Note: Martin Killias is not known as an objective researcher. Regardless, you might want this reference for your records.
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Army weapons "kill 300 people a year"
Swiss Info
http://www.swissinfo.org/eng/front/detail/Army_weapons_kill_300_people_a_year.html?siteSect=105&sid=7357024&cKey=1166356142000
December 16, 2006
More than 300 people are killed every year by army guns, according to a study led by the Swiss criminologist Martin Killias.
These weapons play a central role in suicides and Switzerland's grim history of family killings, said the research, published on Saturday ahead of a parliamentary debate on the subject.
The study revealed that private guns and army weapons were used in 36 per cent of domestic murders.
The majority, 60 per cent, of murders outside the home on the other hand involved illegal weapons.
However, army weapons were used in more than two‑thirds (68 per cent) of suicides.
Killias said the total number of deaths from army weapons, an extrapolation from data from six cantons, was far higher than he had expected.
The figures, published in the latest journal of the Criminological Institute at Lausanne University, are part of a full study which should be released in the summer.
Killias said it was also alarming that domestic murder happens so frequently -- every second murder or attempted murder in Switzerland occurs within the family circle.
"It is undeniable that keeping weapons at home causes major problems," he said, adding that threats involving army weapons should not be forgotten.
Tradition
For Killias, the keeping of weapons and ammunition at home cannot be justified.
"Do we want to continue accepting the deaths of almost 300 people a year by pistols, rifles and carbines in order to perpetuate a tradition which allegedly strengthens the will to defend oneself."
All able‑bodied Swiss men aged 20‑30 are conscripted for about three months and issued with a rifle, to be used only in the event of an alert.
