A Las Vegas, Nev., woman shot and killed her next-door neighbor, whom she had previously caught burglarizing her home. Felipe Starks was trying to evade police officers, who wanted him in connection with a string of burglaries and a parole violation, by using a crawl space above the two apartments. The woman had just stepped out of her shower when Starks crashed through her ceiling. Fearing for her life, she picked up a gun she had purchased after the burglary in April, and fired several shots at Starks, who ran back into his apartment. Police took him into custody, but he later died of his wounds. Las Vegas homicide Lt. Tom Monahan said it appeared the woman had cause to fear for her life. "If a man fell through the ceiling right after you're getting out of the shower - I'm told she had just finished drying off - I think it's reasonable that you would be terrified," he said. (Las Vegas Review Journal, Las Vegas, NV, 09/ 18/03)

Jarnes Carter became aware something was not quite right when he noticed someone had damaged his front door. The Augusta, Ga., homeowner told police he then heard a loud noise and that's when he saw a man standing in his living room. Carter aimed a .357 Mag. revolver at the man and fired three shots, but the intruder escaped. Police investigating the break-in recovered a gray jersey that may have been left by the unwelcome visitor. (The Augusta Chronicle, Augusta, GA, 08/23/03)

A bank robbery went awry when the suspects crashed their getaway car in a Sacramento, Calif., suburb and took off running to evade authorities. Ed Tippets was in his back yard, watching several helicopters bear down on his neighborhood, obviously searching for someone, when he noticed his dog, Charley, was acting strange. "That's when I decided to get armed," he told authorities. Tippets recalled that he went to the back of his house to load his gun and then began searching room to room. Moving toward the kitchen, Tippets noticed a shoulder in the doorway of his laundry room. "l saw a pistol pointing at me, so l started firing," he said. The homeowner then ran outside where he was ordered to the ground by police. The suspect, later identified as Jermain Blair, fled the house and tried to escape by jumping several fences. Blair confronted two police officers who had given chase and was shot in the leg. A police task force is investigating 13 other local bank robberies that may be linked to Blair. (The Sacramento Bee, Sacramento, CA, 08/31/03)

An Orem, Utah, man nearly had his ticket punched when he attempted to rob a Greyhound bus station. The man handed the clerk at the station a note demanding money. The clerk, who has a CCW permit, drew a gun and held the would-be robber at gunpoint until authorities arrived. The suspect was charged with attempted robbery and public intoxication. (The Salt Lake Tribune, Salt Lake City, UT, 09/12/03)

In an odd turn of events, a Decatur, La., man shot an intruder and then administered first aid to the wounded suspect. Ronald Kirk was awakened just before dawn one Sunday by an intruder. Kirk shot the would-be burglar in the leg and dialed 9-1-1. The homeowner then applied pressure to the wound to slow the bleeding until police arrived. The suspect, Robert Lee Goode, was taken to the hospital, and later charged with second-degree burglary and possession of burglar's tools. (The Huntsville Times, Huntsville, AL, 09/15/03)

Justin Doyle was roused at 11 p.m. one night by loud banging on his back door. In order to protect his pregnant wife and 19-month-old child who were at home, Doyle retrieved his rifle while his wife dialed 9-1-1. Suddenly a glass door was smashed in with a cinder block and a man with a knife burst into their home. Doyle shot the home invader once in the torso, killing him. Police later identified the suspect as Manuel Villa. "The law allows citizens to use deadly force to protect their homes, lives and property," said police spokesman Jeff Arbogast. "Out of fear for his life, and the lives of his family, Mr. Doyle armed himself with a rifle and shot the intruder. It's a tragic event to have to go through." (Albuquerque Journal, Albuquerque, NM, 08/22/03)

Two men entered Wesley Stevens' Tucson, Ariz., home one night, then attacked Stevens. The homeowner picked up a revolver and fired several shots at the intruders, according to Sgt. Marco Balboa, Tucson Police Department spokesman. Balboa said the reason for the attack was unclear. One of the assailants was found dead at the scene, the other died of gunshot wounds at a local hospital. (Mohave Valley Daily News, Tucson, AZ, 09/16/03)

A bird hunting friend-whose favorite shotgun is a vintage Winchester Model 12-recently asked me, "What has the 'assault weapon ban got to do with me and my freedom?" The question made me think of a quiet, peaceable Englishman-the very symbol of the cruel injustice of gun control. I replied, "The reason you should care about any gun ban is Tony Martin."

