Letter: Victims of the .22 handgun

Sir: All handguns should be banned except for people in uniform who carry them for the protection of the public (letter, 19 November).

The .22 handgun is not injurious to humans? What about my schoolmate shot in the stomach accidentally? He did not even get to the hospital alive. The weapon involved in the tragedy was a .22 revolver. What about the two men, albeit they were looters, shot in front of me with a .22 rifle? One died instantaneously, the second died while I was writing down his particulars.

I write as one who for six years in uniform carried a pistol on my hip. That weapon was solely to destroy human life.

GEORGE O'NEILL

Richmond, Surrey