Police Union Chief: City's Reaction Insufficient
Police union chief Kristopher Baumann said he was disappointed at the reaction to the Supreme Court ruling from Mayor Adrian Fenty and Police Chief Cathy Lanier, who said they will craft gun registration rules and work with the D.C. Council to develop new laws governing the storage of guns in the home.
Baumann said the city should have done more, including announce new rules that establish "minimum mandatory sentences" for those who violate a host of other laws pertaining to guns, such as illegal dealing, transporting and manufacturing. Baumann said the union never believed the handgun ban was an effective way to fight gun violence because criminals still were able to get the weapons even if law-abiding citizens were not.
"They should have been making the laws that are effective, instead of spending all their resources and energy fighting for a statute that was never was effective," said Baumann, a frequent critic of Fenty's and Lanier's. "The fact is, they were caught flat-footed."
By David A Nakamura |
June 26, 2008; 3:02 PM ET
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David Nakamura
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Gun Ban Case
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Posted by: Anonymous | June 26, 2008 5:35 PM
It's worth remembering that Nickles insisted on changing the DC lawyer who was handling this case, replacing a well-regarded lawyer who'd worked extensively on this case with one of his own cronies.
This is also the guy who is going to cost the District millions by stupidly saying he was firing lawyers from his office to replace them with "young" ones. Replace the word "young" with "white" and you see where this is going.
He is an arrogant jerk with a background in private practice and absolutely no sense for what is required of a public official. And, of course, he lives in Virginia (whether he buys a DC condo or not).
Fenty really, really needs to dump him.
Posted by: Meridian | June 26, 2008 8:05 PM
The city's reaction was pathetic. They knew what the Circuit CT ruling was and should have regulations proposed that allowed exactly what the Circuit CT stated. IT was only because the Circuit CT stayed it's decision that people did not already have these abilities last year.
The law abiding folks have never been the problem. As been stated if you outlaw guns, only outlaws have guns. That has been the state in DC for 32 years. The people have suffered the consequences with DC have been the murder capital in past decades.
Now that law abiding folk can defend themselves, these hoodlums and thugs that infest DC will get a sharp lesson facing an armed populace.
The police need to stop being lazy and doing feel good measure against law abiding folk. Arrest the criminals when caught during a crime and lock them up. DC has a catch and release program for criminals and they go back to prey upon their neighborhoods.
Posted by: tasha | June 27, 2008 9:52 AM
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Flat footed is not quite adequate, that would suggest that they were caught off guard. Although I agree with everything else that the Police Union says. Peter Nickles should have attempted to strengthen the gun laws and regulations already on the book, however, he opted to go for the whole kit and kabootle resulting in a liberation from gun control that now extends to every city in the United States.
The District cut off its nose to spite it's face. Not only is the District now unable to ban handguns, but they, and every other city are prohibited from dictating that they must be "unusable" or better said, unloaded, while stored in the home.
Again, Peter Nickles is too much of a grand standing attorney attempting to live out his legal twilight from a judicial bench that he does not and never will have.
It is quite sad, really.