Camden citizens tell N.J. task force about gun concerns

IF HIRAM ROSA were alive today, he could have been mayor of Camden, a local business owner or maybe one of the dozens of city residents who returned to his alma mater Tuesday night to talk about gun violence.

But it's been almost 12 years since Rosa, a senior finance major at Rutgers-Camden, was shot to death with an AK-47 assault rifle about 500 feet from the student campus center there. That campus center was home to the first of three public hearings for New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie's NJ SAFE Task Force, which he established last month in the wake of the massacre at the Sandy Hook Elementary School, in Newtown, Conn.

And though the task force was designed "to study and make recommendations on the intersection of gun control, addiction, mental health and school safety in New Jersey," many at the hearing focused strictly on gun rights versus gun control. Some said that the government was focusing too much on the gun-owning "good guys" when it should keep them from the hands of criminals with harsh penalties and mandatory prison sentences.

"No law is going to prevent another psychopath from going off," said Bill Bruner, 57, from Shamong, Burlington County.

Some audience members urged the panel, made up of former state attorneys general, as well as experts in education, mental health and substance abuse, to loosen laws about transporting firearms and carrying them. Some went even further.

"We need our teachers to be certified and strapped in the city 'cause of all the violence," said Camden resident Eulisis Delgado, 60.

State Sen. Donald Norcross, who lives a few blocks from campus, said that Camden's woes begin with poverty and unemployment and addiction, and that record-breaking violence is the end result.

"The murder rate here is the highest in New Jersey, the highest in the world," he said. "The closest nation is Honduras, and we're above that."

For Wayne Williams, the whole idea of the task force, the talking, the pondering and the statements he heard, were frustrating. He told the panel that each of his kids knows five people who've been murdered and that he had even considered joining the National Rifle Association, a statement some in the audience applauded.

"I've lived here 34 years and I've listened to people talk about problems and how to solve them," Williams told the Daily News later. "In my perspective, nothing's gotten better."

The task force will meet Wednesday night in Monmouth County and Thursday night in Newark. The panel is expected to report its findings back to Christie in 60 days.

One audience member said he believed that the problems extend beyond New Jersey and the solutions are far too complicated for one task force.

"America is sick," said Floyd McArthur, 56, a drug counselor from Voorhees. "Sick people can't fix sick people."