Safe Silver Spring News Gun Safety, Drunk Driving & Sentencing Reform Top Topics at Legislative Forum

SAFE SILVER SPRING

SafeSilverSpring.com

Contact: Tony Hausner, Chair, thausner@gmail.com, 301-641-0497

Woody Brosnan WoodyBrosnan@verizon.net

Safe Silver Spring News

Gun Safety, Drunk Driving & Sentencing Reform Top Topics at Legislative Forum

By Woody Brosnan, Vice Chair of Safe Silver Spring

Building on one of the toughest gun safety laws in the nation, Maryland legislators are now planning efforts to keep guns out of the hands of persons on the Terror Watch List and domestic abusers.

Lawmakers and advocates also discussed plans to equip police with body cameras, toughen Maryland’s drunken driving law, restore voting rights to felons and reform sentencing laws for non-violent offenders at Safe Silver Spring’s annual legislative forum.

But guns took center stage as they have this week nationally with President Obama vowing to issue executive orders to tighten gun laws because Congress has failed to act on legislation.

Gun Safety

State Sen. Jamie Raskin (D-20), said it was “baffling” that Congress would not ban firearm sales to persons on the government’s no-fly list but that he would introduce legislation to make Maryland “one state that will not issue permits to people who are either known terrorists or suspected terrorists.”

Between 2000 and 2014 more than 2,000 people on the terror watch list purchased a gun, said Raskin.

About 100 persons attended the legislative forum, including more than a dozen members of Maryland Shall Issue or other gun rights groups wearing stickers saying, “Guns Save Lives.”

One audience member asked Raskin how he plans to ensure that persons are not wrongly placed on the Terror Watch List. Raskin responded that he will probably include language allowing persons to appeal that designation to the Maryland attorney general, just like federal law allows appeals to the U. S. Attorney General.

Sara Love, public policy director for Maryland ACLU, said her board has not taken a position on the legislation, admitting they have concerns because people have been incorrectly targeted and because of past revelations that Maryland State Police conducted covert surveillance of peace and anti-death penalty groups during the Ehrlich administration.

Raskin praised Safe Silver Spring, Marylanders to Prevent Gun Violence and other groups for helping to pass Maryland’s Firearm Safety Act of 2013 in the wake of the Sandy Hook school massacre. Among other things the bill required fingerprinting for new handgun purchases, banned the sale of assault rifles and required gun owners to report to police if one of their firearms is lost or stolen.

Another audience member asked why if Maryland’s gun safety bill is so tough that last summer saw a rash of homicides in Baltimore.

Liz Banach, communications director for Marylanders to Prevent Gun Violence, said 44 per cent of the guns used in Baltimore homicides were purchased out of state, pointing out the need for national legislation along the lines of Maryland’s law.

Montgomery County Councilmember Marc Elrich, chair of the Public Safety Committee, said county police confiscated 1200 illegal guns last year.

Elrich said gun control may reduce crimes of impulse but that the best way to fight crime is to eliminate the deplorable economic circumstances in the big cities.

“Baltimore is struggling as one of the most impoverished and desperate cities . . . It rivals Detroit on a bad day. If I was going to deal with Baltimore I would be renovating housing, stabilizing families, finding jobs for people, fixing their schools and a lot of other stuff to stop crime,” said Elrich.

Domestic Abusers and Guns

Raskin, a member of the Judicial Proceedings Committee, and Delegate Kathleen Dumais (D-15), vice chair of the House Judiciary Committee, also promised efforts to clarify that sentencing judges must tell persons convicted of domestic violence that they must surrender any firearms and cannot purchase more.

A recent study by Court Watch Montgomery of sentencing proceedings of domestic violence offenders found that only one offender out of 126 was told by a Montgomery County district court judge that he could no longer possess a gun. Judges did not warn a single disqualified offender that possessing a gun could result in a felony charge with a mandatory minimum sentence of 5 years.

“If a domestic abuser possesses a firearm the victim is six times more likely to be killed than if there is no gun in the house,” said Deena Hausner, attorney for the House of Ruth Maryland.

Guns and the Mentally Ill

In response to a question, Raskin and Dumais said they were not aware of any upcoming efforts in this session to change Maryland law concerning the mentally ill and guns. State law now mirrors federal law by allowing the police to seize the firearms from anyone involuntarily committed to a mental institution for 30 days or more.

Raskin said this was the “most contentious” issue in 2013, not with the NRA but with mental health professionals. Some legislators wanted the seizure law to apply to persons who voluntarily commit themselves to mental facilities but psychiatrists were concerned that people would be reluctant to commit themselves if it meant they had to give up their guns.

