Texas duplicates federal gun smuggling crime

Houston Chronicle:

A bill on its way to Gov. Rick Perry’s desk will help authorities crack down on gun smuggling from Texas to Mexico, the state’s chief law enforcement official said Thursday.

Attorney General Greg Abbott said the legislation, passed last week by the state Senate, is intended to prevent drug cartels from obtaining weapons that have fueled recent violence and instability in Mexico.

Authorities say Texas, and especially Houston, are popular sources for guns in Mexico, where civilians generally are prohibited from possessing the weapons. The push for the new law comes as the administration of President Barack Obama has vowed to do more to stem the flow of illegal firearms, a goal Perry also cited during a speech to lawmakers earlier this year.

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While illegal gun trafficking is already a federal crime, the bill’s authors said they hope the legislation will give state authorities more tools to fight the problem, too.

“This just gives us one more means to prosecute,” said state Sen. John Carona, R-Dallas, who chairs the Senate’s homeland security committee. “The problem with relying on the federal officials is just that there aren’t enough of them. Their resources are spread so thin.”

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This probably will not make much difference. In most cases it will be an extra count in an indictment for other offenses. While we certainly need to prosecute weapons purchases for Mexico's criminal insurgency, the media and this administration has blown that issue out of proportion. They get most of their weapons from other sources, like those taken by deserters from teh Mexican army and bought on the black market in Central America.