“Frankly, this is no surprise. The Mayor and Council are trying to prevent children from accessing guns with this Safe Storage legislation. If the NRA and SAF want to be on record fighting responsible gun ownership, that’s their choice.” – Seattle city attorney Pete Holmes in Seattle residents, Bellevue gun-rights group, NRA sue Seattle over gun-storage law [courtesy seattletimes.com]
I think every new home should have secure storage areas…for whatever you want to keep there.
Medicine cabinets should be locked and secured as well. Child ODs? No locked cabinet? Fine and jail time for parents/guardians
Laundry supplies, too. Child eats laundry pod and ends up in ER? Fine and jail time for parents/guardians.
Have a pool? Kid drowns or ingests pool chemicals? Parents/guardians get fine or jail time.
Your kid took the car and wrecked it? Jail time for you. Oh, he killed somebody. Life for you.
The only problem would be: Who is going to be prison guards when 99.98 percent of the population is incarcerated?
Wait, I know. They all get paroled and wear ankle bracelets! The perfect slaves and under perfect control. It’s perfect…
You must live wrapped in bubble wrap.
No familiar with sarcasm or was he too subtle?
I don’t think even an extreme Prog is a dumb as “Cavendish”. But I could be wrong.
I’ve learned you often have to label sarcasm as in “sarcasm/ …./sarcasm.” Even then people get confused and you need to bring out the crayons.
You could, be wrong…
Sarcasm in print is often missed. It must be stronger than in a face-to-face conversation, because voice inflection and facial expression are missing.
See “A Modest Proposal.”
“It must be stronger than in a face-to-face conversation,…”
Subtlety and sarcasm are different, but can be combined. Discourages skim-reading, don’t you think?
I think every home should be free, and you should be free to join your oppressed socialist brethren in another country and leave our freedom alone.
There already laws for criminal negligence, child neglect, and reckless endangerment. Leave an open bottle of drugs on the coffee table where a toddler eats them and ODs? Expect legal action. Close the child safe bottle and put it on shelf or medicine cabinet, and the kid still ODs? Legally defensible since you took reasonable action to prevent the tragedy. Leave 5 year old unsupervised in car with the engine running, and he put it in drive and runs over someone? Your fault. Kid climbs on chair, takes key off hook, goes for a joy ride? Probably in the clear. Same policies for guns or any other dangerous item should apply and be sufficient.
Just lock everyone up….. that should do it….NO WAIT ….people get shanked in prison too …tootie fruitcake were weapon are illegal!!!!!!!!!!
“…The Mayor and Council are trying to prevent children from accessing guns ”
If that is true then how come your proposed new law doesn’t focus on children? Your new law focuses exclusively on gun owners regardless of how many children they do or don’t have. It makes criminals out of people who don’t even have children.
The vast majority of American kids murdered, be it with gun, knife or beating) are murdered by criminals domiciled in the home. The large majority of accidental gun death of children is with an illegal firearm owned by a criminal domicile in the or in a relationship with the mother.
These “firearms owners” are not going to pay attention to any law. This is why safe storage laws have never been shown in the data to reduce gun death in any cohort.
If these politicians cared at all about the safety of children they would pass laws controlling presence of persons with criminal records in homes with children since that is the actual risk variable.
Who cares about ‘accidental gun deaths’ of children when those are a tiny fraction of ‘accidental deaths’ of children?
Why not go after stuff that kills many more children than guns do?
“Why not go after stuff that kills many more children than guns do?”
You must mean, of course, the Democratic Party and Planned Parenthood.
Nearly 1000 children drown each year with the majority in back yard pools with 80 percent of the kids being ages 1 to 5. Clearly we need background checks for pool ownership..
OK…let’s look at making home invasions and robberies and burglary ALL felony level offenses…whether the suspect is armed or not…whether people are home or not.
Maybe do a 5/10/20…
5 years first offense…10 for a second…20 for third. NO early releases or pardons.
If a gun is found on any suspect(s) the terms DOUBLE.
You are as bright as a 2 watt bulb.
I think the point is that we should focus on actual intention a harmful crimes like burglary, theft, robbery home invasion rather than blaming the victim.
Those all already are felonies…. and in many states, the penalty minimum is worse then those you described.
Oh please, have you ever spent time in the US courts? They are all pled down and catch and release is the rule.
Home invasion down to robbery, robbery down to theft, theft down to taking without permission, burglary down to trespass, aggravated assault down to simple assault, simple assault down to disturbing the peace.
That’s about plea bargaining, the idiotic system set up by prosecutors for prosecutors in contravention of justice.
