OFFICER’S CASE DEMONSTRATES HOW GUN LAWS HURT WRONG PEOPLE, SAYS CCRKBA

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OFFICER’S CASE DEMONSTRATES HOW GUN LAWS HURT WRONG PEOPLE, SAYS
CCRKBA

The case of Upper Southampton, PA police Lt. David Johnson is a text
book example of how gun laws hurt the wrong people-law-abiding,
productive citizens instead of career criminals-the Citizens
Committee for the Right to Keep and Bear Arms said today.

And the disposition of that case, with Lt. Johnson winning back his
gun rights, is a slap in the face to every other law-abiding citizen
who has lost his or her gun rights based on a past misdemeanor
conviction, not the felony arson for which Johnson was convicted in
1959, CCRKBA added.

Johnson’s conviction did not prevent him from becoming a police
officer in 1966, or keep him from rising to a position of
responsibility in his department and his community. But because the
state Uniform Firearms Act was amended to include arson as a
disqualifying crime, even if it happened years ago, Johnson nearly
lost his job.

“What happened to David Johnson was disturbing,” said CCRKBA
Executive Director Joe Waldron, “but not nearly as repugnant as the
way citizens who have been convicted of far lesser crimes are
treated by police and the courts, due to oppressive anti-gun laws
passed as panaceas to crime. Thousands of law-abiding citizens all
over the country, none of whom was convicted of a crime as serious
as arson are suffering, and the common denominator in all those
cases is a gun control law designed to make increasing numbers of
good citizens ineligible to own firearms.

“Because these laws are written to work retroactively,” Waldron
stated, “they have made criminals out of people who may have made
one mistake years ago, and have since led exemplary lives. Johnson
appears to have gotten special consideration because he is a police
officer. That doesn’t wash. While we’re glad Johnson has his gun
rights back, this does not address the troubles being experienced by
tens of thousands of other citizens whose civil rights are still
being trampled.

“But anti-gun extremists don’t care about that, and never did,”
Waldron continued. “The Centers for Disease Control released a study
recently that proves gun laws do not effectively reduce crime.
Johnson’s case is an example of what gun laws are really all about:
disarming people who pose absolutely no threat to the public safety.”

“Unless, and until, every other citizen ensnared by unjust,
retroactively-enforced laws is granted the same kind of relief
provided Lt. Johnson simply because he is a police officer,” Waldron
stated, “these laws and their enforcement remain a black mark
against equal justice. Johnson’s circumstances are really no
different than anyone else who has been legislatively disarmed by a
zealous gun law. The bottom line here is that the law in
Pennsylvania, and similar laws everywhere, need to be changed or
repealed, not just for Johnson’s sake, but for the sake of every
other law-abiding gun owner whose rights have been trampled for
something that may have happened decades ago, and for which he or
she has repaid the community many times over by becoming a
productive citizen who learned a lesson from a bad experience.”

With more than 650,000 members and supporters nationwide, the
Citizens Committee for the Right to Keep and Bear Arms is one of the
nation’s premier gun rights organizations. As a non-profit
organization, the Citizens Committee is dedicated to preserving
firearms freedoms through active lobbying of elected officials and
facilitating grass-roots organization of gun rights activists in
local communities throughout the United States.

-END-

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Copyright ? 2003 Citizens Committee for the Right to Keep and Bear
Arms, All Rights Reserved.
Citizens Committee for the Right to Keep and Bear Arms
James Madison Building
12500 N.E. Tenth Place
Bellevue, WA 98005 Voice: 425-454-4991
Toll Free: 800-426-4302
FAX: 425-451-3959
email: info@c…