California

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ReasonTV On The Debate Over Open Carry In California

August 9, 2011 by 4 Comments

ReasonTV today released an excellent video on the debate over unloaded open carry in California. It features Assemblyman Anthony Portatino (D-Pasadena) who wants to outlaw it, activist Sam Wolank who argues cogently for it, and law professor and blogger Eugene Volokh who serves to give some of the background on the banning of open carry from the 19th century.

Interesting enough, loaded open carry was legal in California until 1967. That was when then-Governor Ronald Reagan signed the Mulford Law which outlawed it. The outlawing of loaded open carry was in response to armed Black Panthers patrolling black neighborhoods while armed. With all due respect to the late Ronald Reagan, this was not his finest hour.

The renewed impetus for this law was the attempted murder of Rep. Gabby Giffords (D-AZ). However, as Professor Volokh notes, it doesn’t make good sense to craft comprehensive legislation that deals with rare situations. Obviously, this has not stopped bills like AB144 and its proponent Assemblyman Portatino.

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Now We Know Why Dept Of Education Bought Those Shotguns (Updated)

June 8, 2011 by 4 Comments

Last spring there was a story going around the blogs concerning a solicitation to buy from the U.S. Department of Education for 27 short barrel shotguns.

Now we know what they planned to do with them. They went to their SWAT Teams for use in collecting student loans. Unfortunately, this isn’t a joke as this story from Stockton, California illustrates. (The Department of Education is now saying it wasn’t about student loans but may have involved fraud or bribery in connection with student loans.)

According to the story from Sacremento’s KXTV News10 ABC, the Department of Education did issue the search warrant and authorized the SWAT team due to defaulted student loans held by Mr. Wright’s estranged wife who no longer lived with him or their children.


According to the Department of Education’s Office of the Inspector General, the case can’t be discussed publicly until it is closed, but a spokesperson did confirm that the department did issue the search warrant at Wright’s home.

The Office of the Inspector General has a law enforcement branch of federal agents that carry out search warrants and investigations.

Stockton Police Department said it was asked by federal agents to provide one officer and one patrol car just for a police presence when carrying out the search warrant.

Stockton police did not participate in breaking Wright’s door, handcuffing him, or searching his home.

H/T WizardPC 

UPDATE: Links to the embedded video on KXTV are down. I’m not sure why but I have sent an email to KXTV’s news desk asking about the reason. This has been a very popular story on both blogs and Twitter today. Could be that their servers are overloaded.

I just updated the story link as KXTV has updated the story on their website.

UPDATE II: The video and story links have been updated to reflect the latest coming from KXTV News10. The Department of Education is still mum on why they thought they needed a SWAT team to execute a search warrant on the wrong guy.

UPDATE III: Here is a link to a redacted search warrant. There are allegations that Mr. Wright’s wife engaged in student loan fraud. Unfortunately, for Mr. Wright and his kids, the confidential informant wasn’t aware that suspect didn’t live there anymore.

Frankly, I don’t see any justification for a SWAT team on a white collar crime where there is no indication of violent actions. I am assuming that the sole reason that the Dept of Ed’s OIG used a SWAT team was to justify having one.

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“It Was Disturbing”

April 22, 2011 by 3 Comments

“It was disturbing” was one of the comments regarding a group of Open Carry proponents in Pasadena protesting attempts to ban open carry in California.

A Brady Campaign spokeswoman agreed.

“I believe the open carry movement is very intimidating,” said Suzanne Verge of the Brady Campaign to Prevent Gun Violence. “I think as a citizen I should be able to go along Colorado Boulevard and shop where I want to shop and not have to worry about running into somebody with a loaded weapon.”

Substitute “Negro” for “loaded weapon” and I’m sure that either of those comments could have been also said by certain white people in Birmingham about seeing Rosa Parks sitting in the front – as opposed to the back – of the bus.

One of the major reasons Judge Irma Gonzalez gave for dismissing the challenge to California’s requirement to show good cause for a concealed carry permit was that California allowed unloaded open carry along with loaded open carry in certain rural areas. Because the state did provide that alternative, the good cause requirement passed constitutional muster.