The purpose of plea bargaining is to ensure that prosecutors never have to do their jobs by proving guilt beyond a reasonable doubt, and it also promotes equality by making sure the innocent receive the same punishment as the guilty.
“The purpose of plea bargaining is to ensure that prosecutors never have to do their jobs by proving guil…”
Plea bargains are more about statistics; convictions achieved. Resume builder; campaign fodder.
I wholly agee about the prosecutors. Plea bargaining is also about lazy courtrooms in general. If everyone involved with the court was forced to work the same amount of hours as a typical job, they could process many more cases. I have spent plenty of time in court rooms. The judge is there about 3 hours a day max. And that’s a hard working judge.
Why the gun enhancement, Cavendish? You’ve been suckered into thinking guns are magically dangerous. Maybe you are trying to throw the antis a bone. Won’t work.
There are already plenty of enhancements for using a “deadly weapon” in an assault. Why do you want to demonize guns? Wise up, please.
Because the enhancement worked when it was tested in VA and worked so well it was done away with.
That enhancement should exist for any tool which could be used as a weapon as an attempted murder charge.
Prosecutor: why did you feel the need to be armed?
Criminal: i needed to shoot the owner if he came in or tried to stop me
Sounds like a premeditation to me. Slap that charge on there as well.
Home invasions, robberies, and burglaries are already felonies. It’s just that the legal system is overwhelmed and the prisons are overloaded, so they get pled down to misdemeanors. We need to build more prisons, which would be a great boost for the economy.
Of course, once The Wall is completed, we could continue it up the CA state line and the turn CA into a prison!
The WA pre-emotion law is for gun control, not safe storage, so it is likely that courts will throw out the lawsuit.
The optics of fighting against responsible storage against theft / child proofing the guns in your home may backfire on the NRA.
Other news: A survey of criminals said NRA and military bumper stickers make criminals break into the car looking to steal guns; the study focused on car break-ins, but could just as easily apply to homes. Maybe people should think twice about that “Colt .45 home safety” stickers.
Don’t be ridiculous. Gun owners can be responsible whether there is a law of not, and in point of fact, there are already state level crimes for allowing minors to access firearms, so this particular law is just virtue signalling. Any other suggestion is nothing but spin.To suggest that if the law is overturned, gun owners in Seattle will feel free to act irresponsibly is plain stupid. Moreover, as already pointed out, the law is overbroad, as it applies to people irrespective of the presence of minors in the home. A single adult living in an apartment with no children living or visiting there, and who wants to keep a gun loaded and available for immediate use if needed, is violating the law although there is no conceivable benefit to compliance, but at the same time an increased risk of harm for those who do comply. Just as did the San Francisco ordinance (unfortunately upheld with certiorari denied), the law spits in the face of Heller, which held that a requirement to keep all firearms loaded and locked up, with the ammo locked up in a separate location, to be an indispensable violation of the Second Amendment.
Has anyone read Heller?
It specifically states requiring locks on guns is unconstitutional.
“Has anyone read Heller?”
Thought I had quoted from it.
“The WA pre-emotion law is for gun control, not safe storage, so it is likely that courts will throw out the lawsuit.”
Laws that mandate ‘safe storage’ (locking) of guns ARE gun control laws.
Merced Pitchfork Massacre.
You’re playing “what if” with extremely rare cases.
The Merced pitchfork massacre is famous because it is the only 1 case like it; there are thousands of accidental gun deaths by minors including one just yesterday where a 4 year old shot a toddler:
https://www.google.com/amp/s/fox5sandiego.com/2018/07/20/california-4-year-old-accidentally-shoots-kills-2-year-old-cousin/amp/
there are NOT “thousands” of accidental gun deaths of children per year. so righ toff you start with a LIE. On top if it accidental gun death rate of children have been falling for 40 years.
The vast majority are associated with CRIMINAL gun owners. Especially criminals in the home. they are not going to be affected by these gun storage laws.
Your citation is a town that is over 80% Hispanic, and has massive MS13 and illegal Latino GANG presence.
Near certainty this is some gang banger, odds are illegal alien as well, who wont give a flying fk about gun storage laws leaves their gat out and you want to start cutting up the bill of rights for law abiding??
Yes, the accidental gun death rate has been falling for 40 years; much of that has to do with cable locks and cities requiring safe storage.
There are 1300 kids that die every year vs Merced massacre that is once every 20 years. The link I put up has it and this link below has more info on this statistic:
https://www.google.com/amp/www.latimes.com/science/sciencenow/la-sci-sn-gun-deaths-children-20170619-story.html%3foutputType=amp
And yes, many of those kid gun deaths are kids trying to be thugs, but they are thugging with their parents guns.