Safe Silver Spring Chair Tony Hausner noted that in 2014 California approved a law allowing family members to petition a court for a gun-violence restraining order (GVRO) against another family member who they believe is a danger to others or themselves.

http://www.csmonitor.com/USA/USA-Update/2015/1230/California-gun-law-wil...

“It is clear that most people who are mentally ill are not dangerous, but there are a small number of people who are dangerously mentally ill,” said Hausner.

The mentally ill are more likely to take their own lives with guns than harm others, added Banach.

According to the Centers for Disease Control, 21,175 persons took their own life with a gun in 2013, just over 51 per cent of all 41,149 suicides that year.

Tony Hausner stated that he personally supports legislation: 1) strengthening the background checks legislation, 2) the no fly list provisions, 3) taking guns away from domestic abusers permanently; 4) giving local jurisdictions authority; 5) building on California’s “Gun Violence Restraining Order” legislation passed in 2014 which takes guns away from “dangerously” mentally ill, drug abuses, and/or alcoholic.

Drunk Drivers

The death of Montgomery County Police Officer Noah Leotta also has spurred attempts to tighten Maryland’s drunken driving laws. Leotta was struck at a traffic stop on Dec. 3 by a car driven by a man who was suspected of driving under the influence and whose license had been suspended for a prior DUI conviction.

Maryland does not require convicted drunk drivers to install an interlock device on their vehicles unless their blood alcohol level is just under twice the legal limit or if it is a repeat offense. Interlock devices require drivers to breath into a breathalyzer before the vehicle will start.

“We continue to have more than 100 people die a year in Maryland (from drunken driving),” said Dumais. “There should be universal ignition lock for anyone convicted of drunk driving in Maryland.”

Dumais also plans to reintroduce a “dram shop” bill that would let family members of victims of drunk driving sue liquor establishments that over-served the drunk driver. But she admitted it would be hard to pass.

Criminal Justice Reform

Dumais said she was “most excited” about measures to implement the sentencing reform and parole reform recommendations of the Justice Reinvestment Coordinating Council.

http://governor.maryland.gov/2015/12/17/the-justice-reinvestment-coordin...

In one major change, non-violent offenders could be paroled through an administrative procedure rather than a hearing if they go to classes and received drug treatment.

“Most low-level offenders served 9 to 13 months beyond their parole eligibility because they didn’t get a hearing,” said Dumais.

The savings from, all the reforms, which the Council estimates could top $247 million over a decade, could be used to fund mental health courts, said Dumais. Elrich said fully one-third of the prisoners in Montgomery County’s detention center require mental health treatment.

Raskin also predicted that the General Assembly this year will overturn Gov. Hogan’s vetos of bills to reform Maryland’s civil forfeiture laws and another measure by Delegate Will Smith (D-20) to restore the voting rights of ex-felons.

See: https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/the-meaning-of-the-vote-to-an-ex...

Police Body Cameras

Elrich said the county’s push to require officers to wear body cameras has been slowed by an arbiter’s recent ruling that the issue has to be negotiated with their union.

“The council is committed to having body cameras. It’s going to get negotiated with the union, but at the end of the day officers are going to wear body cameras. They’re going to be on when they need to be on and it’s going to hold everybody accountable,” said Elrich.

In the meantime, a state task force is working on guidelines for when the camera footage should be released to the public.

“We know people act better if they know they are on video,” said Love. “But there is no accountability if no one can see the footage.”

She said Maryland already has a strong privacy law that protects people and that across the country people are not seeing “abusive” uses of police camera footage.

Sex Trafficking

Councilmember Tom Hucker reported that the Council recently passed his bill to allow police to issue a civil citation against the clients of prostitutes. The fine is $500 for a first offense and then $750 and $1,000 for second and third offenses.

Police have been stymied on the “demand” side of prostitution by the reluctance of prosecutors to charge the clients, said Hucker.

Hucker said sex trafficking is increasing up and down the I-95 corridor and that the county needs to work on services for victims of sex trafficking who are brought here from out-of-state.

For more information on sex trafficking in Maryland visit: http://www.mdhumantrafficking.org/ and http://goccp.maryland.gov/safeharbor/index.php

Deportations

Elrich said that “there is a lot of concern in the community” about the Obama administration’s decision to resume deporting families with children who arrived in the U. S. illegally since July 1, 2014.

It’s been discussed that some residents even fear sending their children to school because they think it might trigger deportation, said Elrich.

Hausner stated that “we are just sending these families and their children back to a very violent place, which is inconsistent with our values.” Further, “in most cases, these families were either not present at the deportation hearings, or did not have legal representation.”

See http://tinyurl.com/ssslegforeventrel for event photos and related materials.

#WordsCanStopBullets