Unique law lets police seize guns before a crime is committed
 

Unique law lets police seize guns before a crime is committed

http://waronyou.com/forums/index.php?topic=614.0

BY PAUL HUGHES REPUBLICAN-AMERICAN
HARTFORD -- Using a unique state law, police in Connecticut have disarmed dozens of gun owners based on suspicions that they might harm themselves or others.

The state's gun seizure law is considered the first and only law in the country that allows the confiscation of a gun before the owner commits an act of violence. Police and state prosecutors can obtain seizure warrants based on concerns about someone's intentions.

State police and 53 police departments have seized more than 1,700 guns since the law took effect in October 1999, according to a new report to the legislature. There are nearly 900,000 privately owned firearms in Connecticut today.

Opponents of a gun seizure law expressed fears in 1999 that police would abuse the law. Today, the law's backers say the record shows that hasn't been the case.

"It certainly has not been abused. It may be underutilized," said Ron Pinciaro, coexecutive director of Connecticut Against Gun Violence.

Attorney Ralph D. Sherman has represented several gun owners who had their firearms seized under the law. His latest client was denied a pistol permit because the man was once the subject of a seizure warrant.

"In every case I was involved in I thought it was an abuse," said Sherman, who fought against the law's passage.

The report to the legislature shows that state judges are inclined to issue gun seizure warrants and uphold seizures when challenged in court.

Out of more than 200 requests for warrants, Superior Court judges rejected just two applications � one for lack of probable cause, and another because police had already seized the individual's firearms under a previous warrant. Both rejections occurred in 1999. The legislature's Office of Legislative Research could document only 22 cases of judges ordering seized guns returned to their owners.

Rep. Michael P. Lawlor, D-East Haven, is one of the chief authors of the gun seizure law. In his view, the number of warrant applications and gun seizures show that police haven't abused the law.

"It is pretty consistent," said Lawlor, the House chairman of the Judiciary Committee.

Robert T. Crook, the executive director of the Connecticut Coalition of Sportsmen, questioned whether police have seized more guns than the number reported to the legislature. Crook said the law doesn't require police departments or the courts to compile or report information on gun seizures. The Office of Legislative Research acknowledged that its report may have underreported seizures.

"We don't know how many guns were actually confiscated or returned to their owners," Crook said.

Police seized guns in 95 percent of the 200-plus cases that the researchers were able to document. In 11 cases, police found no guns, the report said.

Spouses and live-in partners were the most common source of complaints that led to warrant applications. They were also the most frequent targets of threats. In a Southington case, a man threatened to shoot a neighbor's dog.

The gun seizure law arose out of a murderous shooting rampage at the headquarters of the Connecticut Lottery Corp. in 1998. A disgruntled worker shot and killed four top lottery officials and then committed suicide.

Under the law, any two police officers or a state prosecutor may obtain warrants to seize guns from individuals who pose an imminent risk of harming themselves or others. Before applying for warrants, police must first conduct investigations and determine there is no reasonable alternative to seizing someone's guns. Judges must also make certain findings.

The law states that courts shall hold a hearing within 14 days of a seizure to determine whether to return the firearms to their owners or order the guns held for up to one year.

Sherman said his five clients all waited longer than two weeks for their hearings. Courts scheduled hearing dates within the 14-day deadline, but then the proceedings kept getting rescheduled. In one client's case, Sherman said, the wait was three months.

Many gun owners don't get their seized firearms back. Courts ordered guns held in more than one-third of the documented seizures since 1999. Judges directed guns destroyed, turned over to someone else or sold in more than 40 other cases.

A Torrington man was one of the 22 gun owners who are known to have had their seized firearms returned to them.

In October 2006, Torrington police got a seizure warrant after the man made 28 unsubstantiated claims of vandalism to his property in three-year period. In the application, police described the man's behavior as paranoid and delusional. They said he installed an alarm system, surveillance cameras, noise emitting devices and spotlights for self-protection. They also reported that he had a pistol permit and possessed firearms.

A judge ordered the man's guns returned four months after police seized them. The judge said the police had failed to show the man posed any risk to himself or others. There also was no documented history of mental illness, no criminal record and no history of misusing firearms. "In fact, the firearms were found in a locked safe when the officers executed the warrant," the ruling said.

Lawlor and Sherman weren't aware of any constitutional challenges to the law, or any state or federal court rulings on the question of its constitutionality.

Lawlor said there have been no challenges on constitutional grounds because of the way the law was written. "The whole point was to make sure it was limited and constitutional," he said. Sherman said it is because the law is used sparingly, and because a test case would be too costly for average gun owners.

Lawlor, Crook, and Sherman don't see the legislature repealing or revising the gun seizure law. Pinciaro said Connecticut Against Gun Violence doesn't see any reason why lawmakers should take either action.

"The bottom line from our perspective is, it may very well have saved lives," Pinciaro said.

Crook and Sherman said law-abiding gun owners remain at risk while the gun seizure law remains on the statute books.

"The overriding concern is anybody can report anybody with or without substantiation, and I don't think that is the American way," Crook said.

Re: Unique law lets police seize guns before a crime is committed
 

http://www.ilmfan.com/credits/poster..._report.01.jpg

If I hear NRA groupies say one more time that the Supreme Court gun case 'was a huge victory,' the odds of the speaker catching projectile vomit are elevated.

