(WTTW News)

Two weeks before her death, Little Village resident Karina Gonzalez filed an order of protection against her husband. It was granted.

He was to temporarily lose his Firearm Owners Identification (FOID) card, which Illinois requires of gun owners. Even so, her husband was able to hold onto the gun he used to kill Gonzalez and her 15-month-old daughter, Daniela.

“That order should have meant that the gun that killed would have been removed from the home. But it wasn’t,” said state Sen. Celina Villanueva, a Democrat whose district office is blocks away from Gonzalez’s home. “Their murder is horrific, and it should have never happened.”

Villanueva is sponsor of a previously stalled measure that she said will help to protect future victims by requiring police to temporarily take guns from firearm owners under certain orders of protection.

“Simply put, when survivors go to the courts for protection, we have to make sure that protection works,” said Amanda Pyron, leader of The Network, an organization that fights domestic violence. “This isn’t something that survivors can do on their own, this is something subject to judicial review, and it needs to be clear guidance.”

She and other domestic violence survivor advocates are also seeking to expand the law so the same order of firearm restraining order petitions could be sought for, and apply to, exes and dating partners.

The measure would also forbid a gun owner from temporarily transferring their firearms. As it stands, advocates say it’s legally possible for someone to be stripped of their FOID to hand off their guns to another FOID card holder, including a relative who may live with the accuser and the perpetrator.

Such loopholes are a “failure” of the state and the system, Villanueva said.

A previous attempt to pass similar legislation failed during the legislator’s spring session, but state Rep. Maura Hirschauer, D-Batavia, said she is committed to passing the proposal when the General Assembly returns to Springfield later this month for its annual veto session.

Hirschauer said the changes are particularly important given a rise in domestic violence incidents coupled with an increase in gun ownership.

“An order of protection is a key tool to help survivors, especially as they try to leave a relationship. Right now, however, the order of protection process is failing too many domestic violence survivors especially when firearms are involved,” she said. “When an order of protection is granted with the firearm remedy, that gun needs to be removed from the home immediately. We cannot have any ambiguity about this process. The stakes are too high.”

Gun regulation measures are politically precarious, and with veto session scheduled for only six days the window for advancing the measure is small.  Still unresolved are matters such as where and how guns would be stored once they’re seized by police.

Follow Amanda Vinicky on Twitter: @AmandaVinicky