You have to wonder which the gun prohibitionists fear most: unloaded open carry or shall issue concealed carry.

H/T Brandon Combs

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The Case Of The Duck-Hunting High School Student

February 16, 2011 by 1 Comment

From the California Rifle & Pistol Association and attorney Chuck Michel:

SHOCKING VIDEO RELEASED BY CRPA FOUNDATION ABOUT NRA/CRPAF SUCCESSFUL LEGAL EFFORT ON BEHALF OF EXPELLED DUCK HUNTING HIGH SCHOOL STUDENT

Last year the NRA and the CRPA Foundation joined forces under their California Legal Action Project (LAP) to provide legal assistance for high school student Gary Tudesko in his fight to be readmitted to Willows High School in Glenn County, California. NRA News, in cooperation with the CRPA Foundation, has now released a video chronicling the events and the ultimate victory. It is posted at http://youtube.com/MichelLawyers. The Tudesko’s will be guests of honor at the upcoming CRPA banquet to be held on February 26, 2011.

Sixteen-year-old Tudesko was expelled on November 19, 2009 for having unloaded shotguns in his pick-up truck that he legally parked on an off-campus, public street near the Willows High School campus. The high school is located in a small rural community near Sacramento, and the unloaded shotguns were in his truck because he had gone duck hunting in the pre-dawn hours before school. The case garnered significant national media coverage as an example of zero-tolerance policies run amuck.

Tudesko’s shotguns were discovered in the pick up truck by scent-sniffing dogs during a questionable school search. Police ran the license plates, determined Tudesko was the owner, and then called him out of class. Tudesko cooperated and readily told the Principal about the shotguns and his early morning hunting trip.The school first suspended Tudesko for five days, then extended the suspension indefinitely until an expulsion hearing was held. Tudesko’s mother, Susan Parisio defended her son during the November 19th public hearing on his expulsion. She challenged the school district’s legal jurisdiction to enforce the Education Code’s prohibition of guns on campus against her son for having unloaded shotguns locked in an off-campus vehicle parked on a public street. (See Hearing Minutes) High Principal Mort Geivett told the local School Board that, as a matter of law, it had no choice but to expel Tudesko, and the Board did just that.

Tudesko appealed the local school district’s expulsion order to the Glenn County Board of Education. The appeal hearing was held on January 19, 2010. Tudesko was defended by civil rights lawyers Chuck Michel and Hillary Green of the Long Beach-based law firm of Michel & Associates, P.C. (www.michellawyers.com). (Read the Brief in Support of Appeal filed by Michel & Associates, P.C.)

In a dramatic victory, the Glenn County Board of Education unanimously reversed the decision of the Willows Unified School District and Principal Mort Geivett reinstated Gary Tudesko at Willows High School!

This was a great victory for law-abiding gun-owners – particularly young adults who wish to enjoy their rights – over nonsensical “zero-tolerance” policies.

Disturbingly, Geivett claimed the school had jurisdiction over students traveling to and from school, as well as students off-campus during lunch, and that the school had jurisdiction over off-campus vehicles because students could not possess firearms within 1,000 feet of campus. But Geivett confused the Penal Code with the Education Code. With a number of exceptions, it is a potential criminal violation of the Penal Code, specifically the Gun Free School Zone law, to knowingly possess a gun within 1,000 feet of a school. But that law has nothing to do with the sections of the Education Code generally prohibiting possession of firearms on school grounds Tudesko was charged with violating. (See Education Code sections Tuedesko allegedly violated.)

Tudesko’s truck was parked off school grounds, and Gary was not traveling to or from school at the time of the search of the off-campus truck. He was in class. Moreover, schools do not enforce criminal/penal statutes like the Gun Free School Zone law, the District Attorney does. And, the District Attorney and Willows Chief of Police had already stated there would be no charges filed against Tudesko, likely because there was no intent to violate the law.

Legal issues aside, Tudesko was in this position because of a short-sighted bureaucratic approach to enforcing the school’s “zero tolerance” policy toward firearms, which is in many cases misapplied. Time and again these policies have resulted in a triumph of irrational political correctness over common sense and justice. Given that Tudesko had gone duck hunting that same morning with friends (hence the two shotguns), had bird-shot loads as ammunition, had both firearms unloaded, had intentionally parked off-campus to avoid any issues, and had several people who corroborated his story, school administrators should have acknowledged that the circumstances did not warrant expulsion.