Lastly: the neighborhood is majority Hispanic but it is a small town full of nurseries and horse properties, so I don’t see where you get the illegals and MS-13.
Actually, he didn’t say “per year.” So technically he is accurate, although misleadingly so. And you are correct, there are between 500 to 600 accidental gun deaths per year, and not all of those are children.
Well yes, it’s not every day you wake up to find a naked guy in your kitchen holding a pitchfork with a homicidal look in his eyes. But it’s hardly unique in the sense that it involves a minor in need of self defense. You hear about teenagers defending themselves with firearms all the time and just the other day there was a case where a very young child, 4 or 5 years old, retrieved his mother’s handgun for her while her estranged boyfriend/husband (?) was strangling her. Safe sto rage laws = one dead mother in that case.
Secondly, you can’t force common sense on stupid people through legislation. Stupid people will either ignore the law or be ignorant of the law and their children will die anyway. Smart parents will train their children in firearms safety from a very early age.
Thirdly, you’re opening a big can of worms for overly aggressive DAs. For example, Family X follows the letter of the law. They store the firearms in one safe and their am mo in another. Unfortunately, their suicidal teenage son finds where mom and dad hid the combo to the safes and kills himself with dad’s g un. In comes the overly aggressive DA to charge mom and dad with a felony. Granted, this is sort of a straw man (or straw-DA) theory, but is it really that much of a stretch to think an anti-gun DA would do this?
The Merced Pitchfork massacre happened almost 20 years ago and is famous for being so unusual.
1300 children die every year in gun accident because they access guns.
A 2 year old was killed by a 4 year old just yesterday in Muscoy: https://www.nbclosangeles.com/news/local/Toddler-Shot-Dies-San-Bernardino-488748171.html
You have to make decisions on statistics and facts not rare occurrences.
How can 1300 children die each year when the CDC says only 584 (2014 stats) in total died? The total number of deaths for under 15 YO is 50. Compare that to 266,560 violent victimizations out of about 3.7 million home invasions.
You start be defining “child.” A reasonable person would set the age at 12 or less. However an article that claims the 1,300 goes up to 18 years old. Others go higher, up to 20 years old.
When you dig into the research used in the articles you find the 0-12 age group has 17.7 % (229 deaths) of the total and the 13-17 age group (1068 deaths) has 82.3 % of the total.
Incidentally, the non-fatal gun injuries are 0-12, 11.8% (684) and 13-27 is 88.2% (5106)
Note the average age of gang members is 14-21 and the average age of death for a gang member is 20.
Clearly, age is a factor in gun deaths. Teenagers tend to experiment and take risks that can lead to death.
Now for the “1,300 Children die every year in accident because they access guns.” (sic)
It’s established that the 1,300 number is for all deaths. When you go to the source, there is a chart that reports accidental gun deaths. Ages 0-12 were 60.6% (50) and 13-17 were 39.4% (32).
As with defining “children,” it’s all about how you define “accident.”
Last, from the CDC, a comparison:
“According to the Center for Disease Control (CDC), gang homicides accounted for roughly 8,900 of 11,100 gun murders in both 2010 and 2011. That means that there were just 2,200 non gang-related firearm murders in both years in a country of over 300 million people and 250 million guns”
https://www.cdc.gov/nchs/data/nvsr/nvsr61/nvsr61_06.pdf
https://psmag.com/news/how-american-children-are-killed-by-guns
http://pediatrics.aappublications.org/content/pediatrics/early/2017/06/15/peds.2016-3486.full.pdf
http://www.floridagangreduction.com/flgangs.nsf/pages/HowOld
https://www.nwitimes.com/news/gang-members-on-path-of-assumed-destiny-dying-by-age/article_a9110339-5381-56dc-af4c-8d1224a162a9.html
https://www.cdc.gov/nchs/data/nvsr/nvsr61/nvsr61_06.pdf
Thank you for the analysis, and resource links. However…..
It is all irrelevant, because….the children. It is clear even in the data you identify that it is primarily bad people who kill others with guns. Ergo, anyone who wants a gun is a bad person, ipse dixit. The data referenced shows that the main purpose of guns is to kill people. People who want and do kill people with guns are bad people. Guns are bad, it follows people who have and want guns are bad. It also follows that bad people want guns. All the data in the world cannot mitigate (undo) the needless death of one child.
There is no escaping: guns are harmful to children and other living things. Get rid of guns. If it saves only one….. For the children. For peace and safety. For a better (riskless) society. Because only the worst kind of people would insist on owning guns after knowing the damage guns do. Only deplorables would think like that. Nobody needs a gun in modern society; guns are just a horrible and dangerous hobby. Its a proven fact, guns do not save lives. There is no such thing as “a good guy with a gun”, except police and military (and even they are suspect). When cold, hard data substitutes for conscience, civic duty, caring about life, overrides that which is a proper and beneficial emotional response to the slaughter of innocents, we are just a nation of savages, living by law of the jungle. Support your local sheriff.
