The NY law states:
S 2353. FIREARM OWNERS INSURANCE POLICIES. 1. ANY PERSON IN THIS STATE WHO SHALL OWN A FIREARM SHALL, PRIOR TO SUCH OWNERSHIP, OBTAIN AND CONTINUOUSLY MAINTAIN A POLICY OF LIABILITY INSURANCE IN AN AMOUNT NOT LESS THAN ONE MILLION DOLLARS SPECIFICALLY COVERING ANY DAMAGES RESULTING FROM ANY NEGLIGENT OR WILLFUL ACTS INVOLVING THE USE OF SUCH FIREARM WHILE IT IS OWNED BY SUCH PERSON. FAILURE TO MAINTAIN SUCH INSURANCE SHALL RESULT IN THE IMMEDIATE REVOCATION OF SUCH OWNER'S REGISTRATION, LICENSE AND ANY OTHER PRIVILEGE TO OWN SUCH FIREARM.
This is a presumption of intent. No insurance, not here or in the UK ( except in this one instance for the NY gun owners) does insurance cover a willful unlawful act.
Claiming that auto insurance covers a third party in the event of a DUI overlooks the fact that the individual, while breaking the law, is not willfully attempting to harm another person.
That's an interesting point.
The legal gun owner who decides to hold up his local liquor store is carrying out a criminal act, but whether the intent is that he is going to shoot someone is, or could be, a moot point since the gun, in this instance really has only one purpose: to cause harm to someone else. That could not be said about a car.
Now, if the legal gun owner goes to someone's house with the express purpose of killing them (or seriously wounding them) you seem to believe that this should not be covered by the insurance, and yet I suggest that (at least in the UK) if someone was to deliberately attempt to kill or harm someone by driving a car at them, the driver's insurance would still pay out to the injured party.
The problem is that the insurance is currently designed to protect the insured, and if the insured is a bad boy, you want the insurers to wash their hands of him.
The reality is that (mandatory) third party insurance should be about protecting the third party not the insured.
Also, Nessie and UK Dave... are either of you advocating the NY proposals or insurance in general along similar lines to mandatory UK car insurance.
BTW my cycle club membership includes third party personal coverage up to £2-million.
No, I think I've said upstream that I prefer a sin tax, simply because it has less chance of penalising existing, responsible gun owners, but will eventually make all guns much more expensive while at the same time providing a properly funded pool of resources for cleaning up the mess left by guns within a society.
Also it has the benefit of being closely aligned with an existing sales tax which, apparently, is not considered to be an infringement of the 2A.
There would be other measures too:
- Registration of weapons
- Possibly a restriction on the resale or even gifting of weapons - maybe treating them like prescription drugs: you have a right to them, but you don't have a right to pass them on to anyone else.
- Mandatory training
Also the sin tax could apply to ammo as well as the weapons.