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California AB962 Found Unconstitutionally Vague

January 18, 2011 by 1 Comment

From Chuck Michel at CalGuns Law is this report that Fresno Superior Court Judge Jeffrey Hamilton found AB 962 – the bill which would have outlawed anything other than face-to-face purchases of handgun ammo – was unconstitutionally vague.

NRA / CRPA LAWSUIT INVALIDATES AB 962!

COURT GRANTS NRA / CRPA FOUNDATION MOTION, INVALIDATES UNCONSTITUTIONAL AMMUNITION REGULATION STATUTE THAT WOULD HAVE BANNED MAIL ORDER AMMO SALES & REQUIRED AMMO SALES REGISTRATION

by C.D. Michel

In a dramatic ruling giving gun owners a win in an National Rifle Association / California Rifle and Pistol (CRPA) Foundation lawsuit, this morning Fresno Superior Court Judge Jeffrey Hamilton ruled that AB 962, the hotly contested statute that would have banned mail order ammunition sales and required all purchases of so called “handgun ammunition” to be registered, was unconstitutionally vague on its face. The Court enjoined enforcement of the statute, so mail order ammunition sales to California can continue unabated, and ammunition sales need not be registered under the law.

The lawsuit was prompted in part by the many objections and questions raised by confused police, ammunition purchasers, and sellers about what ammunition is covered by the new laws created by AB 962. In a highly unusual move that reflects growing law enforcement opposition to ineffective gun control laws, Tehama County Sheriff Clay Parker is the lead plaintiff in the lawsuit. Other plaintiffs include the CRPA Foundation, Herb Bauer Sporting Goods, ammunition shipper Able’s Ammo, collectible ammunition shipper RTG Sporting Collectibles, and individual Steven Stonecipher. Mendocino Sheriff Tom Allman also supported the lawsuit.

The ruling comes just days before the portion of the law that bans mail order sales of so called “handgun ammunition” was set to take effect on February 1, 2011. The lawsuit, Parker v. California is funded exclusively by the NRA and the CRPA Foundation. If it had gone into effect, AB 962 would have imposed burdensome and ill conceived restrictions on the sales of ammunition. AB 962 required that “handgun ammunition” be stored out of the reach of customers, that ammunition vendors collect ammunition sales registration information and thumb-prints from purchasers, and conduct transactions face-to-face for all deliveries and transfers of “handgun ammunition.” The lawsuit successfully sought the declaration from the Court that the statute was unconstitutional, and successfully sought the injunctive relief prohibiting law enforcement from enforcing the new laws.

The lawsuit alleged, and the Court agreed, that AB 962 is unconstitutionally vague on its face because it fails to provide sufficient legal notice of what ammunition cartridges are “principally for use in a handgun,” and thus is considered “handgun ammunition” that is regulated under AB 962. It is practically impossible, both for those subject to the law and for those who must enforce it, to determine whether any of the thousands of different types of ammunition cartridges that can be used in handguns are actually “principally for use in” or used more often in, a handgun. The proportional usage of any given cartridge is impossible to determine, and in any event changes with market demands. In fact, the legislature itself is well aware of the vagueness problem with AB 962’s definition of “handgun ammunition” and tried to redefine it via AB 2358 in 2010. AB 2358 failed in the face of opposition from the NRA and CRPA based on the proposal’s many other nonsensical infringements on ammunition sales to law abiding citizens.

Constitutional vagueness challenges to state laws are extremely difficult to win, particularly in California firearms litigation so this success is particularly noteworthy. Even so, an appeal by the State is likely, but the Court’s Order enjoining enforcement of the law is effective – February 1, 2011 – immediately regardless.