And so on.
Ah, yes. The ultra-liberal “guns-are-bad—outlaw all guns” and “guns serve no purpose in a ‘modern’ society” contingent is heard from (again).
And as usual, with distorted “facts” and “data” to supposedly support an “enlightened” view of a society where people are UNABLE to protect themselves from lawless criminal types that have no regard (or desire) for your “utopia”.
A truly sad comment from a known troll, thank you “Sam-I-Am”.
Wish I knew to which comment you are referring.
1300 children die every year in gun accident because they access guns…
You have to make decisions on statistics and facts not rare occurrences.
Statistics and facts? You make them up entirely and then lecture others? Please provide ANY source saying 1,300 children die from gun accidents per year.
CDC says the number is less than half of your claim. and the large majority are in the upper teen cohort related to gangs.
Considering that we lose 93 million Americans a DAY due to gun violence, according to one well-informed politician, it is highly likely that at LEAST 1300 children are among that number.
It must be remembered, however, that precisely 87.3% of all statistics found on the InterWebs are simply made up as necessary by the Russians.
I do believe, regarding the Seattle ordinance, that they have neglected one important but dramatically simple life-saving measure. All privately-owned motor vehicles, when not in immediate use, should have their batteries removed and fuel tanks drained, and the batteries and fuel kept secured separately to prevent unauthorized use. Surely, it is only a minor inconvenience to refill a fuel tank and reinstall a battery if one MUST use a non-environmentally-friendly conveyance when there is public transportation readily available.
This could be extended to include other dangerous household items such as washing machines and pools; Washing machines should be disconnected and unplugged when not in use, and pools drained and covered with locked, child-proof roofs, or filled with sand for ultimate safety.
Oh, just imagine the possibilities! If it saves just one life. . . Think of the Children!™
I remember one of the first times a leftist (socialist, communist, Democrat, fascist) quoted some statistic they got from some anti-2nd amendment organization website. Obviously, he did not do the math. He got angry when I pointed out that if the numbers he quoted were correct, the entire population of the United States would die from accidental/negligent discharges within 4 years. That over 10 years ago.
Frankly, I have never heard a meaningful gun statistic quoted by a leftist organization that withstood fair scrutiny. What is frustrating is that every time one of their talking points is debunked, they invent another so you have to research their stat to debunk it too. Funny, even if one of their stats is debunked, for some ungodly reason, they continue to throw it out to the uninformed who swallow it up even though it has been long debunked. I know, what should I expect from those who are following the strategies and writings of Saul Alinsky (Rules for Radicals), Cloward & Piven, Karl Marx (the Communist Manifesto), and Hitler (Mein Kamfe). I get that this is a strategy for conquering a free people, that there will always be those who want to destroy everything we have accomplished as a nation. It is just frustrating that we have to defend our freedoms against people who use that freedom to try to take away our freedom.
Time to Heller them.
All these attempts by municipalities to force “safe storage” laws are not just about “preemption”. Heller declared “safe storage” requirements unconstitutional.
(Pg 2, Section 3,)
“3. The handgun ban and the trigger-lock requirement (as applied to
self-defense) violate the Second Amendment…. Similarly, the requirement that any lawful firearm in the home be disassembled or bound by a trigger lock makes it impossible for citizens to use arms for the core lawful purpose of self-defense and
is hence unconstitutional. ”
There is no reason to sue under “preemption” laws, and no State “preemption” law is necessary regarding “safe storage” laws in municipalities.
Blatant refusal to follow the SC ruling in Heller should be attacked as a pure Second Amendment matter, settled by Heller.
The preemption route is probably an easier lift, and less likely to be “reinterpreted” by an activist lower court judge.
I can “see” that thought process, but how does anyone re-interpret “disassembled or bound by trigger lock”. Later in Heller, it describes making the gun unusable for self-defense in the home as “unconstitutional”?
Going after “safe storage” laws can make this a town-by-town attack against preempted laws. Heller is nationwide.
Heller does not prevent all storage laws. DC law pre-Heller said even when you were home you could not control your firearm by wearing it and had to have it locked up. Thereby making it useless for home or self defense.
this case will be fought on the state’s pre-emption law.
“Heller does not prevent all storage laws.
The implication of “rendering inoperable” for self-defense is locked in a container. The SC is not going to make an exhaustive list of the possible means of “rendering inoperable”. If a gun is locked in a container, it is inoperable for immediate use (cited as verboten in Heller).
