Summarize this content to 2000 words in 6 paragraphs Police and crime commissioner for Bedfordshire John Tizard has written to the Home Secretary Yvette CooperProsper was today sentenced at Luton Crown Court (Image: PA)A Labour police and crime commissioner is calling for an urgent change in the law on firearms licensing following the case of triple-killer Nicholas Prosper.John Tizard has written to the Home Secretary to express his concerns about how easy it was for Prosper to buy the double-barrelled 12-bore Nikko shotgun he used to kill his own mum and two of his siblings, while also plotting to kill 30 school children and their teachers.He now wants to to see a government review to help prevent another gun tragedy. In the letter to Yvette Cooper, Mr Tizard, who represents Bedfordshire, where Prosper carried out his rampage, said: “This case has exposed a major system failure and some serious shortcomings in the current law.READ MORE: Nicholas Prosper: Teen who gunned down his own family and planned school massacre jailed for 49yearsMr Tizard has written to Home Secretary Yvette Cooper requesting an urgent review(Image: Thomas Krych/ZUMA Press Wire/REX/Shutterstock)“I believe that new legislation is needed to ensure public safety and to restore confidence in firearms licensing policy and process when firearms are sold or exchanged. I believe that one viable option would be for anyone wishing to purchase a firearm to provide documented confirmation from the police service that they have a legitimate entitlement to own a firearm, as well as proof of identity to the vendor.”Luton Crown Court heard Prosper had been thinking about mass killing for “over a year”… “but his plans stalled in 2023 because he could not work out how to get hold of a firearm”. Then, after extensive online research, he realised guns can be traded privately if the buyer is able to produce a firearms certificate to the seller.He successfully exploited Britain’s gun laws by downloading a blank firearms certificate and using a website which allows users to amend pictures so he could create his own convincing looking fake. The con allowed Prosper, who was aged 18 at the time, to buy a 12-bore Nikko shotgun and 100 cartridges from an unsuspecting pensioner the day before the murders.Prosper murdered his 13-year-old sister Giselle, his mum Juliana, 48, and his 16-year-old Kyle in September last year(Image: PA)Under the current law, sellers have to notify police within seven days about the sale of the weapon. But they don’t have to check with police whether the buyer’s firearms certificate is genuine before the purchase, creating a loophole whereby the new owner has a window to carry out an attack before the fake is discovered.In his letter, Mr Tizard added: “This confirmation needs to be shared by the police with the vendor ahead of sale and exchange. It is clear to me that there should be a national database of firearm licence holders or the ability of police services to be able to interrogate each other’s databases.“My request to you is for the sale and exchange of firearms to be reviewed as a matter of urgency and for new regulations to be introduced. I hope that this might be addressed quickly by secondary legislation, and should primary legislation be required that this could be included in the current Crime and Policing Bill.”Prosper tricked a pensioner into selling him a gun by using a fake firearms certificate he made himself(Image: PA)Talking about the case, the PCC said: “Whilst Bedfordshire, Cambridgeshire and Hertfordshire constabularies are taking measures to help legitimate firearms holders spot potentially fraudulent licences and be cautious about sales, there is an urgent need for legislative change. “The public rightly would expect stringent and effective safeguards to be in place to better regulate the issuing of licences, and gun sales and exchanges, particularly when the vendor is a private individual, in order to keep us all safe.”
