FC: Boston Globe warns of online knife sales, provides links

[Declan McCullagh <declan () well com>]

[Buying knives online is now something to be regulated? Sheesh. Kids can 
just buy them at the local Army-Navy store; I know I did. --Declan]

**********

Date: Tue, 20 Feb 2001 21:52:13 -0500
To: declan () well com
From: Duncan Frissell <frissell () panix com>
Subject: Boston Globe Sells Knives

Declan,

The Boston Globe article on the suspects in the Dartmouth killings buying a 
knife over the nets, helpfully provides the urls  of a number of online 
knife sellers.  Just in case anyone needs a blade.

DCF

http://www.boston.com/dailyglobe2/051/metro/Few_limits_on_who_buys_knives_online+.shtml


Few limits on who buys knives online

By Anand Vaishnav, Globe Staff, 2/20/2001

The message from www.sharpknives.com is clear: Only people 18 years and 
older can buy knives from the Web site. Not all knives are legal 
everywhere. And an adult's signature is required on shipments.

But a few keystrokes away is www.bladez.com, where a buyer can order 
hundreds of knives with just a credit card number and no age or geographic 
verification.

The largely unregulated world of online knife sales was thrown into the 
spotlight yesterday when prosecutors said that either Robert Tulloch, 17, 
or James Parker, 16, bought a military-style knife on the Internet - and 
allegedly used it in the slaying of two Dartmouth College professors.

The two teenagers were arrested yesterday morning in Indiana, where they 
were allegedly trying to hitch a ride west.

Dennis McClure, the sheriff for Chelsea, Vt., the youths' hometown, told 
the Associated Press yesterday that the two youths became suspects because 
one bought a military-style knife on the Internet.

It is believed that investigators were able to trace the manufacturer of 
the knife from a sheath left at the crime scene and that they obtained from 
the company a list of knife purchases made over the Internet.

[...]

James Melvin of www.1stdirectknife.com said he does not sell to anyone 
under 18 at knife shows or conventions. But on the Internet, buyers' true 
ages are a mystery.

[...]




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