Connecticut Bill Tries to keep Guns Away From kids

HARTFORD, Conn. — The Connecticut Senate on Thursday approved a measure that would ban children under 16 years old from handling or shooting machine guns.

The legislation, which passed on a 31-2 vote, stems from the October death of an 8-year-old Ashford boy who accidentally shot himself in the head with an Uzi at a Massachusetts gun show.

"For a young person, a minor, to handle an automatic weapon … it’s like saying that it’s OK to pick up a rattlesnake and that it is somehow going to be safe,” said Senate President Donald E. Williams Jr., D-Brooklyn. "It’s not going to be safe and it should not be legal and I would think that a lot of folks would be shocked that there was not a law.”

The measure now moves to the House of Representatives, where it is expected to pass.

by the associated press