BTW, “preemption laws” are subject to politics of the state legislature and governor. An SC ruling is supposed to be applicable throughout the US.
https://code.dccouncil.us/dc/council/code/sections/7-2507.02.html
survived both Heller II and Heller III
“survived both Heller II and Heller III”
As noted before, courts and municipalities defy the Supreme Court with impunity.
This !
Sam nailed it.
No, CC nailed it.
Seattle’s new rule requires you to lock up an unattended firearm. You can walk around your house with a loaded pistol on each hip and a loaded rifle slung on your back. DC’s law required you to keep all guns locked up in a useless condition.
Heller declares law requiring the storage of guns in a non-functional condition violate the second amendment. A gun in a safe is non-functional (just attempt to shoot it without opening the safe).
Sam, I don’t want to get to argumentative since you and I are almost certainly on the same page as to the lack of efficacy of such laws, their unconstitutionality beyond Heller.
But they are not outright forbidden by Heller. Plenty of states and local jurisdictions have laws (not quite as bad as the Seattle one) that have survived post heller.
some states criminalize allowing access by children. there are four or five levels present now in various states
require secured storage and
1) criminalize possible access by children
2) criminalize successful access by children
3) criminalize access with harm by children
4) criminalize access to any prohibited person person
DC criminalizes access and requires a firearm be on the person or locked if children other than the gun owner parent’s kids can be expected to be in the home.
It is not criminal for me to not prevent access by my own kids, but if their pals are in the home and any guns are not locked up it is a crime penalized by six months, whether they gain access or not.
https://code.dccouncil.us/dc/council/code/sections/7-2507.02.html
“…states and local jurisdictions have laws (not quite as bad as the Seattle one) that have survived post heller.”
They “survived” because they were not individually challenged at the SC. That is the beauty of defiance of court orders. It is called, “Catch me if you can”. Here is how it unfolds:
“Heller” rules that an absolute ban on handgun possession in the home is unconstitutional. This is the “headline” ruling, where all the attention is focused. A secondary holding is included in the SC decision (rendering firearms non-functional). The secondary holding is not a top line consideration for the matter at hand (ban on all handguns in D.C.) The D.C. government complies with the top level ruling (remove ban on all private gun possession in the district), everyone focuses on that, and moves along after D.C. decides to not defy the ruling, appearing compliant with the SC ruling. Then comes notice that the SC ruling included a prohibition against rendering firearms in the home useless for self-defense. Almost no one notices. So, along comes Jones who files suit against rendering firearms unusable/non-functional. Note that this is a suit is required to compel D.C. to comply with the original SC ruling. Time has passed with the “safe storage” still on the books, time passes with the new law suit, time passes with the appeals, and time passes with the SC review. All that time, D.C. is free to enforce their already ruled unconstitutional law. D.C. then gets to appeal on the grounds that they did not interpret the Heller ruling to include prohibition of “safe storage” provisions as really, really unconstitutional (because Heller also acknowledged that some regulations on firearm possession were constitutional). And that D.C. has a compelling government interest in public safety, and so on. In this manner, every segment of a court/SC ruling is defied, leaving the decision relatively moot. Obfuscation and delay are a form of art in government. To put the pistachio on the sundae, the SC decides not to grant cert to here a case where the ruling will only be, “This time we mean it.”.
As some have noted here, anti-constitutionalists will defy and litigate every sentence of an adverse court ruling. “Survival” does not mean “legitimate”.
Oh, I do not consider discussion to be argument.
A locked gun is as usefull as tits on a bull. Locked & loaded is my motto. & not the kind of locked they mean. Any locked up weapon is useless in any matter. & the signs , that’s like advertising , gun on premises , please try and steal from me !! Don’t advertise your weapons as there are criminals out there that won’t hesitate to try stealing from you. But we already know these things. Seattle is fighting a losing proposition. Revert to Heller. Left politicians are about as usefull as tits on a bull !!
Washington used to be a great state, even our democrats were fairly centered. Then came the great flood, Californians fleeing their own self made sh!thole not even realizing that they were the ones who caused it and not caring. Now like a spreading cancer they keep moving with only 2 eventual outcomes, they kill the host or the cancer is eradicated. I hear people say to flee to a conservative state, but giving up territory is a losing proposition, pretty soon you run out of places to retreat to. So I say FU to Seattle and it’s loyal commie SJW’s. Want my guns, come and try, I’ll give you the bullets first.
If it wasn’t for the tech industry that Californians brought with them, the only non-agrarian major employer would be Boeing (who moved to Chicago).
Take the good with the bad and do everything to elect people with a level head on their shoulders.
