As Many As One Million Armed New Yorkers Are About To Break The Law | Homestead Security | Forums

I need to call my uncle and see whats up with him

This year April 15 is more than the tax deadline for an estimated one million New York State residents. It’s also the deadline to register “assault weapons” and “high-capacity” magazines. If they don’t, they’ll begin living outside the law. A lot of them have decided to do just that. They’ve decided to practice civil disobedience even though failure to register an “assault weapon” by the deadline is punishable as a “class A misdemeanor,” which means a maximum sentence of one year in prison.

I put “assault weapon” and “high-capacity” in quotes because their definitions vary by state—they’re political terms. In New York State, the SAFE Act passed by the legislature and signed by Governor Andrew Cuomo in January 2013, uses an expansive and elaborate definition of “assault weapon” that includes a lot more than AR-15s. Now even a semiautomatic Remington Model 1100 shotgun—a popular shotgun first made in 1963 that is used by millions of hunters and skeet shooters—is an “assault weapon” in New York State if the shotgun has a pistol grip. Many other commonly owned pistols, shotguns and rifles are also now labeled “assault weapons” in New York State.

When I asked the New York State Police how many New York gun owners had registered the guns they own that now fit somewhere into the state’s expansive “assault weapons” category the state responded: “New York State Police cannot release information related to the registration of assault weapons including the number of assault weapons registered. Those records you seek are derived from information collected for the State Police database and are, therefore, exempt from disclosure.”

This is the same dilemma Connecticut gun owners found themselves in at the end of 2013. As of December 31, 2013, according to Lt. J. Paul Vance of the Connecticut State Police,  the state had received 41,347 applications to register “assault weapons” and 36,932 applications to register “high-capacity” magazines. That means that more than 300,000 Connecticut residents decided not to register their “assault weapons,” moved them out of state, or sold them.

The numbers of gun owners who might still have “assault weapons” in New York and Connecticut are not guesses. The National Shooting Sports Foundation (NSSF), the trade association for firearms manufacturers, estimates there are likely 350,000 residents of Connecticut who had now banned “assault weapons” as of late 2013. The NSSF says, “The 350,000 number is a conservative estimate based on numerous surveys, consumer purchases, NICS background check data and also private-party transactions.” The NSSF used the same criteria to estimate that at least one million New York residents had “assault weapons” the state banned the sale of and demanded that owners register with the police.

The next question is what the states will do about all those gun owners who now might be living outside the law. Will the state police seek search warrants? Connecticut’s Department of Emergency Services and Public Protection (DESPP) has been using a “Sale or Transfer of All Firearms” form at the retail level that acts as a de facto registration, as it requires that gun sales, along with make, model, serial number and the buyer’s information to be reported to the DESPP and the police. As a result, the CSP has information on which residents might have an unregistered firearm the state considers an “assault weapon.” When I asked if the CSP would use late-registration applications to obtain warrants to seize “assault weapons” Lt. Vance told me, “We don’t make the laws our legislature has that responsibility.” In New York, many sheriffs departments have said they won’t enforce this law.

http://www.forbes.co.....k-the-law/