New York: Guns Close to Home

Ten days after the shooting in Newtown, The Journal News, a daily newspaper in the northern suburbs of New York, caused a national controversy by publishing the names and addresses of 33,614 holders of weapon permits. Despite threats that forced them to hire armed guards, the newspaper’s management is fighting these days to identify other weapon holders. At least one American media outlet has followed suit this week.

Donald Trump. Howard Stern. Sean Hannity. These well-known names are part of a list of people who hold permits to carry firearms in New York. 446 pages long, this list was released in a rather crude way on Tuesday by the website Gawker: “Here is a list of all the assholes who own guns in New York City.”

The title was subsequently changed, but the intent of Gawker has remained the same: to show solidarity with The Journal News, which also denounced New Yorkers who refuse to obey the law on handguns.

“The state legislature decided that they wanted New Yorkers to be able to know who had guns in their community,” said John Cook, a Gawker journalist who in 2010 obtained a list of firearms permit holders in New York with the help of the law on access of information.

“I had this list and in order to sort of make the point that Putnam County is violating the law, I wanted to sort of let people know this information is available and it’s out there,” he adds.

It must be said that officials of Putnam County refuse to meet the demands of The Journal News and publish the names and addresses of those holding weapon permits. On Dec. 24, the Gannett newspaper chain caused an outcry among fans of firearms in the United States by publishing the names and addresses of 33,614 handgun license holders in the counties of Westchester and Rockland (a permit is not required for rifles or shotguns).

The newspaper obtained the list thanks to the law on access of information. Its decision to publish resulted in threats to its staff and led to its management hiring armed guards to protect its offices. Bloggers have also published the addresses of several journalists of the newspaper, including schools attended by their children.

But Dwight Worley, the journalist who caused the scandal, regrets nothing. “The people have as much of a right to know who owns guns in their communities as gun owners have to own weapons,” he told the New York Times, expressing an opinion with which his boss, Janet Hasson, agrees.

“We knew publication of the database would be controversial, but we felt sharing information about gun permits in our area was important in the aftermath of the Newtown shootings,” she said.

The clerk of Putnam County, Dennis Sant, is far from sharing this belief.

“I am a man who follows the rule of law. This is not about the rule of law anymore,” he said at a press conference on Jan. 3. “We are talking about endangering citizens.”