Re: Unique law lets police seize guns before a crime is committed
 

Nah, taking a gun every other day for nine years is not abuse.
:sarc:

Re: Unique law lets police seize guns before a crime is committed
 

It sounds like the guns were confiscated from people who had threatened to use them to kill others or, in one case, a neighbor's dog. Had charges been filed when the threats to kill were made, then perhaps there would be justification for not allowing them to own guns. I don't like confiscation, but the threat to kill someone is not something to be taken lightly, either.

I knew Matt Beck, the guy who knifed and shot his coworkers at the Connecticutt Lottery, the incident that birthed the gun confiscation law. Matt was one of my college friends, one of a group of college friends from CT who had returned to CT after graduation. Matt had always had problems with depression. He'd made up the list of the five people he intended to kill (he only got to four of them, but he had also intended to kill his union representative) well over a month before he did it and talked to his friends about it repeatedly. I didn't live in CT, but my friends had called me and told me about the list and about their fears that Matt was really going to do it. At least one of them called the police, and Matt, himself, had requested a transfer to another department or office because, as he claims to have told them, he was afraid he was going to hurt or kill the supervisors he was angry with. He was released back to work anyway, with no department change (and, as Matt claimed, a computer stripped of all files and no job duties), and his fears about losing it and killing his coworkers weren't taken seriously. Nothing came of the apparent call to the police, either. In the end, at least a dozen people saw it coming and were powerless to stop it. I don't believe, however, gun confiscation would have stopped the horror in this case. Matt stabbed his first victim to death, and I believe he would have stabbed the other ones to death, too, if he hadn't had a gun.

Re: Unique law lets police seize guns before a crime is committed
 

Nonsense. The entire concept of preemptive arrest in anticipation of what someone "might" do flies in the face of the principle of presumed innocence and is just more nanny state big brother. It is incrementalism like this that will destroy what liberties we have left. Anybody can rationalize any kind of lunacy like this but in the end, it is a direct contradiction to living in a free republic. Just as Jefferson said to the Danbury Baptists, the law should judge the action, not the thought. Action, not thought or speech. Untill someone breaks a law, they should be left alone to live their life as they choose.

Re: Unique law lets police seize guns before a crime is committed
 

Isn't it breaking the law to make threats on someone's life? I understand what you're saying about action, not thought or speech, but I haven't decided how I feel about the speech part. If one announces he's going to kill someone, I think that ought to be enough to have legal grounds to intercede. Obviously, you can't charge the person who announced an intention to kill with murder at that point, but making a terroristic threat should serve as grounds for some intervention.

Re: Unique law lets police seize guns before a crime is committed
 

Once you do that though, then everyone who has ever mentioned that someone needs to be drug out in the street and shot (Something I say a lot).

You even have the angry "I'm gonna kill him", how many times have you heard that say or even said it yourself. Ever meant it?

I myself have never been one for intervening because someone said something or because it's possible to have it happen. Now if I was pointing a gun at you and saying 'I'm gonna kill you" Now is when intervention comes in at, and I would hope that intervention would be your own gun, and a bullet in my chest.

Re: Unique law lets police seize guns before a crime is committed
 

I want to know how this isn't the legal system abusing the law...

So the police were mad that they actually had to leave Dunkin Donuts to investigate claims of property damage by a homeowner.

I see nothing wrong with what he did. Hell, the police would consider 9/10ths of GIM members to be paranoid and delusional. That still didn't give them the legal right to deny him his 2nd amendment right.

Again, if he had no record of mental illness, no criminal record, and no record of misusing firearms, how is that not abuse? It sounds more like retribution to me.

And then there's these assholes

MAY_have_saved_lives???

HYPOTHETICAL QUESTION
What about a homeowner that had his or her firearms preemptively seized by police because they view that person to be paranoid and delusional, but needs a pistol when their house gets home invaded and the homeowner gets killed?

Saved lives indeed...

Re: Unique law lets police seize guns before a crime is committed
 

The disarming of America is a dangerous game for them. That's why they use the "1 step forward and 2 steps behind" technique.

Re: Unique law lets police seize guns before a crime is committed
 

that's why i think food shortages are coming in the future
starve a population for 1-2 months
then tell the survivors, you can trade your guns for food

Re: Unique law lets police seize guns before a crime is committed
 

I am "concerned" the cops will misuse their firearms in acts that violate civil rights. Let's disarm them preemptively.

Re: Unique law lets police seize guns before a crime is committed
 

New Orleans after Katrina proved that the "authorities" don't need laws, they can just unilaterally declare disarmament, mass or singular, when they wish.

Re: Unique law lets police seize guns before a crime is committed
 

What part of "shall not be infringed" do the supporters of this law not understand?

Re: Unique law lets police seize guns before a crime is committed
 

Ive often talked to my dad about that. You can disarm the population real quickly, shut down their means of eating and let them starve for a while.

Now of course, there is always the "long pork" option. :yes:

Re: Unique law lets police seize guns before a crime is committed
 

mmmmm mmmm good

Re: Unique law lets police seize guns before a crime is committed
 

Hehehehe, there wont be any shortage of the other, other white meat now will there?

http://blog.wired.com/photos/uncateg...cannibalm1.jpg