"Who's that?" he asked.

I'll answer for anyone who hasn't heard. Tony Martin is an ordinary, decent, middle-aged English farmer whose isolated home was burglarized dozens of times by violent criminals who knew there would be no response from faraway police, and who assumed that anyone in the house would have been disarmed by government edict.

When Tony Martin woke in the dead of night on August 21, 1999, hearing the sound of three men downstairs ransacking his home, he did what any prudent armed citizen in America would do. He reached for his pump shotgun, confronted the burglars and, certain of mortal danger, fired-killing one home-invader and wounding another. The third escaped.

But this wasn't America. This was England, where using arms in self-defense is a crime-a crime for which Tony Martin paid dearly. Martin's classic pump shotgun is the very vision of what the American gun-ban crowd soothingly calls "a sporting purpose firearm." But in England "suitable for sporting purpose" has nearly vanished as, one by one, the organized shooting sports have been snuffed out.

Tony Martin's gun was similar to my bird hunting friend's treasured shotgun. The only difference is that in England, Martin's slide-action gun was banned in 1988 under a confiscatory "buyback" along with virtually all pump-action and semi-auto shotguns and rifles all under the rubric of "assault weapons." That ban followed a mass murder by a madman wielding a semi-auto version of an AK-47. Sound familiar?

So, in England, our vintage Winchester Model 12s, or Remington 870s, or Ithaca Sweet 16s or Remington ll00s are illegal.

Do any of us think of them as "assault shotguns?" Does my friend think of his Model 12 as a "danger to society?"

The anti-liberty forces in England believed exactly that and, with a massive anti-gun propaganda campaign, they prevailed.

Tony Martin's nightmare was the final rung in the long series of "sensible steps" demanded by the enemies of freedom in Britain. Those same steps began here at home with the 1994 Bill Clinton "assault weapon" ban and represent a long-term campaign modeled on England's total civil disarmament.

Never forget that the self-styled "gun safety" movement in America has a gun-ban agenda; it's purely an anti-self defense movement. Just witness the ferocious and irrational opposition to right-to-carry laws.

When Tony Martin was tried for murder for defending his life, the court sentenced him to life in prison.

The surviving burglars were in and out of jail within months, even though they had racked up over 80 lifetime arrests and convictions. The criminal Tony Martin wounded was even consulted by authorities regarding Martin's parole, and given £5,000 in taxpayer legal aid to sue Martin. Worst of all, the government opposed Tony Martin's ultimate release-after 36 months in prison- because they said he posed "a danger to burglars."

Ultimately, Tony Martin's life sentence was reduced by a higher court. Only after a huge public outcry over his mistreatment is he now free. But the nightmare didn't end there. He now finds himself facing another sentence-a death sentence-revenge sworn by the crime family of the home-invader Tony Martin killed in self-defense.

Once again, Tony Martin is prohibited from defending himself against such deadly threats.

In England good men and women are required to cower in the face of criminal evil; they are required to submit to violence. But as a headline in The Observer recently blared: "Gun crime spreads like a cancer across Britain."

In a nation where an armed citizen like Tony Martin is seen as a danger to criminals, the cause of this "cancer" should be a no-brainer. But that society is coming our way- one step at a time if the Charles Schumers or Hillary Clintons or Carolyn McCarthys have their way. Never forget that the first step toward the gun-ban utopia in England-as it was in Australia where citizens at this very moment are being forcibly disarmed-was a ban on Congress so doubted the concept of any gun prohibition that it capped Clinton's so called "assault weapon ban" with a 10-year sunset provision-whereby the law will automatically be purged from the books September 13, 2004.

Let your Senators and Congressman know that common sense demands that the Clinton/Feinstein/Schumer gun ban be allowed to vanish from the books just as Congress intended. The sad story of Tony Martin shows us all that, as a social engineering experiment, any firearm ban is doomed to failure because it has nothing to do with curbing crime, but everything to do with ultimately rendering innocent citizens defenseless.