"Assault" rifle recovered?

An article in this morning's Northwest Herald (Page 3A) reported the recovery of an "assault rifle" during a traffic stop and pursuit by a Barrington Police Department officer.

The good work of the officer is to be commended. He observed a speeder and gave chase. The driver was captured after he eventually stopped, left the vehicle and entered another that was then stopped.

Here's my bone. The culprit was reported as having a "stolen assault rifle" in his possession. Probably the reporter used terminology given to her by the Barrington police report. The term "assault rifle" is frequently used in Illinois as a tool for setting the anti-gunners off on another crusade.

An "assault" rifle is usually the type of long-barreled gun that can be set to fire all rounds of ammunition during a single trigger pull. You pull and hold the trigger, and all rounds will fire through the weapon automatically without successive trigger pulls (versus a semi-automatic rifle, which requires a separate trigger pull to fire each bullet).

Assault (fully-automatic) rifles have been illegal in the United States for many years. Only military and police are allowed to have them and, even at that, only certain members of certain military and police units; for example, selected and specifically-trained SWAT team members.

What the Barrington Police most likely recovered was a semi-automatic, assault-type (look-alike) weapon. While these weapons might "look" mean, they function exactly like the semi-automatic rifle in your closet that doesn't "look" mean.

Police and reporters should be careful to state a classification of weapons clearly.