You are the guy that just completely falsified the number of accidental fatalities of children by firearms per year. And Washington has a huge non California tech industry, as well as huge shipping and other extant economic drivers.
The only the only thing they are getting from California is more crime and more left wing policies that make crime pay.
Given its has demographics that elsewhere commit very little crime, Seattle now has a profoundly higher violent crime rate than it should.
Don’t resort to ad hominem attacks. The 1300 deaths is documented and reported by many reputable news sourced:
https://www.cnn.com/2017/06/19/health/child-gun-violence-study/index.html
Now, lets check your facts:
Muscoy is a small town of 10,600 full of horse properties and nurseries, not MS-13 graffiti. It is 66% (not 80%) Hispanic and 44% white according to Wikipedia (the numbers add up to more than 100% because many Hispanics are also considered white).
About Washington: a Google search shows the largest employers are Boeing (local but moving), Amazon (started by a NY City DE Shaw investor Jeff Bezos), Microsoft (started by another East Coast educated liberal) and Oracle (from San Francisco). Seems like Washington attracts high tech liberals. Maybe Californians did not Californicate Washinton after all, but the tech industry brought money and liberalism.
Actually Surf what you said was wrong.
You said the 1300 kids were killed in “gun accidents”.
That is not what the study you just referenced says.
For 13 – 17 year olds
On average, from 2012 to 2014, nearly 1300 children (N = 1297) died each year in the United States from a firearm-related injury, for an annual crude rate of 1.8 per 100 000 (Table 1).
Fifty-three percent of these were homicides (n = 693), 38% were suicides (n = 493),
and 6% were unintentional firearm deaths (n = 82);
the remaining 3% were due to legal intervention (n = 9)
and deaths of undetermined intent (n = 19).
The annual rates of firearm homicide (2.6 per 100 000) and firearm suicide (2.3 per 100 000) were roughly equivalent among the older age group (aged 13–17 years) and were 15 to 17 times higher than the unintentional firearm death rate for this group.
This is showing only 82 as Unintentional firearm deaths.
Now that is just this study.
The last time I saw anything from the CDC it was at the lowest it has been at less then 500.
Half of those in the study were murdered. (gangs?)
And if you had lived in WA back in the early 80s (Before Amazon or the Tech industries)
The CAs moved here in droves.
And they did change Seattle.
We were a pretty decent state.
We were always Shall Issue, No gov mandated training for CCWs Open Carry.
Now Californians weren’t the only ones that have been coming here.
They have come from China, Mexico, Japan, and a huge amount of homeless, illegals, and drug addicts.
None of which came from places that respect our gun rights or make this a better place to live.
Yes the influx of the Tech companies have brought more leftists.
Maybe a chicken – egg thing.
Guns are dangerous and need to be locked away, in the city that gives out free drug paraphernalia to addicts.
I live in Washington, in the I-594 gun registration scheme only (3) three counties voted for this and yet 36 other counties voted against it, It still passed because the population base is located in three counties around the liberal Seattle area. The Seattle area is ripe with liberals and they dictate to the rest of the state what laws will be passed. Where I live (Central Washington) there is a lot of talk about residents moving to Idaho. Washington is turning into California, Tax and spend mentality. If Washington imposes a State tax I am gone. This Gun security legislation is not about safety, it’s a chipping away process on responsible gun owners.
“RCW 9.41.290 State preemption.
“The state of Washington hereby fully occupies and preempts the entire field of firearms regulation within the boundaries of the state, including the registration, licensing, possession, purchase, sale, acquisition, transfer, discharge, and transportation of firearms, or any other element relating to firearms or parts thereof, including ammunition and reloader components.”
That seems clear to me. But then again, so does “shall not be infringed.”
Sorry, but even if this went into effect, they can’t enforce it. I’m pretty sure peeking in through the windows is illegal.
If a gun is stolen, I also fail to see any judge or police officer who would take the recovered gun, if it’s recovered at all, and then arrest the legal owner because of this pathetic law.
“The only power any government has is the power to crack down on criminals. Well, when there aren’t enough criminals, one makes them. One declares so many things to be a crime that it becomes impossible for men to live without breaking laws.”
— Ayn Rand
Cops will arrest and judges will convict. After all, what’s the point of having power if you can’t abuse it?
Then why don’t YOU become a police officer and show us all how it SHOULD be done? Put up or shut up.
“Sorry, but even if this went into effect, they can’t enforce it. ”
Not quite true. The intended force of the law is to make gun owners uncertain, and afraid. Afraid that if there is a problem with unintended gun possession by a minor, police WILL arrest you. The only way to prevent such unintended possession is to lock up the guns and ammo in containers not easily accessed by minors.
