Posted on 09/25/2008 2:07:29 AM PDT by marktwain
ATLANTA - Oconee County sheriff's deputies are hard-pressed to decide whether they're dealing with a criminal when they get a call that someone is carrying a concealed weapon where they shouldn't be, Sheriff Scott Berry said Tuesday.
The state's ban on firearms at public gatherings is too ambiguous, Berry told a panel of state senators conducting a wholesale review of the state's gun laws.
Places of worship, sporting and political events, publicly owned buildings and places the public may gather currently are off-limits to concealed weapons carriers. But Berry said the situations his deputies encounter often straddle the line between legal and unlawful because they are subject to interpretation.
"Essentially, what you have here is unenforceable," Berry said.
The Senate Firearms Committee met Tuesday for the second in a series of hearings that may lead to new gun legislation in January.
They heard from gun safety advocates who asked that any changes to the law require training for concealed weapon permit holders.
Committee member Sen. Chip Rogers, R-Woodstock, questioned whether gun safety advocates had any statistics showing that permit holders who received training were any less likely to commit a crime than someone who did not.
In response, Dee-Jay Beard, a board member of Georgians for Gun Safety, said that is difficult to prove because records of permit holders are kept secret in many states.
In his testimony, Berry said during his 16 years in office he knew of only one of 3,600 permit holders in Oconee County who had committed a crime.
Much of the discussion Tuesday centered on removing the ban to allow churches and the owners of other private property to set their own policies on who can bring guns on their land. Attorneys and clergy urged the lawmakers to keep a part of the law that makes it a crime to carry guns when a property owner prohibits it. Without that, they wondered how property owners would be able to enforce their own policies.
City governments want to keep a ban on weapons in places where city councils and other municipal policy makers meet. That would better prevent gunfire during a contentious city council meeting, said Lamar Norton, director of governmental relations for the Georgia Municipal Association.
Such a ban would, Norton quipped, also "protect city council members from city council members."
I'd like to see a case where a CCW permit holder challenged this, but it seems everyone here is afraid of SLED.
The attorneys, at least, should be aware that vigilanteeism is illegal.
Or, just make the law clear that you can carry a gun anywhere except in a court house or government building. That would straighten things up pretty well.
Here is how to determine “whether they’re dealing with a criminal”:
When a call comes in ask if they are threatening anyone? If not, tell them there no need to send an officer and then say goodbye.
See that wasn’t that hard.
“Or, just make the law clear that you can carry a gun anywhere except in a court house or government building. That would straighten things up pretty well.”
I think your solution is a little too broad. I would slightly change it to: A citizen can carry a gun anywhere a policeman is allowed to carry a gun.
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