Ban sale of Grand Theft Auto, other violent video games, state rep says
With carjackings rising, Rep. Marcus Evans wants to prohibit the sale of violent video games promoting criminal activity. Also Monday, Operation Safe Pump announced its gas station guards program will expand to south suburban Olympia Fields.
chicago.suntimes.com
With carjackings rising, Rep. Marcus Evans wants to prohibit the sale of violent video games promoting criminal activity
Rep. Marcus Evans Jr. wants to amend a 2012 law preventing some video games from being sold to minors. Friday, he filed HB3531, which would amend that law to ban the sale to anyone of video games depicting “psychological harm,” including “motor vehicle theft with a driver or passenger present.”
“The bill would prohibit the sale of some of these games that promote the activities that we’re suffering from in our communities.” Evans said.
Besides addressing carjacking, the bill also changes the definition of a “violent video game” to one in which players “control a character within the video game that is encouraged to perpetuate human-on-human violence in which the player kills or otherwise causes serious physical or psychological harm to another human or an animal.”
CPD officers responded to 218 carjackings in January, police said. Walker believes there is bipartisan support in Springfield to ban sales of the game in Illinois.
Olympia Fields has a “significant population of women and seniors,” who have been targeted in recent carjackings, according to Safe Pump.