By Claire Bernish at theantimedia.org
Sacramento, CA — Beginning January 1, gun regulations in California will give authorities the right to seize a person’s weapons for 21 days if a judge determines the potential for violence exists.
After a shooting rampage perpetrated by Elliot Rodger in May 2014, the billwas proposed as an “emergency restraining order” option for families concerned their loved ones may act out violent urges — if they persuade a judge that loved one’s possession of a firearm “poses an immediate and present danger of causing a personal injury to himself, herself, or another by having it in his or her custody or control.”
In other words, the “law gives us a vehicle to cause the person to surrender their weapons, to have a time out, if you will,” Los Angeles Police Department Assistant Chief Michael Moore told a local NPR affiliate.
You read that right — a government-imposed time out. Now go sit in the corner, and think about what you did.
“It’s a short duration and it allows for due process,” Moore continued. “It’s an opportunity for mental health professionals to provide an analysis of a person’s mental state.” Because, as everyone knows, mental health professionals — like police — are infallible.
Rodger was 22-years-old when he launched a series of attacks around Isla Vista near the campus of University of California, Santa Barbara that left six people dead and 14 injured before he turned one of his guns on himself. All the weapons he used — three handguns and two knives —had been legally purchased. Mere minutes before carrying out his plan, Rodger uploaded a video to YouTube and circulated a 107,000-word manifesto.
How this law answers that attack on Isla Vista — with the attacker offering nothing in the way of an advance red flag about the carnage that was about to unfold — is anyone’s guess.
Even UC president, Janet Napolitano, said at the time, “This is almost the kind of event that’s impossible to prevent and almost impossible to predict.”
Seeming to ignore this major factor completely, San Diego State University professor and attorney, Dr. Wendy Patrick, told a local CBS affiliate, “[I]t’s the family members, it’s the people closest to the perpetrator who are in the best position to notice red flags.”
Second Amendment and constitutional advocates have been understandably upset by the coming law, saying further rules in a state already rife with restrictive gun laws will only serve to punish law-abiding gun owners.
“We don’t need another law to solve this problem,” asserted Sam Paredes, executive director of Gun Owners of California, to the Associated Press, as reported by the Washington Times. “We think this just misses the mark and may create a situation where law-abiding gun owners are put in jeopardy.”
What could possibly go wrong?
This article (California Law Allowing Government to Seize Legal Guns Goes into Effect January 1st) is free and open source. You have permission to republish this article under a Creative Commons license with attribution to Claire Bernish and theAntiMedia.org. Anti-Media Radio airs weeknights at 11pm Eastern/8pm Pacific. Image credit: Augustas Didzgalvis. If you spot a typo, email [email protected].
This is nothing but the nanny state getting more nannier. Lets put all this crap in perspective. First off as Benjerman Francklyn said, “to give our rights away for a little (false) security, one deserves neither.. A person has a wide table of options if they want to kill someone. The amount of gun free murders are almost triple that of gun murders. It’s just a simple choice of which article one decides to use, but not the only one.
I used to live in Isla Vista, California … supposedly there was an incident there that caused this new bullshit law. They now have the ability to take our guns if they think we may use them for illegal purposes. Also when I was living in in Isla Vista, California … there was a kid who ran over an entire block of people with his car on purpose. Now, when are they gonna confiscate our cars if they think we might use them to do harm?
You to realize that all mass shootings are committed by people who are mentally ill…all of them. Mass shootings are what triggers new gun control laws. Taking guns away from psychos is not a bad thing because you will take the pressure over responsible, sane gun owners . So you really have a choice, take guns away from psychos or keep the status quo and then eventually only government and criminals will have guns. Plus, I believe gun dealers need to police themselves and have the right to deny a sale of a firearm of anyone they believe to be off or not mentally stable or a criminal.
we have plenty of laws just the people that do the background checks are to lazy to do them and just pass them and allow people to get guns that should not have them
Being European, I have to say that American weapon laws and policy make absolutely no sense to most of us. Why in the world do you think people need guns in their homes?? School shootings happen where guns are allowed and easy to come by. Meaning it’s hardly an issue to the millions of Europeans. Any law that may help limit the private use of weapons in America or anywhere else in the world is better than no law, in my opinion.
