LCAV

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So Much For “Truth Telling”

October 2, 2012 by 15 Comments

The Law Center to Prevent Gun Violence (sic) – the group formerly known as the Legal Community Against Violence or LCAV – is holding an event entitled Truth Telling: The Media’s Role in the Conversation on Guns on October 25th. It will be held at the University of California Hastings College of the Law.

The Law Center to Prevent Gun Violence & Opus2 International
are pleased to present:
Truth Telling: The Media’s Role in the Conversation on Guns

 OCTOBER 25, 2012 | 6 – 8:30 PM
UC Hastings College of the Law

Louis B. Mayer Lounge
198 McAllister Street | San Francisco

RSVP REQUIRED

Free to Members, UC Hastings Students and Faculty
$12 All Other Students | $20 Non-Members
The Law Center reserves the right to refuse admittance.

Following an hors d’oeuvres and wine reception, a diverse group of
journalists from local and national news outlets will share their
perspective on the role the media plays in the national conversation on
guns, particularly in an election year.

As the “information age” has become
incredibly fast-moving and complex, the media’s power to inform,
educate, and persuade has also grown. Meanwhile, the topic of gun
violence in America remains complicated and fueled by passionate beliefs
from all sides.
What are some of the challenges journalists
and news agencies face when trying to tell the truth about America’s
gun laws? What impact does the national political debate have on the
media’s approach to this issue? How is “new media” affecting the way in
which this conversation is cultivated?
Please join us to find out the answers to these questions and more. Come and ask your own questions for our panelists!

JOINING THE PANEL:

  • MARK FOLLMAN, Senior Editor, Mother Jones
  • KRIS HUNDLEY, Staff Writer, Tampa Bay Times
  • BOB EGELKO, Staff Writer, San Francisco Chronicle
  • SCOTT JOHNSON, Violence Reporting Fellow, The Oakland Tribune
  • ABBY STERLING, Producer, CBS 5 San Francisco

MODERATED BY:
RORY LITTLE, UC Hastings Professor of Law

Unfortunately, the former LCAV really doesn’t want to hear anything other than their version of “the truth” as told by sycophantic reporters.

Notice that little disclaimer about “the right to refuse admittance”? This means that if they know you are associated with gun rights you are to be excluded from their little soiree. They don’t want their worldview tainted by dissenting questions.


Josh Berger, a director of the CalGuns Foundation, had purchased tickets to this event. You can guess what he had waiting in the mail for him when he returned from the Gun Rights Policy Conference in Orlando. It was not the tickets he had ordered but rather a refund of his money with the note below.

Truth telling is a joke when you are dealing with the gun prohibitionists. The only “truth” they want to hear is their own skewed version of it.

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Sunnyvale Planning Commission Wants To Impose Unconstitutional Restrictions Due To NIMBYs

August 26, 2011 by 6 Comments

Attorney Chuck Michel who works with the NRA/CRPA Legal Action Project in California posted an article this evening about the Sunnyvale, California Planning Commission. The Planning Commission is seeking to have the Sunnyvale City Council adopt a new municipal ordinance which would put increased restrictions on the sale of firearms in Sunnyvale. The Commission is responding to unfounded complaints from some neighbors of a firearms dealer that opened in Sunnyvale in 2010. The complaints include that they weren’t notified and that children walk by the store on their way to school as if just merely seeing guns will turn their kids into the next Klebold and Harris (of Columbine infamy).

NRA & CRPA OPPOSE NEW REGULATIONS RESTRICTING FIREARMS DEALERS IN SUNNYVALE, CA

On August 22, 2011, the Planning Commission for the City of Sunnyvale held a meeting to consider the City’s ongoing “Firearms Sales Study Issue.” The issue originated when a firearms dealer, U.S. Firearms, opened for business in Sunnyvale in the fall of 2010. Despite the fact that the dealer had all necessary permits and licenses from both the state and federal government, neighbors made complaints to Sunnyvale staff and elected officials.

