Gun

TRENTON - They're now called "Newtown families. " They wear bright green ties, ribbons, and pins. They hand out bracelets that bear the names of their children. Lawmakers hug them and cry. With federal gun control legislation stalled in Washington, they came to New Jersey on Tuesday to ask the Legislature to make the state's gun laws, already among the toughest in the nation, more strict. Specifically, they want Senate President Stephen Sweeney (D., Gloucester) to let the Senate vote on a bill that would reduce the legal magazine capacity to 10 rounds from 15. "That is one critical component that's very dear to our hearts," said Nicole Hockley, whose 6-year-old son, Dylan, was one of 20 children killed in the December shooting at Sandy Hook Elementary School.

WASHINGTON - Sen. Pat Toomey (R., Pa.) dismissed talk Friday that he might take a second run at passing new gun laws, even as a new poll found voters in the state giving him high marks for backing a bipartisan plan to expand background checks. "My own view is very simple: The Senate has had its vote. We've seen the outcome of that vote. I am not aware of any reason to believe that if we had the vote again that we'd have a different outcome," Toomey said on a conference call. He was responding to a question about a New York Times report that Sen. Joe Manchin (D., W. Va.)

You don't have to be in Washington to get a glimpse of America's seemingly unbridgeable divide over guns. Less than five months after the massacre of 20 Connecticut schoolchildren, there's plenty of evidence closer to home - say, in the 20 miles between Clayton's Hunting & Fishing in Horsham and the University of Pennsylvania, where researcher Charles Branas studies methods of reducing violence. I spoke last week with Branas and Tom Clayton, Clayton's co-owner, seeking insights on the predictable dance that follows America's disturbingly predictable series of mass killings.

OLYMPIA, Wash. - After struggling to sway both state and federal lawmakers, proponents of expanding background checks for gun sales are now exploring whether they will have more success by taking the issue directly to voters. While advocates generally prefer that new gun laws be passed through the legislative process, especially at the national level, they are also concerned about how much sway the National Rifle Association has with lawmakers. Washington Rep. Jamie Pedersen, a Democrat who had sponsored unsuccessful legislation on background checks at the state level, said a winning ballot initiative would make a statement with broad implications.

TRENTON - The names of hundreds of thousands of current and former New Jersey residents who have been involuntarily committed to psychiatric facilities have been added to an FBI database used to bar firearms purchases by people with criminal records or a history of mental illness. New Jersey court officials said that they began forwarding digital records to the FBI earlier this year and that they expect to complete the program by the end of May. The Civil Commitment Automated Tracking system has turned over identities of 280,000 people subject to involuntary civil commitment dating to 1975 in 16 of the state's 21 counties.

TRENTON - A package of gun violence prevention bills was introduced in the New Jersey Senate on Thursday, and the chamber's president said he was committed to advancing the legislation quickly. President Stephen Sweeney (D., Gloucester) said he believes the bills could become a national model as states struggle to curb gun violence after high-profile shootings such as the school massacre in Newtown, Conn. The Assembly Democratic leader criticized the package, however, because it does not seek to limit magazine capacity, which stands at 15 in New Jersey.

Philadelphia police are offering $30,000 in reward money tied to a fatal shooting in North Philadelphia three weeks ago - $20,000 for information on the killer and $10,000 for his gun, an AK-47 style assault weapon involved in both the homicide and another shooting a week later, several blocks away. Tyrone Rosser, 36, was shot multiple times by the .30-caliber weapon at 10:37 p.m. April 6 near Seventh Street and Venango Avenue, and pronounced dead at Temple University Hospital. A companion was shot in a leg. Video from nearby stores showed the shooter coming up from behind the two men and firing, then fleeing west on Venango and north on Eighth Street, continuing to fire as he ran. Police recovered 22 shell casings from that shooting and 23 more from a similar encounter a week later, near Seventh and Clearfield Avenue, where two men were shot and a third was wounded by flying debris.

WASHINGTON – Sen. Pat Toomey's approval rating reached a personal high in a new poll taken days after he wrapped up his push to expand background checks for gun purchases. Pennsylvania voters gave Toomey a 48-30 approval in a new Quinnipiac University poll. His approval is up four points from a month earlier. More than half of voters – 54 percent – thought more favorably of Toomey, a Republican, because of his work on guns, against just 12 percent who think less of him. Even among Democrats, 41 percent approve of Toomey's work, against 34 percent who disapprove.