https://youtu.be/d4bRtfTwAlw

The Los Angeles City Council has unanimously passed a new “safe storage” law, the violation of which is a misdemeanor offense. Mayor Eric Garcetti has announced his plan to sign the law, which will take effect 30 days afterwards. “Under the law, handguns must be locked up or disabled with a trigger lock unless they are ‘within close enough proximity and control’ that the owner or another legally authorized user can readily retrieve and use them ‘as if carried on the person,'” lattimes.com reports. Here’s a surprise (not) . . .

That wording was added partly to reassure the police union, which had raised concerns about whether retired officers would be able to quickly access their guns and pushed for an exemption.

Because retired police officers have more of a right to defend themselves with a firearm than “civilians.” Apparently Question: what about keeping a firearm on the nightstand? Answer . . .

The question of whether someone was in control “would be a case by case, fact-based determination made by a court,” said Rob Wilcox, a spokesman for City Atty. Mike Feuer.

Krekorian said police won’t be going door-to-door to examine how guns are stored but could encounter violations while reacting to other calls or in the aftermath of a shooting.

Or in the course of some other police-related business, of course. The new ordinance comes on the heels of a prior diktat banning ammunition magazines holding more than 10 rounds. That law is already the subject of a lawsuit. Pro-gun rights groups will have to launch a new, separate lawsuit to contest the safe storage mandate. Which, let’s face it, has little chance of succeeding.

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63 COMMENTS

  1. So much fail…but not much of a surprise. They’ll keep chipping away as much as possible and allow LEO exemptions to get their foot in the door. It becomes so much harder to repeal these laws once they’re signed (with the added benefit of simply making amendments to enact stricter portions later down the line).

    • “All animals are equal, but some animals are more equal than others.”
      ― George Orwell, Animal Farm, 1945

    • There isn’t a LEO exemption; they added the “unless it’s close enough to be under your control” rather than grant a LEO exemption. At least that’s the way I read it.

      • And what that means to every single cop in LA is that they will make an arrest and “let the courts settle it.”

        Not to mention the DA stacking on all kinds of other charges just because he can in order to help coerce a plea bargain.

        Welcome to the “land of the free.”

        • And what does a jury have to go on to make a decision? “…close enough to be under your control?” This is written in an intentionally vague manner by the legislature knowing that the vast majority of the jury pool is anti gun.

          We’re screwed.

  2. So, if you want to say it was close enough not to be locked up, then they nail you, or any prohibited person, for (constructive) possession of a firearm, depending on the circumstances. Damned if you do, damned if you do… (I didn’t stutter.)

  3. This is why every state needs a supremacy clause regarding all weapon laws. It’s ridiculous that city governments can place such restrictive laws.

    In WA State concealed carry laws are effectively supreme to city laws. However there are no laws regarding carrying knives at the state level so every city has a different ban based on length. If one were passing through a city and stopped to get gas your pocket knife that is legal in half the state could get you in trouble.

    • It’s ridiculous that city governments can place such restrictive laws.
      It’s ridiculous that any governments can place such restrictive laws.

  4. This isn’t even remotely enforceable because of our 4th amendment. The only way this will become a problem is when police enter a home due to some form of call. Don’t let them in.

    • There are so many “reasonable cause” exemptions that the 4th amendment is nothing but a fond memory at this point anyway. The fact that you are belligerent and disinclined to invite an officer into your home can be cause for suspicion.

      The final nail in the coffin of the fourth amendment was the tragedy that befell the citizenry of Boston’s suburbs following the Tsarnaev bombing.

  6. “…“would be a case by case, fact-based determination made by a court,” said Rob Wilcox,”

    In other words… arrest them all and let the courts figure it out later.

  8. I’m thinking we need to cut back to part time lawmakers. They do very little to begin with, and most of what they do is stoopid! A waste of our taxes!
    Eventually it will be easier for them to just say what ISN’T ILLEGAL.

      • That’s an interesting idea, born of science fiction writing, I believe? There should be a third chamber of the legislature, one whose sole purpose is to propose bills repealing prior laws.

        Failing that, I could consider a constitutional amendment imposing a sunset provision on new laws and requiring a two-thirds majority in both houses to override the sunset provision.

        Laws should come with expiration dates. If they’re oooh sooo effective and necessary, then it shouldn’t be too difficult coming up with the requisite legislative support to continue them.

        • “My aim is not to pass laws, but to repeal them. It is not to inaugurate new programs, but to cancel old ones that do violence to the Constitution, or that have failed their purpose, or that impose on the people an unwarranted financial burden.”

          Barry Goldwater

      • We need a law (I know, I know!) that specifies that in order to pass any new law, two present laws must be repealed first. Get crackin’.

    • Yep politician should be a part time position that’s unpaid. And should get tomatoes thrown at them anytime they pass idiotic laws

  9. Americans are so far removed from the founding that we no longer connect with that experience. Our big civil rights battles of the last several generations fall under the rubric of “How do we snatch preferential treatment from the they/them/the other guy, and recast them as entitlements for ourselves?”

    The idea of fighting for the mere opportunity to struggle to create value, wealth and happiness out of nothingness, as opposed to petulantly demanding a guaranteed handout at another’s expense, is both alien and hostile to the minds of many modern Americans and interlopers. So the people freely forfeit their rights.

    They’ve never fought to claim them in the first place. They’ve never experienced the inevitable consequences of life without them. One day they will and they’ll regret it. Another day after that, others will suffer to correct their error, perhaps followed by solemn vows never to lose their rights again.

  10. It’s another disincentive to having a home defense gun.

    Antis hate that firearms have practical use as self preservation tools. So, they write the law to ensure no matter how a gun is used youre taking a ride in a squad car.

