State wide "training day" needed to stop ongoing Keystone Cop gun grabs!

[Mike]

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OpenCarry.org Press Release - May 20, 2008
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FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE[1]
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OpenCarry.org calls for a state-wide police “training day” to stop ongoing Keystone Cop gun grabs!

Dickson City, PA police report on the Dickson Dozen round-up “sounds like a bad episode of Hogan’s Heroes” says Allentown, PA lawyer Brian Collins

Apparently Dickson City Police Chief and Lackawanna County ADA did not get the memo: Rep. Cruz’s gun registration bill (HB 760) was laughed out of Harrisburg last year

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The police report is out. Read it at http://scrantontimestribune.com/proj...licereport.pdf.

And gun owner discussion threads are ablaze at http://opencarry.mywowbb.com/forum46/11071.html & http://www.pafoa.org/forum/news-123/...n-dispute.html.

And based upon this report, and the analysis by the Scranton Times-tribune’s Charles Schillinger at http://www.thetimes-tribune.com/site...d=590572&rfi=8 (“Report shows confusion on gun dispute”) it’s not lookin’ good for Dickson City Police Chief Stadniski nor Lackawanna County Assistant Attorney Kolcharno who jointly ordered the confiscation of lawfully owned handguns from PA residents Rich Banks and Roger Mccarren. Banks’ gun has not yet been returned to him, and Mccarren’s gun was inexplicably given by police to another citizen who did NOT own the gun.

The fact that neither the police nor the ADA have stepped up the plate and come clean to admit that there is no gun registration in PA and that no law limits gun carry to guns somehow “linked” in police databases to the carrier indicates that Stadniski & Kolcharno and, from recent Internet chatter about other similar police gun grabs around the Keystone State, many police officers and DAs across PA must have missed the memo – i.e., that Rep. Cruz’s gun registration bill (HB 760) was laughed out of Harrisburg last year![2]

OpenCarry.org therefore calls on Governor Rendell to declare a state wide “training day” for police and DAs to prevent any more Keystone Cop gun confiscations.

For starters, every police officer and DA should be required to sign a statement that they have read 18 Pa.C.S § 6111.4 which provides that “[n]otwithstanding any section of this chapter to the contrary, nothing in this chapter shall be construed to allow any govern*ment or law enforcement agency or any agent thereof to create, maintain or operate any registry of firearm ownership within this Commonwealth.” Further, the law enforcement community must be made to understand that carriage of a handgun is not unlawful even if the PA State Police record of sale database happens to indicate that at one point in the past life of the handgun it was transferred to person other than the current possessor. Finally, the police and DAs need to acknowledge that absent reasonable suspicion of a crime, they have no right to even temporarily seize guns to check serial numbers any more than they may lawfully demand to check people’s cell phone SIM card serial numbers.

NOTE: The Keystone Cops’ gun grabs in Dickson City will be the topic of Alex Jones’ nation-wide radio/short wave show on http://www.infowars.com from 1-4 PM East Coast Time. Guests will include Pennsylvania Firearm Owner Association member Bill Grumbine speaking on the Dickson Dozen police round up.

John Pierce/Mike Stollenwerk

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Contact anytime on gun stories:
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Mike Stollenwerk
Mr. Stollenwerk is a lifelong legal resident of Lancaster County, PA. In 2006, Stollenwerk prevailed in a federal lawsuit against the Pennsylvania State Police to quash their unlawful demands for social security number disclosure from gun purchasers and License to Carry Firearms applicants. Stollenwerk v. Miller, 2006 WL 463393 (E.D. Pa. 2006).
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John Pierce
Mr. Pierce is an IT professional and works for an Allentown, PA area firm.
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http://www.OpenCarry.org
A national pro-gun Internet community with more than 5,700 registered
members
News media reports citing OpenCarry.org's perspective:
http://opencarry.mywowbb.com/forum63
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[1] See previous press release focusing on the unlawful police detention, searches, and arrests of the Dickson Dozen at http://opencarry.mywowbb.com/forum46/10755.html, and summary of last week’s Dickson City borough council meeting at http://opencarry.mywowbb.com/forum46/10896.html.


[2] See e.g., Tom Mitchell, Official says gun bill doomed, Leader Times, April 13, 2007, available at http://www.pittsburghlive.com/x/lead...s_502548.html; Brad Bumstead, Extreme gun control, Pittsburgh Tribune Review, April 22, 2007, available at http://www.pittsburghlive.com/x/pitt.../s_503956.html.

[Damage control]

Great job Mike!


DC

[Evolution]

This police report amazes me. There are numerous incriminating statements in this "official document". A lawsuit should be as easy as pie.