Despite this win for common sense over ill-conceived and counter productive gun laws, additional legislation on this and related subjects will no doubt be proposed in Sacramento this legislative session. It is absolutely critical that those who believe in the right to keep and bear arms stay informed and make their voices heard in Sacramento. When AB 962 passed there was loud outcry from law abiding gun owners impacted by the new law. Those voices must be heard during the legislative session and before a proposed law passes, not after a law is signed. To help, sign up for legislative alerts at http://www.nraila.com,/ and http://www.calnra.com/ and respond when called upon.

Seventeen years ago the NRA and CRPA joined forces to fight local gun bans being written and pushed in California by the gun ban lobby. Their coordinated efforts became the NRA/CRPA “Local Ordinance Project” (LOP) – a statewide campaign to fight ill conceived local efforts at gun control and educate politicians about available programs that are effective in reducing accidents and violence without infringing on the rights of law-abiding gun owners. The NRA/CRPA LOP has had tremendous success in beating back most of these anti-self-defense proposals.

In addition to fighting local gun bans, for decades the NRA has been litigating dozens of cases in California courts to promote the right to self-defense and the 2nd Amendment. In the post Heller and McDonaldlegal environment, NRA and CRPA Foundation have formed the NRA/CRPA Foundation Legal Action Project (LAP), a joint venture to pro-actively strike down ill-conceived gun control laws and ordinances and advance the rights of firearms owners, specifically in California. Sometimes, success is more likely when LAP’s litigation efforts are kept low profile, so the details of every lawsuit are not always released. To see a partial list of the LAP’s recent accomplishments, or to contribute to the NRA or to the NRA / CRPAF LAP and support this and similar Second Amendment cases, visit http://www.nraila.com/ and www.crpafoundation.org.

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Impressions of California – Bay Area and Central Coast

September 30, 2010 by 2 Comments

We are finishing up our trip to California’s Bay Area and Central Coast today. We are in the SFO terminal waiting for our flight back to North Carolina.

My first impression of San Francisco is that it is crowded. Even in the more residential areas, people live, to use a Southern expression, cheek by jowl. However, once you get out of the city, there is a lot of open space.

Driving along the Pacific coast, one can see why surfing is so big on the West Coast. It’s the waves. You just don’t see waves like this at East Coast beaches. The scenery is outstanding and the beaches are everywhere. And in many areas, there is little to no inhabitation.

Another quick impression – and that is all it is – of this part of California is that the high-tech cities and suburbs are heavily Anglo and Asian while the more agricultural or industrial areas are heavily Latino or Hispanic. I haven’t checked any data on this but when comparing the Silicon Valley suburbs to Salinas, this seems very evident.

If I were a wine drinker, I’d be in heaven. We found very good wine available directly from the winery as low as $60 per case. And little vineyards are everywhere both north and south of San Francisco.

Another impression is how vital agriculture is to the California economy. Whether along the coast between Half Moon Bay and Santa Cruz or inland in the Salinas Valley, agriculture is king. Along the coast we saw tons of Brussels sprouts and artichokes being grown while inland we saw the grapes, lettuce, etc.

Gang violence is a problem in some areas. While we were in Salinas, there was a 17 year old who was gunned down while walking with a friend. The friend ran away and the kid died. It was suspected to be gang related.

Finally, this place is mountainous! Whether inland or driving along the coast, the hills were everywhere. However, unlike my native Smokies, these hills are sparse and brown. I can see why wildfires are a major problem – one spark and you can have a grass fire. Moreover, with so many houses built on steep slopes, firefighters have a hard time just getting to the site.

It was a fun trip. The GRPC conference was great. We ate well, we tasted some nice wines, and we met some nice people. That said, it’ll be nice to get home even if we just had 3-4 inches of rain from a tropical storm. Regular blogging should resume tomorrow and into the weekend. There is a lot to write about and just not enough time!

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All Politics Are Local

September 24, 2010 by

To paraphrase the late Speaker of the House Tip O’Neill, all politics are local. When looking at gun politics that is the first place one should look. I say this because both the Heller and McDonald cases stemmed from actions by municipal governments.

And so it was in California two days ago when the Santa Clara City Council had planned to vote on an ordinance that would have prohibited firearms from city parks except for “peace officers”. The ordinance would have deemed city parks “sensitive places” because children, their families, and others gather there. More importantly, this ordinance would have banned both unloaded open carry (it’s a California thing) and licensed concealed carry.