    Months later Suzy Newbie is in the gun store asking about a HD gun, at which point the clerk goes “why bother. You live in LA and would get more time for using a gun then the thug who broke into your home .”

    Boom. One less gun owner.

    • Yup. Home invasion… intruder shot… police don’t see any evidence of a gun safe or gun lock… victim gets arrested.

      • Pretty much every gun is sold with a lock these days. Leave one on your nightstand as a prop. Massachusetts is a little obnoxious when it comes to gun laws but we can’t hold a candle to CA or IL.

    • Most liberals take the position that Heller was a flawed law and does not apply in their jurisdictions. Actually the liberal take on it is any firearm infringement is legal as long as they pass a law saying so. DC has been ignoring the court for how long now in regards to Heller? Nothing will change until people force the issue and in mass start ignoring these types of restrictions. Then when arrested juries find everyone not guilty using nullification.

      • “…Most liberals take the position that Heller was a flawed law and does not apply in their jurisdictions.”

        Or they try to use the dissenting opinion since that is they one they agree with.

  14. The Ad Council continues to infuriate me. Every time I see or hear one of their NOT PAID FOR, GIVEN TO THEN FOR FREE spots for their ads on radio and TV I switch channels and/or want that xx number of seconds of my life back.

    So here we have cute little children asking a rhetorical question. Isn’t that witty. You go Ad Council writers and producers. Best that the taxpayer’s money can buy.

    Well, maybe rhetorical isn’t entirely correct. The Ad Council does provide a series of answers.

    Scum.

    • These kinds of laws aren’t designed to encourage compliance, they are design to punish non-compliance after the fact.

  16. Sure they won’t go door to door to enforce this deliberately vague law…SURE. They already have a confiscation squad. Boycott LA? Or all of California?

  17. Once again, we’re predicating our gun laws, like our whole society and the future of our country, on people whose children can’t be trusted to never touch a gun that their father tells them never to touch.

  18. This law does not violate Heller. In the Heller case, firearms could not be home carried. They had to be locked up or disabled. This local law does not prohibit home carry and actually goes one step beyond home carry by allowing guns to be kept at the ready but under the owner’s control. SCOTUS never decided a case like this, and probably won’t decide this one.

  20. This law is not designed for anything other than to create a new class of criminals for cops to exploit.

    Cops show up at a house on some pretext or another, find what they deem to be a firearm stored in an unsafe manner (need to charge for something) and the owner goes directly to jail. The gun owner will then either plead and pay the fine or get out on bail and then have to spend a bunch of money trying to defend himself.

    Women with husbands/boyfriends they despise will love this law and will take full advantage.

    This is nothing more than local tyranny designed to cow people into submission.

  22. If you read this blog, and live in California….FLEE !! Take your family and move to a state where the majority who respect our civil rights is teetering on disaster. Bring your experience with totalitarian government, and carry the torch of freedom. Tell your story, encourage and persuade others of the idiocy that thrives in places like California. Move away, take your tax base with you. Bankrupt the left coast. You might actually make less gross income, but there are plenty of states where you can live very well on much less than what is making you a slave to the dollar. Run away, America needs to see you and hear you spread the truth of the serpent in shinning clothes that is a place like California.

  23. The government heterosexuals in LA and the government homosexuals in San Francisco both agree about proper bedroom activity regarding gun storage.

    At least in Kentucky the government stays out of your bedroom.

  24. Kalifornia is an abomination to the rest of America. May she rest in peace and fall into the sea
    (Allah Snackbar willing)

  25. Statists say that government’s purpose is to protect our rights while being completely oblivious to the fact that government is by far the worst violator of those rights.

  26. If i lived in LA I’d buy the cheapest trigger lock I could find and leave it by the bed with the key in it just so i could say “sure my gun was locked good thing i got it off in time when that guy came in my window/door huh?”

    If I felt particularly industrious I’d get a cheap lock box and then punch the lock my self that way i could just claim my gun was properly stored till those dam thieves got in my house while i wasn’t home and tried to steal it just before they got spooked and ran off.

  29. Let’s cut to the chase……. if applied to me, might as well round me up and send me to jail. What good is my defensive firearm, if it’s “safely stored” and inaccessible. Just more asinine BS from the Utopian communist party. Really losing my patience with this crapola.

  30. 2A advocates: Be patient. California will crumble under its own weight. Nothing can survive effectively for very long under such thorough Democrat control. We must simply ensure the liberals who leave and scatter across the U.S. are watched carefully.

  31. If the exception was “unless in use”, and “in use” was defined by the owner, it would be fine. IMHO, a pistol in the kitchen towel drawers is “in use” because it’s there where I can reach it if I’m washing dishes, and the lever-action rifle between the washer and dryer is “in use” because it’s there where I can reach it if working in the basement, and the one in the stand by my bed is “in use”just as well.

    My rifles for deer and elk and rabbits aren’t often “in use”, so they should, yes, be safely and securely stored. The 12-gauge? It’s generally only “in use” at home if there’s been an alert about an escapee from the prison camp up the mountain, so otherwise it, yes, should be safely and securely stored.

    But a gun — or any weapon — which I have placed in locations so I can retrieve them in case of an intruder are “in use” by any reasonable definition. I look at it this way: if I can locate kleenex boxes around my house in strategic locations in case of need, I can do the same with my chosen weapons of defense, and they are both equally “in use”.

  32. The wording requiring the guns to be in close proximity if not on the person would seem to make the ordinance into a compelled carry law with a caviat to lock it up if not carrying it. This compelled home carry may increase the amount of people unintentionally carrying outside of the home without a license.

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