Fact: California has an automated system for checking the criminal histories of handgun and assault weapon buyers to determine if they’re eligible to own one. The aforementioned $19 fee pays for the background checks.
Fact: Every day, 15 to 20 gun owners in California – people who were eligible to own a gun when they bought one – are convicted of a crime that makes them subsequently ineligible to own one. Today, the total number of armed “prohibited” persons in California exceeds 19,000, and they’re estimated to possess more than 34,000 handguns and 1,590 assault weapons.
Fact: State and local law enforcement agencies don’t have the monetary resources to go around collecting guns from people who were OK when they bought one but became “not OK” later.
Supervisor Mike Antonovich and a number of state lawmakers see a solution: Use some of the money in the state’s “Dealer’s Record of Sale” account to cut the backlog. Free up some of the fees collected on the sale of assault weapons (AR-15 series and all AK series weapons) and give it to law enforcement for the specific purpose of taking guns away from newly minted criminals.
On Tuesday, Antonovich will ask his fellow supervisors to get behind a state Senate bill that would do just that. The bill, SB 140, was introduced late last month by Democrats Mark Leno of San Francisco and Darrell Steinberg of Sacramento.
“This is an example of enhanced enforcement of existing gun control efforts to protect public safety and avoid a major tragedy in our communities,” Antonovich said in his board motion.
Antonovich: Disarm Once-Legal Gun Owners Who've Become Criminals