An additional benefit to such laws is that homeowner and renters insurance will not cover illegal acts. It is all part of the effort to convince you that owning a gun has a higher risk level than an actual deadly attack by another person.
Agree with you about insurance and slam dunk higher civil liabilities being the result. But this law is not about kids gaining access, but guns being present and possible
access being a crime.
There are storage laws all over the US that survived post heller and they have a wide range.
– some criminalize actual successful access with harm,
– some successful access with no harm,
-and some criminalize any possible/potential access even though the gun were not accessed
But that doesn’t make sense! Even from a legal standpoint, if no actual crime was committed, there’s no reason to even make an arrest!
How serious is the problem. In the entire state of Washington:
“About one accidental firearm death of a child each year is typical in Washington state, according to state health statistics gathered between 2007 and 2010, said Health Department spokesman Tim Church. During that same time period, an average of nine kids 17 and younger ended up in the hospital because of an accidental shooting, Church added. ”
Clearly, the problem is even less when just Seattle is considered.
Let’s consider the impact of this law:
“Tacoma police said the boy’s death came after his father put his pistol under a seat and got out to pump gas while the mother went inside the convenience store. The boy’s infant sister, who also was in the car when the gun went off, was not injured. Detectives questioned the parents and have called the shooting a tragic accident, Benjamin said. The father has a concealed weapons permit, and no charges have been filed, he said. Washington does not have a law specifically concerning child access to firearms, however state law is very specific about carrying loaded pistols in vehicles. A person with a concealed weapons permit may carry a gun in a car in Washington state, but they are required to have it on their person. If they have to leave behind in the car, the law says it must be locked and concealed from view.”
Boy, 3, kills himself with gun found in family’s car https://komonews.com/news/local/boy-3-kills-himself-with-gun-found-in-familys-car-11-20-2015
http://idahonews.com/news/local/boy-3-kills-himself-with-gun-found-in-familys-car
Do we really want to arrest and jail grieving parents? Then bail them out so they could bury a child?
“Do we really want to arrest and jail grieving parents? Then bail them out so they could bury a child?”
Do we arrest parents who leave their children in hot cars in mid-Summer to die? Do we arrest parents who drive drunk and kill their children in car crashes?
Since we DO, why should we not arrest the parents who leave a loaded firearm unsecured in a place where it could easily be found by a child, and a child DOES find it and use it? I’m sure that a LOT of people who cause death through negligence feel just AWFUL about it; That doesn’t seem to be a really good reason to pat them on the head and say, “There, there. . . you’ve suffered enough! Go have a good cry, and DO try not to do that again!”
Maybe I’m just slightly on the ‘harsh’ side of ‘strict,’ but people who kill through stupidity don’t deserve a pass just because they’re terribly sorry. Remember, their victim is still irremediably and irrevocably DEAD, and that is the person that counts.
Do we arrest parents who leave their children in hot cars in mid-Summer to die? Do we arrest parents who drive drunk and kill their children in car crashes?
Uhm we do just like there are the SAME laws affecting access or illegal use of guns. Why do you want special laws for guns?
If you hand your toddler a knife or gun and harm is occurs you are already criminally exposed.
The laws in question have to do with making firearms different than knifes, cars etc which is specious.
So your analogy fails. Do we need a specific law that say telling your toddler to climb a ladder is a crime, leaving your infant in a full bathtub while you leave the home is illegal? or leaving a bottle of whisky on a counter in a home with kids is a crime? No. These are ALREADY covered under child endangerment. and have to do with harm occurring and reasonable expectation of whether it would occur. We don’t need special laws for guns.
do you think we need a specific law criminalizing not locking up power tools or car keys??
Refresh my memory: Where and when, precisely, did I say anything about ‘special laws for guns’? Is it hidden somewhere in what I wrote, somewhere that no one can see but you?
Why would there be a NEED for a ‘special law’ when Negligent Homicide, Manslaughter, Child Abuse, Reckless Endangerment, and a myriad of other laws already cover such things? I simply stated that stupid people should not be given a pass when their stupidity and negligence causes death merely because they feel badly about the outcome.
A ‘special law’ requiring gun owners to secure their firearms in households with small children is neither necessary nor Constitutional, but rigorously prosecuting stupid gun owners for their stupidity when it injures others, IS. NOT properly securing an operable firearm in a house with small children, as an example, is displaying grossly negligent stupidity, and should be criminally prosecuted as such–not as a separate, new crime.
Stop trying to set fire to a Straw Man when none exists.