It is not known if this ordinance was proposed by the Legal Community Against Violence (LCAV) but the text of it is very similar to their pamphlet “Address Gun Violence Through Local Ordinances”. LCAV has been very active over the years throughout California pushing local ordinances as a means of gun control. In this case, by a finding that city parks were “sensitive places”, it may have given them some cover in the face of lawsuits.

On Monday, September 20th, attorney Chuck Michel sent a letter to the City Council on behalf of the NRA and the California Rifle and Pistol Association.The letter made two major points: the proposed ordinance was unconstitutional under Heller and McDonald and the proposed ordinance would violate California’s preemption doctrine.

Mr. Michel also discussed three case that are pending in California. The first is Nordyke v. King which is slated for rehearing before the 9th Circuit Court of Appeal. That case deals with a ban of firearms on county property that had been declared “sensitive”. Even that the Alameda County fairgrounds ban made allowances for concealed carry permit holders unlike the proposed ordinance. The other two cases are Sykes v. McGinnis and Peruta v. County of San Diego. The issue in both of those cases is whether a municipality can prohibit the lawful carrying of firearms in public by generally denying concealed carry permits.

In the face of this letter which did contain an indirect threat of “costly litigation”, City Manager Jennifer Sparacino raised legal concerns about the ordinance and the Santa Clara City Council voted unanimously to withdraw the proposed ordinance from consideration. The City Attorney of Santa Clara will need more time to study the case law cited in the NRA/CRPA letter. While this issue may be brought up again, for the time being it is a win for gun rights at the local level.

Chuck Michel has more on the NRA/CRPA Local Ordinance Project in a post on the CalGuns Forum here.

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A Trifecta in California

September 1, 2010 by

As reported in a release from the California Rifle and Pistol Association, three anti-gun bills in the California Assembly were voted down late last night. There was intense pressure on a few members to change their vote but they didn’t switch.

•AB 1810(Feuer) – Registration of Rifles and Shotguns
•AB 1934 (Saldana) – Handgun Open Carry Prohibition
•AB 2358 (De Leon) – Ammunition Registration

AB 1810 would have registered ALL rifles and shotguns in the same manner that handguns are currently registered in California.

AB 1934 would have prohibited the open carry of handguns whether loaded or unloaded. There is currently a growing movment among California gunowners to participate in unloaded open carry or UOC. The goal is to normalize perceptions of firearms and those who carry them.

AB 2358 would have “required that ammunition vendors transmit records of sale, information on the quantity and type of ammunition purchased, and the personal information of purchasers collected at the time of sale to local law enforcement if required by city or county ordinance.” The sponsor of this bill was the same Assemblyman who was the prime sponsor of AB 962 which requires face-to-face sales of handgun ammunition. The dangerous component of this bill is the last clause – if required by city or county ordinance. This would have allowed politicians in areas such as Oakland, LA, and San Francisco to make life even harder for lawful firearms owners.

Congratulations to our friends in California and to all who worked so hard to defeat these bills including CRPA and CalGuns.

UPDATE: Dirtcrashr at Anthroblogory has more including info on SB250 which mandated spay or neutering of (most) dogs.

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NRA/CRPA Foundation Legal Action Project Sues to Stop California AB 962

July 17, 2010 by 2 Comments

From  C. D. Michel of Calgunlaws.com:

The NRA-CRPA Foundation Legal Action Project (“LAP”) has filed a lawsuit challenging AB 962 and the newly adopted statutes that regulate “handgun ammunition.” The suit challenges the requirement that handgun ammunition be stored out of the reach of customers, the ammunition sales registration and fingerprinting requirements, and the bill’s prohibition on mail order and internet sales. The lawsuit alleges that the mandates of AB 962 are incomprehensible, and that the law’s definition of “handgun ammunition” is unconstitutionally vague.

The NRA/CRPA Foundation lawsuit has been in the works ever since AB 962 passed. A request for an injunction will be filed shortly, in an effort to stop the bill’s ammunition sales registration requirement and the ban on mail order ammunition purchases before those provisions take effect on February 1, 2011.

