The government's project team for studying measures to prevent the spread of guns has submitted a report to the state minister in charge of such measures, Sanae Takaichi. She says the government will push the necessary measures with determination to revive the nation as the safest country in the world. The report points to a series of gun-related crimes that have happened since the turn of the year. To eradicate such crimes, the government must focus on confiscating guns from gangsters.
Recent shooting-death crimes include the April 17 murder of Nagasaki Mayor Itcho Ito by a former gangster; the April 20 gangster-on-gangster killing in Sagamihari, Kanagawa Prefecture, after which the suspect holed up in a house in Machida, Tokyo; and the May 17 killing of a police special-attack team member by a former gangster in Nagakute, Aichi Prefecture.
Police estimate that at the end of 2006, there were about 41,500 gangsters in the nation. If each gangster has a gun, it means that at least 40,000 guns exist in Japanese society. For the decade ended in 2006, only about 4,500 guns were confiscated. Last year alone, 458 guns were confiscated, 204 of them from gangsters. In June, the Kanagawa prefectural police seized 31 guns and about 500 live cartridges from a gangster.