The Sunnyvale Planning Commission ultimately decided to sponsor the issue as a result of the complaints, but the City Council ranked it number 4 of 4 for 2011. Even though this issue had the lowest ranking by the City Council for 2011, and the fact that the Staff Report on the issue (AVAILABLE HERE) indicates that “there has been no evidence of increased crime, property devaluation or land use incompatibilities as the result of the businesses,” and Sunnyvale “staff ha[d] not identified any adverse land use impacts associated with a firearms store,” the Planning Commission nonetheless recommended that the City Council adopt an ordinance to amend the City’s municipal code to place restrictions on firearm sales in Sunnyvale. Though the staff report acknowledged there had been no problems with firearm sellers, staff nonetheless inexplicably noted in the report that, “[t]he greatest concern regarding firearm sales is the business operator that is engaged in buying and selling the firearms.”

The approved ordinance would: 1) add a definition for “firearms sales business;” 2) prohibit these businesses in commercial and industrially-zoned districts within 200 feet of public schools in order to provide a buffer to the schools; and 3) require a new DPS Firearms Dealer Permit that would include additional conditions such as requiring a security plan to be installed and then inspected by the City, and that the Federal Firearm License (FFL) holder and all employees meet the state and federal requirements regarding past criminal convictions, etc. (current requirements are limited to the dealer and not the employees).

Michel & Associates attorneys submitted an opposition letter to the Planning Commission on behalf of the National Rifle Association (NRA) and California Rifle & Pistol Association (CRPA) noting that firearm dealers are subject to a variety of background checks at both the state and federal levels. The letter (AVAILABLE HERE) also noted that firearm dealers are generally some of the most upstanding members of society, and that after the Supreme Court’s McDonald decision, they enjoy a protected status as purveyors of a fundamental right. So the fact that some “residents [of Sunnyvale] have expressed [unfounded] concerns about the potential crime and public safety risk associated with a firearm sales business located near their homes and schools” does not mean that the City of Sunnyvale is free to infringe on fundamental Second Amendment rights.

The letter explains that since the Second Amendment is a newly court-recognized right, the contours of the Second Amendment’s protections are still being litigated in courtrooms across the country. The letter also amicably explains the current legal landscape regarding firearm regulation, and suggests Sunnyvale should avoid litigation on these issues by consulting with the NRA, CRPA, and their attorneys.

As the city continues moving forward with the proposed ordinance, additional correspondence will be submitted.

I have examined the 141 page staff report submitted to the  Sunnyvale Planning Commission. Much of the document was devoted to reporting on the comments at a public meeting on the issue. Approximately 120 people attended the June 2011 meeting and it appears that the overwhelming majority were against any new regulations and were indeed pro-rights. Many of the letters received also support the existing gun store, U.S. Firearms, and gun stores in general.

However, the Legal Community Against Violence (LCAV) has weighed in on the issue with a 59 page submission urging the Planning Commission to adopt new regulations. Unfortunately, this submission and not the majority of the residents of Sunnyvale seems to have carried the day. You must wonder if LCAV will also foot the legal bills for Sunnyvale when they get the pants sued off of them on Second Amendment grounds. I somehow doubt it.

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Always Hard To Prove Causation

March 27, 2011 by

Juliet Leftwich is the Executive Director of Legal Community Against Violence or LCAV. LCAV is a San Francisco-based group that promotes gun control and which has received over $2.3 million from the Joyce Foundation. One of their bigger initiatives is their promotion of their Model Laws to state and local governments. This is especially true in California where they have been particularly active and many communities have adopted their Model Laws.

In the video clip below, Leftwich is being interviewed by Omar Samaha. He is with MAIG’s National Initiative to Fix Gun Checks. Samaha’s sister was one of the victims of the shootings at Virginia Tech. Samaha is something of a media darling like Colin Goddard and has done “undercover buys” for ABC’s 20/20.

Samaha asks Leftwich if she has seen a change in “gun violence” since California has adopted its restrictive gun control laws. Leftwich responds that “unfortunately there is not a lot of great data out there.” However, she does try to put a good spin on it saying that the rate of “gun violence” in California has gone down more than in the rest of the country. And then she makes this admission, “But it is always hard to prove causation because gun laws are a very complicated issue.”

To recap, she says there is not good data, there are only a few studies, and that causation is hard to prove from the studies that do exist. This is a bit of a startling admission from a leading gun control advocate.