Is it ok with you if we jail the negligent parents if their toddler kills somebody else’s kid with the loaded gun they left accessible? Same actions, same crime. Maybe it’s best to take the rest of the kids out of a home where the parents are so careless that they let their toddler shoot himself. Prosecutors, judges, and juries have the discretion to be more lenient if they think the parents have been sufficently punished and are unlikely to repeat their mistake. They could charge them with felonies and bargain them to no time served, but they’d never be able to be possess guns to be negligent with.
The current laws already cover these cases. Punishing the victims of theft is also overreaching.
It should be unnecessary to enact laws of this type.
Certainly it is prudent to secure weapons against theft or misuse. With rights come responsibilities.
Pushed by so-called Liberals, the Gov’t seeks to intrude upon and regulate the life of the People. Restrictions pertaining to firearms is only one element of these encroachments. The rise of the Nanny State is a symptom (or perhaps the cause) of this disturbing trend.
I was a kid, never killed myself or anybody else. But I was brought up right.
Dad trained me in safe handling, maintenance and operation. I knew without a doubt guns in the house were off-limits. Even the thought of touching them gave me the willies.
About 50 years ago, when he judged me sufficiently responsible, he presented me with my first rifle, and later, my first handgun.He walked with me through hunter safety class, and supported me in smallbore rifle competition.
He instilled great respect and a lifelong interest in firearms.
Maybe I was lucky- this sort of instruction seems less common these days. At any rate, I am grateful for the legacy.
RIP, Dad.
Why don’t we teach people (children) before it gets to that point, and stop making laws that only punish people after the fact. Laws overall barely deter crime, it’s just a repercussion for the action after. Safe storage laws are an absolute violation of 4th Amendment, and the only way to enforce them would be to get a warrant to check every single time. It’s a waste of time, money, man hours, and energy.
Given the gun control lobby groups are specifically recommending and have as strategic goal of emulating countries that also have warrant protection, BUT which in firearm registration process, require a waiver for surprise inspection of any premises include homes with firearms, the fourth could be made moot by waiver in the case of inspecting for firearms storage.
That is the point of gun control laws — to drive further laws and losses or rights. Another target for example is HIPPA waiver on gun registration, tossing out your right to privacy there as well. It is already being done on carry licenses in some US jurisdictions. Another could be waiver for be spot urine tests.
HIPAA – Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act. You are right about it needing a test; as currently used, not counting the legal duty to report / evaluate / restrain / treat appropriately a patient who is a threat to themselves or others, release of protected health information regarding mental health or substance abuse treatment requires a separate consent signed by the patient. Period. You checking a box “waiving” your HIPAA rights does NOT mean the health care providers get to waive their compliance.
Obviously, ‘we’ SHOULD instruct children on the dangers of firearms; We SHOULD also instruct children on how not to run out into traffic chasing a ball, and how NOT to fall into pools, and how NOT to do a myriad number of things that can get them killed. We DO teach children all of these things, yet they continue to die from the very things that they were taught about because, after all, they are ‘children’.
Children are just as much idiots as are many adults, if not more so, but can be excused for being idiots due to their lack of experience and judgement; They still make mistakes, and it’s required of adults such as their parents to look out for them. One OBVIOUS way to look out for children is to make damn’ sure that, no matter how well they were taught, they are NOT going to be able (up to a reasonable age, of course) to get to a loaded firearm. If they DO, they’re just as likely, due to poor impulse control and lack of mature judgement, to do the same thing that an immature, impulsive adult might do–torch off a round into something or someone valuable.
I am NOT saying that there ‘oughta be a law’; Anyone who owns a firearm ‘should’ know about such things, and keep their guns secured if there are kiddies in the house, but, sadly, many firearm owners do NOT possess that thing known as ‘common sense,’ and that’s how children die more often than not–because some stupid adult set them up for it.
I AM saying that no new law is going to prevent a firearm tragedy; Using the ones that are already on the books rigorously just MIGHT if the outcomes are properly ‘advertised.’
Even then, there are always going to be stupid people who should never possess anything more lethal than a tennis ball, let alone children.
““Frankly, this is no surprise. The Mayor and Council are trying to prevent children from accessing guns with this Safe Storage legislation. If the NRA and SAF want to be on record fighting responsible gun ownership, that’s their choice.””
I have to wonder if anyone realizes that Obama was elected president after twice, as a state senator, voting to allow children who were born alive after a botched abortion to be killed by medical inattention.
Yes, he voted to allow children born alive to be killed. Twice.
If you think I’m lying, look it up and be amazed.
I say this because that is exactly the same way to twist words that Holmes is twisting words.
A firearm is a tool like any other. Misuse can hurt or kill. Train your family in the proper use and handling of your tools, as well as when to, and when not to use them. I know that sounds boringly like common sense, but there it is. If a tool cannot be accessed when needed, it is as useless as the ones in the display at the store.