For months, LAP lawyers have worked to secure appropriate plaintiffs for this strategically-timed litigation. In a highly unusual move that reflects growing law enforcement opposition to ineffective gun control laws, Tehama County Sheriff Clay Parker is the lead plaintiff in the lawsuit. Other plaintiffs include the CRPA Foundation, Herb Bauer Sporting Goods, ammunition shipper Able’s Ammo, collectible ammunition shipper RTG Sporting Collectibles, and individual Steven Stonecipher.

The lawsuit is being funded by the NRA / CRPA Foundation Legal Action Project (LAP). LAP is a joint venture between the Nation Rifle Association (NRA) and the California Rifle and Pistol Association (CRPA) to advance the rights of firearms owners in California. Through LAP, NRA/CRPA attorneys fight against ill-conceived gun control laws and ordinances, and educate state and local officials about available programs that are effective in reducing accidents and violence without infringing on the rights of law-abiding gun owners.

Sometimes the chances of success are greater when LAP’s litigation efforts are kept low profile, so for now the details of this lawsuit are not being released. To see a partial list of the Legal Action Project’s recent accomplishments, click here. To contribute to the NRA / CRPAF Legal Action Project (LAP) and support this and similar Second Amendment cases, visit www.crpafoundation.org. Please register at www.calgunlaws.com to receive updates on this and other litigation as it is made available.

 From the discussion on Calguns.net, it seems that this lawsuit has not been filed yet but will be within the next two weeks. You can read the thread here.

UPDATE: Thanks to Glen I found that this case was filed on June 17th in Superior Court in Fresno, CA. The link to the case is here. However, it only gives the parties and not the complaint.

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Reality Bites

July 1, 2010 by

Sayre Weaver is one of the leading legal lights of the gun control movement in California. She is one of the lead attorneys for the County of Alameda in the Nordyke case and she helped the City of West Hollywood develop their law prohibiting the sale of “junk guns”(sic). She has won awards from Women Against Gun Violence and the California Wellness Foundation for her work on gun control. The LA Times writes glowing articles about her that characterize her “as the California gun lobby’s Public Enemy No. 1.” So, when she says the McDonald decision is likely to spawn lawsuits challenging local gun control laws, I listen.

Weaver released her analysis on the impact of McDonald v. Chicago on Monday. Her analysis centers on the likely immediate impact that McDonald will have for local governments in California.

  • Local ordinances regulating firearm possession and sale are now more open to challenge on Second Amendment grounds

It appears likely that McDonald will generate challenges to a wide range of local firearms regulations, as well as ammunition regulations…..Because the Court has given little guidance on what standard a firearms regulation must meet to survive challenge under the Second Amendment, we anticipate that the decision will embolden individual litigants to challenge a wide range of firearms laws, including long standing laws that have previously survived challenge in the courts.

  • Local firearms ordinances must now meet a more rigorous constitutional standard to survive legal challenge

Because any restriction on firearms possession or sale might be argued to create some burden on the right to possess a firearm for self-defense in the home, local governments should anticipate numerous lawsuits challenging a wide range of firearms laws. There are already a number of such challenges in the California courts, which were stayed while those courts waited for McDonald.

  • Local ordinances regulating possession of handguns or prohibiting certain types of handguns are more vulnerable to challenge under the Second Amendment

Because the Second Amendment right articulated by the Court pertains to possession of handguns, which the Court characterizes as the most popular weapon among Americans for self-defense, it is likely that local regulations of handguns will be challenged under the Second Amendment.

  • Successful Second Amendment challenges to local laws may result in the award of attorney fees against a city and to the challenging party

While she doesn’t come out and say it, if a city loses a challenge to a firearm restriction in court, they will end up paying the costs for both the defense and the plaintiffs. In case-strapped California, this should make some municipalities think twice.

  • Local governments considering adopting new firearms ordinances may wish to consult with their City Attorneys

…ordinances will now be subject to a stricter test in the courts, and the legislative findings that may be needed for a given law to pass muster under the Second Amendment will be of particular importance.

The bottom line for Weaver is that the world as she knew it has changed with McDonald.