Replies

Do you know if there have been any attempts to get that stupid law (no guns within such a distance from a school) a Supreme Court hearing? I don't think there's any way it would pass muster.

Good work, btw. I know it's your job, but it sounds like you did well helping this guy.

I tried hard to get them to just drop the case, or at least just give the guy a small fine and no community service, but it was either take that deal or go to trial and if we had have gone to trial the elements were there for a conviction. We’d have had to hope for jury nullification, even though we aren’t allowed to ask for that, and it wasn’t worth the risk. One funny thing was that we pled this guy to a misdemeanor “possession of an instrument of crime” but he ended up getting his “instrument of crime” back in his possession. The prosecutor wanted to have the weapon destroyed, but I begged him not to because it had been a gift from my client’s grandfather and it had a lot of sentimental value to him. The judge kind of got tickled at the fact that he was ordering that this “instrument of crime” this guy was in trouble for possessing was going back in his possession, but he went along with the deal anyway because he agreed that this was a stupid case. It was only an instrument of crime if he had it somewhere he wasn’t supposed to have it.

“Do you know if there have been any attempts to get that stupid law (no guns within such a distance from a school) a Supreme Court hearing?”

There was a Gun Free School Zones act passed by the feds in 1990. A kid got busted at school with a concealed handgun in Texas and ended up being charged under the federal act. That act was found to be unconstitutional by the US Supreme Court in U.S. v. Lopez, but the reasoning behind that ruling was basically that the Commerce Clause didn’t give the feds authority to pass that act. State statutes banning guns on school property have withstood constitutional challenges. I don’t know about laws against having guns within a certain distance of schools, but probably every state now has laws against having firearms on school property. Of course most also have laws against having guns in government buildings, at banks, bars, etc. I’m no expert on gun laws by any means (and I have no time to do any research today) but I believe these types of state laws making it illegal to possess guns in certain places tend to withstand constitutional challenges, especially when it comes to schools. Laws restricting the right to have a weapon near a school might not withstand a constitutional challenge, but state laws making it an offense to have a firearm on school property are for the most part going to be “bulletproof.”