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Written by Jeff Garvas
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Thursday, 24 May 2007 |
Last week the City of Clyde appealed a decision out of the Sixth District Court of Appeals in favor of Ohioans For Concealed Carry from our case, OFCC v. City of Clyde, where we challenged the city's authority to enact ordinances that contradicted with state law and prohibited carrying concealed firearms in a park. The Sixth District ruled in response to a motion of supplemental authority that Ohio's statewide preemption made the matter moot, and no local government could enact gun control as the City of Clyde had.
Citing various claims based on Toledo v. Beatty and arguing that the Sixth District ignored its own precedent or the decisions in Beatty, the City of Clyde is fighting the home rule argument as if the Ohio Supreme Court never made a decision in American Financial Services. Their basis for the claim that they have the right to do whatever they please is a stretch at best, and often times drifts off topic.
Ohioans For Concealed Carry is not surprised by the appeal, and as we said during a live NRA show from the NRA Convention in St. Louis, this is probably the best case scenario for statewide preemption to date.
Should the Ohio Supreme Court take up this appeal, which we will not object to and will most likely welcome with open arms, the potential to head off all future challenges to the constitutionality of statewide preemption may very well be within our grasp.
Further, since the City of Clyde raised Beatty and relied upon the Sixth District's opinion that HB12 was not a general law, Ohioans For Concealed Carry could be poised to set the record straight on HB12 being a general law. The fact that private property owners can choose to prohibit or not prohibit a person from entering their property doesn't make HB12 inconsistently applied statewide.
The ability of a private property owner who is not otherwise statutorily prohibited, such as a daycare business, to post or not post private property is equally applied and equally available to all private property owners on a statewide basis, and as such, HB12 meets every prong of the general law test.
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Written by Mike Kinsey
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Wednesday, 23 May 2007 |
Ohio House Bill 225 has been introduced in the Legislature. This bill will bring sweeping and necessary changes to Ohio's concealed carry laws. We have gained a lot of ground in the short time since HB12 was passed in 2004, but more work remains.
Ohioans For Concealed Carry will bring you all updates to the progress of this bill as they develop.
Points in HB 225 include:
- Authorization of a person to carry a concealed handgun without obtaining a license to the same extent as if the person had obtained such a license if the person qualifies for a concealed carry license and is legally permitted to purchase a handgun.
- Removal of the requirement to inform approaching law enforcement officers that the person has a license and is carrying the handgun when the person is carrying a concealed handgun.
- Removal of the prohibition of carrying a concealed handgun at all institutions of higher learning (public and private), places of worship, day-care centers and homes, and government buildings other than schools, courthouses, law enforcement offices, and correctional facilities.
- Removal of the "in plain sight or secure encasement" criterion that a concealed carry licensee must satisfy to legally possess a handgun in a motor vehicle for an unlocked container/case.
- Repeal of the "journalist exception" to the provision that otherwise makes confidential the records a sheriff possesses regarding concealed handgun licenses and applications for such licenses.
Please contact your state Representatives and Senators in support of House Bill 225 and check back often for continued commentary about this bill. |
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Written by Mike Kinsey
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Tuesday, 15 May 2007 |
The Cleveland Plain Dealer is reporting that State Representative Michael DeBose (D-Cleveland) is seeking an Ohio Concealed Handgun License after twice voting against the concealed carry laws that were passed in 2004.
Unfortunately, like many people, it took the survival of a violent attack for Rep. DeBose to understand the importance of the innate right guaranteed by the Ohio Constitution: "The people have the right to bear arms for their defense and security."
The loud muffler on a car that slowly passed as he was finishing the walk caught his attention, though. When the car stopped directly in front of his house - three houses from where he stood - he knew there was going to be a problem.
"There was a tall one and a short one," DeBose said, sipping on a McDonald's milkshake and recounting the experience Friday.
"The tall one reached in his pocket and pulled out a silver gun. And they both started running towards me."
"At first I just backed up, but then I turned around and started running and screaming."
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Written by Jeff Garvas
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Friday, 04 May 2007 |
Opponents of Concealed Carry always argue that licensees want nothing more than to 'take the law' into their own hands. In a recent debate I had with an anti-gun representative it was regularly said that he didn't want to live in a society where everyone had a gun.
Damon Wells basically lived in that society until two kids, who we now know were taller than him him, decided he would be their next victim. In the end a fifteen year old street thug was killed, but Damon, like virtually anyone who has had to take a life in self-defense, feels horrible.
Taking the law into his own hands was the last thing on his mind. Going home alive in a dangerous community where "everyone has a gun" seemed to be a top priority for Wells. Like most self-defense shootings, Well's actions were those of a last resort.
The Plain Dealer's Regina Brett, who has done quite a bit of non-biased reporting on self-defense shootings since the Wells shooting hit the news, had the chance to interview Damon Wells recently and the story is enlightening.
You can read that article in Today's Plain Dealer, or online: Tell his family I'm sorry,' Wells pleads
We now know that Wells tried to get away towards his house, but one of the two kids stopped him. We now know that he fired three shots in self-defense, and we know that he promptly called 911. Most instructors will tell you that we fall back on our training in self-defense situations, and from the sounds of it Wells did just that.