H/T J.D. Berger

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Spoofing the Anti’s

July 15, 2010 by 1 Comment

Oh, those crazy kids at CalGuns.net. They planned a pro-gun demonstration at the annual fund-raising dinner for the Legal Community Against Violence in San Francisco. Only they didn’t show. It was a spoof from the beginning as they knew LCAV monitored their message board. They wanted to get LCAV all hot and bothered and worried. It worked.

From the last post explaining their actions:

Maskirovka: “The means of securing combat operations and the daily activities of forces; a complexity of measures, directed to mislead the enemy regarding the presence and disposition of forces, various military objectives, their condition, combat readiness and operations, and also the plans of the commander… maskirovka contributes to the achievement of surprise for the actions of forces, the preservation of combat readiness and the increased survivability of objectives.” – source: Jon Latimer, Deception in War, The Overlook Press, Woodstock & New York 2001

I’m sure that many of you are curious about the results of the LCAV protest. Well, they hired extra security, alerted the hotel to the potential for protests and apparently called in the SFPD to intimidate us.

But we never planned to show in the first place.

As much fun as it would have been to organize a great big ruckus, it was much more fun watching them scramble about in fear that the gun nuts were going to heap insult upon the injury of McDonald at their pyrrhic victory dinner.

And we didn’t have to expend an ounce of energy.

What was the point?

Well, we learned a bunch.

1) That past actions have convinced them to take us seriously. Calgunner attendance at City Council meetings, legislative hearings and court cases has demonstrated that we’re able to mobilize a motivated group of activists on short notice. We’ve proven to them that we show up. We’ve shown that we’re effective, too. Emeryville’s revision of their proposed ammunition ordinance proved that.

2) That they’re paying attention to us. We long suspected that LCAV was monitoring our communications. It’s one of the reasons that CGF boardmembers are circumspect when discussing legal strategies. So, please be patient when folks are using cryptic language to discuss options for regaining our rights.

3) That now they don’t know when we’re bluffing. We’ve spoofed them twice so far. Who knows what other kinds of wild goose chases we can send them on? It will be fun to learn.

4) That they’re afraid of us. Despite my assertions (and requirements) that this “action” not allow any physical contact, trespassing, etc., LCAV felt it necessary to mobilize the police and additional security.

5) That they’re irrational. In every interaction that we’ve had with the antis, we’ve been polite. We’ve been well dressed, well spoken, chivalrous and respectful. We’ve been met with profanities, threats and incivility. I wouldn’t be surprised if local officials are starting to take notice the difference in style.

Make no mistake, folks. We’re winning this fight.

Sometimes it’s not what you do, but what the other side thinks that you’re willing to do that causes the most disruption.

I’d like to offer up a special thanks to all the folks who came together to make this happen. This was a fun little exercise.

Calgunners rock!

Read the whole thread to see the anticipated demonstration. It really starts to move along at page 3.

Were the Calgunners taken seriously? Yes they were. Ezra Denney was the LCAV staffer in charge of the event. On his Facebook page he put that they “might be meeting some wacky folks tonight. Protesters are fun!”

The San Francisco PD showed up in full force with extra motorcycle and bicycle cops assigned to the dinner and anticipated protest. And as they said on the CalGuns.net board, “on this date in San Francisco: nothing happened.” You can see the pictures of the additional cops here.

I started to read their preparations last night and they had me totally fooled. From the discussions, I was expecting some sort of Code Pink demo with pictures of protesters being led away in handcuffs.Checking back this morning I found out that nothing had happened.

It was brilliant. Absolutely brilliant.

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Clogging the Courts?

July 2, 2010 by

From the Legal Community Against Violence:

LCAV anticipates a substantial increase in the volume of Second Amendment litigation already clogging the nation’s courts, despite the fact that most, if not all, state and local firearms laws do not prevent a law-abiding citizen from possessing a firearm in the home for self-defense, and thus, would satisfy the holdings in Heller and McDonald.

They have a strange view of civil rights if they think that free citizens seeking to uphold the protections afforded them through the Second and Fourteenth Amendments should be considered “clogging” the courts.