Kahr in the news, pays large settlement

[rholmes69]

Did you guys see this? Just ridiculous. Don't blame the bad guy, he was only doing what comes naturally. Sheesh..

http://www.foxbusiness.com/2011/07/26/gun-maker-kahr-to-pay-record-damage-claim/

[Thunder71]

They hired a guy with a criminal record to work at a gun manufacturing facility, I can see why they settled.

[georgepittenger]

ridiculous ,
our legal system is great AND absurd at the same time ....... :mad:

[Ol'coot]

This is just ridiculous IMHO, The courts have no common sense anymore. I a person working at Home Depot or another of the large building supplier steals a shovel , pick or whatever and then commits murder with it are they also responsible? Where do the acts of an employee away from the work place become the responsibility of the employer . I do agree Kahr should screen their employee better before hiring but this is just over the top.

[rholmes69]

They don't detail what the criminal record was. Could have been writing a bad check... could have been a larceny. I have a feeling if it was truely a serious crime, the media would have painted the town black with "prior murderer gets hired by gun maker, etc....)

[titus1971]

We should all go out and buy a new Kahr immediately to offset the cost of this settlement.
Also when the press says "criminal record" we all think mass murder/child molester but he could have just as esily been arrested for jaywalking and still had a "criminal record". Looks like Kahr may have had some mis-steps but you know the liberal leaning press is going to slant it in the most negative light to the firearms industry.

[titus1971]

also check this quote out
"The suit, filed in 2002, alleged that Mark M. Cronin, a drug-addicted employee of Kahr Arms with a criminal record, smuggled parts of guns out of the plant before they were stamped with serial numbers. Mr. Cronin then assembled the gun and traded it for 2-1/2 ounces of cocaine worth about $80, according to the federal Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco & Firearms. "
He traded it for $80 worth of blow? Geeesh!

[Bill K]

Thankfully we needn't concern ourselves with such "gun control" negligence on the part of our Federal government. :rolleyes:

[TominCA]

Employers pretty much have a responsibility for what their employees do and a duty to make an effort not to put others at risk. The classical case is the home remodel contractor ( or HVAC contractor or Landscape contractor) who makes no effort to check the background on employees and then one of the employess injures in some way a customer. If no effort was made to screen for criminals, and they hired a person of high risk, then the employer has a very good chance of losing a civil suit. If they did check, and found nothing, they can probably avoid payment.

It doesn't take a very bright lawyer to make the connection between guns and danger to the public and then supposedly giving a criminal with a drug problem access to firearms. New hire Employee screening costs about $125 and a drug test about $80. Why not require it? You get the money back just in employee petty theft reduction. The drug addicts usually screen themselves out by not showing up for the tests.

The basis of the law goes back to the old Germanic Noble-Thane relationship.

[mightymouse]

This is just ridiculous IMHO, The courts have no common sense anymore. I a person working at Home Depot or another of the large building supplier steals a shovel , pick or whatever and then commits murder with it are they also responsible? Where do the acts of an employee away from the work place become the responsibility of the employer . I do agree Kahr should screen their employee better before hiring but this is just over the top.

Yeah, but still so much easier to pull a trigger than wield a shovel or pick. Guns don't kill, maim, people do. As a tool, they really streamline the task though. If it weren't for the fact, for defensive purposes,of course, I wouldn't carry one. Shovels and picks don't fit in my pocket.

[Bigcube]

He shouldn't have been working there but still it's not really the employers fault... unless there is federal guidelines they must follow for suitable employee's . Regardless it was probably better to settle this one. Could have been much worse in front of the wrong jury. :o

[TominCA]

I agree, It is popular to target "guns" as being dangerous and ignoring the people who use them. I'll bet if Kahr made shovels, and an employee stole shovel parts and assembled one which was subsequently sold and used in a crime -- nothing would have happened. Its a bizzare world we live in when inanimate objects can take the blame for the actions of people.

I don't know the facts in this case but I have seen cases where people knowingly hire excons because they want to help them. It doesn't always work out. There are really three levels of involvement:

Screen new hires and reject bad ones
Don't screen and claim ignorance if something goes wrong
Screen for (or know of) a criminal past (or current behavior) and hire them anyway.

The third is the worst and usually the saddest. It is usually done by very nice people who run a family business. They want to help the employee lead a good life and sometimes end up exposing others to harm paying for it.

A recent survey has shown that about 12% of people applying for construction labor jobs had a record in the last 7 years. Employers should check new hires but also use judgement. A guy who got a drunk and disorderly at his high school prom who is now 25 years old with 2 kids and house payments is probably not a risk. The guy with an attempted robbery conviction is.

[titus1971]

The reality is that legislation would never solve this problem. We dont know the specific's, he could have had a fake ID, went in under a contractors license etc. Our problem here is not guns, it's that members of our society are willing to murder one another in cold blood for a few dollars to support a drug habit. When I was younger we all used to take our rifles to school in our vehichles to go hunting afterward. It was never considered threatening because we never dreamed of taking them into the libray and killing innocent people. There's a sickness in our Society and some people are wanting to make guns the boogeyman.

[wdg]

$600,000 ... you can bet there will be FBI background checks perfomed in the future similar to those done for all Nuclear Plant workers. It would be worth the up front cost to avoid future lawsuits. And of course the added expense will be passed on to consumers... Price of doing business in a society that shys away from individual responsibility

[Quickdraw]

Based on that how much will ATF need to pay to Mexican nationals for the 1600+ weapons that they negligently lost and the deaths that they have and will cause?

[LaP]

Based on that how much will ATF need to pay to Mexican nationals for the 1600+ weapons that they negligently lost and the deaths that they have and will cause?

The ATF will just move the responsible agents and supervisors to various locations around the country.... NO charges will be filed... Just a slight oversight... Or, maybe the guns did it by themselves???:eek:
The current administration (the REAL culprits), will laugh all the way to the reelection