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Written by Daniel White
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Sunday, 29 April 2007 |
Saturday, April 28th, 2007 dawned under threatening skies as more than 70 gun rights supporters gathered for the 3rd annual OFCC-PAC Fun 'n Gun fundraiser.
As the shots rang out, the clouds parted and sunshine broke across the grounds of the Rochester Rod and Gun club, giving way to a beautiful spring day.
Men and women alike joined with OFCC staffers, Rochester club members, and Single Action Shooting Society volunteers to a day of fun and comraderie. Proceeds from the event will be used throughout the state to help keep pro-gun candidates in office and continue OFCC's success in strengthening gun rights in Ohio. |
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Written by Jeff Garvas
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Friday, 27 April 2007 |
Shortly after the tragic events at the Virginia Tech University Ohioans For Concealed Carry began receiving invitations to public debates and to provide speakers to large groups.
The Youngstown State University College Republicans have invited Ohioans For Concealed Carry to debate the Ohio Coalition Against Gun Violence on Tuesday, May 1st. (This coming Tuesday night) at 7:00pm.
OFCC will be represented by President Jeff Garvas, and OCAGV will be represented by Jeremy Burnside.
We strongly encourage our members and supporters to attend this debate. The issue of "gun control" is huge in the media and congress due to the Virginia Tech shooting by a mentally disturbed individual, as is the discussion of removing restrictions on guns on campus statewide.
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Written by Jeff Garvas
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Friday, 27 April 2007 |
It happened again. It might even be the third self-defense shooting in less than seven days in the City of Cleveland.
Channel 19 in Cleveland is reporting that a 80-year old woman awoke to breaking glass overnight and moments later heard someone running up her stairs. The woman lives alone and promptly drew a concealed .38 revolver from beneath her pillow and found herself trading shots with a burglar.
The gun was thirty years old.
Thankfully the woman wasn't hit and the suspect fled the scene with a scream indicating he may have been hit. Cleveland Police investigated, and unlike the Wells shooting, the woman's gun was handed back to her on the spot.
Channel 19's report can be seen on their website. |
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Written by Jeff Garvas
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Friday, 27 April 2007 |
Various television stations and the Columbus Dispatch are publishing reports from the Ohio Attorney General's office because AG Marc Dann announced today that the State of Ohio has failed to conduct background checks extensively.
Four people who shouldn't have had licenses were identified, two who still had a license, or what equates to two hundred thousandths of a percent of the overall licensed population in Ohio. Marc Dann said that his office won't allow the process to work on sheer luck.
Jim Petro, who was AG when the concealed carry law went into effect, was contacted by Marc Dann and stated he was unaware of the situation. Background investigations that should include "adjudicated mentally incompetent" court decisions are performed by Ohio's Bureau of Criminal Identification. The Ohio BCI works under the Attorney General's office.
The fact remains that despite the system finding four people who shouldn't have been given a license by law these individuals passed every other single test. None of them were drug addicts, none had ever been convicted of possession, none of them had any convictions for crimes of violence, none of them were felons, and all of them took the mandatory twelve-hour course to carry a firearm in Ohio.
If these people were able to pass all of those hurdles and sit through a twelve-hour course without setting off any alarms one has to wonder just how dangerous to society they were. However, we applaud Attorney General Marc dann in his efforts to do the right thing and for coming out with the unfortunate news so promptly.
Fixing this and revealing that even under his watch the state had been doing the wrong thing for the past few months proves that Marc Dann is serious about his claims to end corruption in statewide politics.
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Written by Jeff Garvas
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Friday, 27 April 2007 |
When a state statute is challenged the Ohio Attorney General's office is required to defend the law and the actions of the legislature in adopting that law. When Cleveland decided to pursue litigation against Ohio's statewide preemption law the Ohio Attorney General's Office did just that.
On April 17th the State of Ohio responded to Cleveland's lawsuit. The nine page answer is relatively "boring" compared to some previous legal documents we've shared here, but it does bring up some interesting defenses.
Most importantly, the State of Ohio has adopted the position that statewide preemption is constitutional in all respects. Interestingly enough the State points out that Cleveland has "failed to join all parties" required by law. This technicality probably won't result in the case being thrown out as much as having it dealt with.
Most encouraging is the fact that the State of Ohio has asked the court to dismiss with prejudice (so that the case can't be brought again) and to have the City of Cleveland pay all costs.
According to the court docket website a pre-trial hearing is scheduled for Wednesday, May 2nd, at 2:00pm.
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Written by Jeff Knox
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Thursday, 26 April 2007 |
When I was six years old my family moved from Wichita Falls, Texas to Sidney, Ohio so Dad could head up the creation of Gun Week newspaper. One of the first things we noticed upon arriving in the land of the Yankees was that the people up north talked funny. Not only did they have odd accents and strange pronunciations, they had different words for things and used terms that were not common where we came from.
One word in common usage in Ohio which, while not completely foreign, was still odd to us, was the word "allow." Rather than saying, "My mom won't let me." or, "I'm not supposed to." Ohio kids would say "I'm not allowed."
There was something very uncomfortable about that word to me and that discomfort has been revived and gnawing at me for the past couple of years. At the Gun Rights Policy Conference in Charlotte, NC last year I discussed some of my concerns about the word "allow" and its implications. In this column I'm going to press the issue further and I expect that this will be a drum I'm going to be beating for a long time to come. |
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