Interestingly, the same thing occurred in Great Britain. Following a 1996 massacre of school children by a madman in Dunblane, Scotland, the British government banned and ordered the confiscation of most firearms. Since then a horrific crime wave has taken place in England and Scotland. In 1998, the U.S. Department of Justice declared that the rate of muggings in England had surpassed that in the U.S. by 40 percent, while assault and burglary rates were nearly 100 percent higher in England than in the U.S.

To make matters worse for England --- and this is also true for Canada --- in those countries where citizens are disarmed in their own homes, day burglary is commonplace and dangerous because criminals know they will not be shot at if caught flagrante delicto. Not so in the U.S., where burglars not only prefer night burglaries but try to make sure homeowners are not at home to avoid being shot at by the intended victim.