One of the provisions of Illniois' last in the nation concealed weapon permit law allows law enforcement to object to issuance of a permit if they have a preponderance of evidence that the applicant, even though not legally prohibited from obtaining a permit, represents a threat to public safety. Some other states have similar provisions; I really do not have any objection to such provisions. There are people who have not been convicted of a serious crime, or have not been involuntarily hospitalized for mental illness, but the police have good reason to be concerned.
Such objections can be appealed to a review board, and the evidence suggests that the review board is not rubber stamping police objections, nor ignoring them. From March 4, 2014 CBS Chicago:
When I say "the evidence," what I mean is that if the review board rejected the vast majority of these applications, it would suggest that the police objections were being given excessive weight (especially because this is supposed to be "preponderance of evidence" standard). If they rejected very few applications, it would suggest that either the police were being needlessly picky, or that legitimate pulbic safety concerns were being ignored.
When we passed shall-issue here in Minnesota, we wrote into the law that an individual could be denied if "there exists a substantial likelihood that the applicant is a danger to self or the public if authorized to carry a pistol under a permit" - AND - "incidents of alleged criminal misconduct that are not investigated and documented may not be considered."
ReplyDeleteGun owners don't object to having people denied when there is evidence to suggest that they would be a threat. What we've objected to is having people denied when there was no such evidence.
"Preponderance of the evidence" requires that there be actual evidence. And that's a significant step forward both for gun rights and for due process.