Task Unit (OCTU), already knew the details, but that didn’t make them less disturbing. A new breed of criminal was loose, and the arms they used and traded meant escalating violence. Pistols and automatic weapons are easy to get in the U.S., not so in Canada, but once gangs get access and decide to go retail, the crazies and criminals gravitate to these underground suppliers.

He’d hoped this global scourge would bypass Vancouver for a while longer, but the world is shrinking, and criminals are an ambitious bunch.

Now, the facts were out, so everyone would have to sleep with the lurking specter that kept him, and 2,000 other under-gunned Vancouver cops, on edge.