[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 147 (2001), Part 10]
[Senate]
[Page 13951]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]



                         WOMEN AND GUN VIOLENCE

  Mr. LEVIN. Mr. President, just last year the Congress passed and 
President Clinton signed into law the Violence Against Women Act of 
2000. The law instituted welcome changes in Federal criminal law 
relating to stalking, domestic abuse and sex offense cases. In 
addition, VAWA 2000 created programs to prevent sexual assaults on 
college campuses, establish transitional housing for victims of 
domestic abuse and enhance protections for elderly and disabled victims 
of domestic violence.
  The importance of the Violence Against Women Act should not be 
underestimated. However, if we are to comprehensively address this 
issue, we cannot ignore the impact of gun violence on women. According 
to studies cited by the Violence Policy Center, in 1998, in homicides 
where the weapon was known, 50 percent of female homicide victims were 
killed with a firearm. Of those murdered women, more than three 
quarters were killed with a handgun. And that same year, for every one 
time that a woman used a handgun to kill in self-defense, 101 women 
were murdered by a handgun.
  While the firearms industry markets gun to women--asserting that 
owning a gun will make women safer--the statistics support the point 
made by Karen Brock, an analyst with the Violence Policy Center, 
``Handguns don't offer women protection; they guarantee peril.''

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