Copyright 1997 Houston Chronicle Amphetamine dealer Dione Christine Allen leans out the passenger window of a stolen Chevrolet El Camino and blasts away at pursuing police officers with a .45-caliber pistol. If gun control laws aim to keep firearms from anyone, it is people like these. There is a gun for every man, woman and child in America, according to some estimates, and the weapons all begin their journey at legal manufacturers. As Hughes says, the local crack dealer doesn't own a forge. The street gun trade is inextricably tied to the street drug trade, say Texas convicts.
Addicts burglarize homes and trade stolen guns for drugs.
The dealer sells the guns to the more brazen carjackers and robbers. A murder weapon dumped in the bayou is quickly and easily replaced, and so the cycle continues. First thing the guy's going to do is look up under the bed, under the shelves. He's going to look for a gun immediately. That's it, just guns and jewelry.