Gun Legislative states have less crimes from those states that dont. Example California. It’s the people not the guns that is the problem. Guns don’t wake up and start shooting on their own. Having our second amendment put in use for any serious threats, can help save lives in many ways.
“It’s the people not the guns that is the problem”?
Maybe, but if one guy go mad with his own hands he can be controlled, no kill. With a hand gun he can kill one. With automatic rifles it can be 5, 10 or a hundred likes in Paris.
In my home town, one man start shooting in the crowd, students and bystander: 5 dead and 20 wounded
Alejandra, that is completely wrong. Exactly the opposite is the truth. The states with the most guns have the most gun deaths and injuries! DUH.
In America we have gun rights. Guess why? A while back our forefathers wrote up documents designed to protect our freedom… I wouldn’t expect Euros to understand it. But FYI… we left Europe because it was bad there, and we wanted to be free. Nowadays, there are parts of the government that are slowly trying to take the freedom away that our forefathers were trying to protect. Our forefathers knew that a corrupted government could someday be a problem… so they said we the people could have a gun to protect ourselves and the freedom we all enjoy. America is a dangerous place, and I understand your point of view… but I respectfully disagree with it.
Contrary to what you might think, Europeans are only interested in US gun laws for the fun of it. We dont care about your “freedom”, your forefathers or amendments. If you knew what the word statistics meant, you’d probably have enough years of kindergarten to understand that our way is superior to yours. The US is a underdeveloped, third world country, where poverty, analfabetism and health care is allowed to prosper and grow. You also have the best developed slavery system, aka. your “justice system”, that is run by private corporations for their own benefit, without any regard for human rights.
And please stop claiming your free, your not. Having to work 3 jobs to pay rent is not freedom. I have 5 weeks paid holiday every year, I have free healthcare, I can study to become a PhD for free, my kids can go to kindergarten, I only work 7.5 hrs per day, 37.5 hours a week. And I still make 100.000 USD a year. THAT is freedom!
I’m French and i don’t feel free ! Europeans countries are false democracy. i don’t know if USA are a better place to live and i will not judge it because my country is really sick, health care is falling down, corruption is everywhere, people are becoming fascist are racism is growing … In France you can have weapon many of French people live in denial with it. For hunt weapon you can buy semi auto rifle (2+1 ammo), for sport you can buy (with prefecture’s authorization) semi auto rifle (30 ammo and Kalashnikov is not a mass destruction weapon), pistol or revolver. The problem in the occidental European “modern-democracy” is that the mainstream opinion is forged by peoples ( politics, journalists ) who has never problems, earn a lot of money, lives in big city, don’t want to see poverty and lives happy with capitalism. This opinion is “WEAPON = BAD” “STATE = SECURITY” “TRUST POLITICIAN” “YOU ARE FREE” “liberté égalité franternité”
But in my opinion if I’m a “citizen” ( so i pay taxes, bills, i can vote for some crooks and i shut my mouth and I will maybe die in stupid war like my ancestor in 14-18 39-45 indochine algérie etc … ) why should i give my weapon to the police ? policemen cannot protect me ! If only State and criminals got weapon am i really safe ? if you think “yes” you’re in denial …
Yes yes and yes. My friend from Italy only tempts me more to move my family from here. The zombie state of mind is tiring. I’m sure the time is coming when other countries will not allow Americans in.
It may not be a perfect solution but it is doing something. It is better than doing nothing. I am a gun owner and I think we must find solutions to an ever increasing problem. Doing nothing is not working. The status quo is leaving too many dead and wounded in our towns and cities and country. The political players don’t want to touch this issue as they believe it might ruin their chances of reelection. They are more worried about keeping their cushy jobs and benifits than they are about the well being of their constituents who elected them. Even the tone of this story sugests that this plan is bs and won’t work before it is even tried. The solutions won’t be comfortable for everybody but we must start trying something. Doing nothing is producing that exact result. Nothing!