Originally Posted by TCinVA
If I remember right project Exile was shown to be very effective. Also if I remember right the reason that Holder opposed it and because it's supposedly disproportionately targeted poor blacks you know the people that commit most of the crimes in America
2006ish I got asked politely to quit visiting a specific gun shop.
I was making up to 3 cases a week on straw purchases and/or felons in possession of firearms. All I had to do was pay attention and wait a little bit. All my local regulars were coming there to either have a girl buy a gun for them or get their guns fixed.
I recall one guy brought his Glock 36 in because his “beams was broke”. His blaster had half the SN plate broken off as well. This was a felon I had arrested several times and paid me no attention as I stood next to him and he described his guns problem to the gunsmith. He felt comfortable because he knew that there was almost no state prosecution on gun cases.
I was lucky that I had a great working relationship with BATFE and they were adopting all of my gun cases. These cases allowed me to lock up some people who richly deserved a lengthy time out. They also allowed me to leverage very useful information from some of them.
So yes, I support this enforcement effort. Used properly it will make a huge difference in the crime rate.
In my area we have historically had a difficult time getting the Feds to take gun cases, though I do have a recent success story on that front. My recollection is that under Obama's DOJ in a different part of the state which was mentioned in another member's post, the local USA was disinterested in gun cases period despite an agreement between the office I worked for and his office for referrals for prosecution (we'd get maybe one out of every hundred referrals taken up). I don't know if that climate is changed under Trump and Sessions.
In my state it is a crime for a felon to possess a handgun (class E felony, 1-6 years). It is not a crime for them to possess a long gun unless they have a felony drug conviction or a violent felony conviction. The plus side is that, thanks to a recent law change, it is a class B felony (8-30) for a felon with a violent prior and a class C (3-15) felony for a felon with a drug prior, regardless of whether it is a handgun or a long gun. The latter two charges are non-probatable, thankfully. Thanks to our lack of truth in sentencing, however, those big scary numbers get shaved down to a fraction of the actual sentence once in DOC custody.
In my happy recent example from ATF, the individual was on parole for agg assault on a police officer and in possession of a rifle and a handgun plus a significant amount of ammo and a ski mask and was likely on his way to do some gangbanger shit at the time he was caught. The ATF guy I spoke with gave me a realistic estimate of 4-6 years based on his history. Better than the 2.5-3.6 he'd actually do if I got what I wanted. Furthermore, had that law change not occurred last summer, I'd only have him on an E felony for the Glock he threw out the window. I am aware of some rather violent people who were previously let go with AKs in the trunk. In my opinion the long gun thing needs to be changed, but the legislature seems uninterested in taking it up.
By policy we don't get to bargain away things like possession of a handgun in a dangerous felony, which is a happy little non-probatable charge which must run consecutive to whatever underlying dangerous felony we convict them of. My boss takes a dim view of drug dealers with guns.
We're doing large amounts of federal gun cases on our end of the state with our USAO. We're bringing new cases to them on a weekly basis. I've recently been tasked with bring back Project Safe Neighborhoods at my department with the USAO to help increase gun prosecutions even more. They've made a couple of us "firearms expert", so we can testify to the interstate nexus of the firearm with out getting the ATF involved.
However, with our local DA's office, possession of a handgun during a dangerous felony will get dropped every time, along with any other non-probatable charge.
I support gun ownership by law abiding citizens. I also support enforcing the law when someone is a violent felon in possession of a firearm. I do not consider someone who has an armed robbery conviction and is in possession of a firearm to be a “low level offender.” I guess they are in the sense that they are not El Chapo, but if you or your loved is the one who gets shot by them, it will be cold comfort that they were a “low level offender.”
If I understand correctly, the NYT is rabidly anti gun, advocates for more gun laws, but doesn’t want people arrested for illegally possessing guns? Am I missing something or does that make absolutely no sense?
My experience with state prosecutions as a police officer is the following:
1) Felon convicted of robbery, aggravated assaault, etc gets arrested for possesssion of a firearm.
2) The wise D.A. makes the following offer: forfeit the firearm, plead guilty to misdemeanor weapon possession, 11 months/29 days on probation with no jail time.
3) Felon decides that sounds pretty good and takes the deal
4). Not all the time but often enough, while the felon is on probation for the felony charge pled down to a misdemeanor, they shoot, kill or rob someone with a gun. If they had been in jail they would not have been free to do that.
My experience with the feds picking up felon in possession of a firearm cases is that the feds were very serious about prosecuting these cases and the offenders did some real time.
One case that I had go federal was from a domestic violence call. The felon threatened his girlfriend and her 12 year old son with a gun while he was drunk. He would not let them leave the house but the 12 year old managed to run away and call police . The felon had several armed robbery convictions that were 15 to 20 years old. The girlfriend and the 12 year old were both scared shitless. What do you think they would say about this guy being a “low level offender?” He was looking at something like 15 years federal time. It would have been much, much less time at the state level. If prosecuting a guy like that isn’t a priority, when does it become a priority?
Sorry if this seems like a rant.
Last edited by BJJ; 05-09-2018 at 09:09 PM.
My comments have not been approved by my employer and do not necessarily represent the views of my employer. These are my comments, not my employer's.
We used the felon in possession cases to good effect here in the '90s, one of the tools that helped us shut down some very serious criminals.
I am the owner of Agile/Training and Consulting
www.agiletactical.com
It's almost as if they really don't care about making people safer when they spout off about common sense gun reforms, especially if it seems to work really well for certain politically favored in-groups...
All prosecution is local. For better or worse, given the state of our laws, sometimes the best way to put somebody in prison is to put them on probation and call their sentence into execution a few months down the road when they violate.
I should clarify my "we don't get to bargain away..." statement: we have a policy guideline which states that we are not do that. We can deviate from that guideline (and others), but we must have a justifiable written reason. "He won't plead to a to-serve sentence" is not a justifiable reason and will draw attention. We likewise have guidelines for any sale of drugs (must include some jail time, second or subsequent must be a DOC sentence), any crime involving violence with a weapon or a threat of same, and guidelines for various classifications of offenders (Range II or above must be a to-serve sentence even if the range is reduced for bargaining purposes).
Glad to see your people are cooperating on the Federal gun stuff. I will say that in my area I have not personally had to deal with many of them yet, so I don't have much of a basis for comparison apart from the word of more senior prosecutors. The current USA for the area where I once worked is a good man and I believe he'll do things a little different with regards to taking up gun cases.
Reply With Quote