Saturday, June 28, 1997
Local law enforcers plan to continue background
checks
By TANYA EISERER / Abilene Reporter-News
Local law enforcement agencies will continue performing criminal
background checks for prospective handgun buyers despite Friday's
Supreme Court decision.
The Supreme Court ruled unconstitutional a provision in the
Brady gun-control law mandating that local police determine the
suitability of buyers to own handguns.
"It's in the best interest of the law itself and the community
for us to continue," said Abilene police Chief Melvin Martin.
The Taylor County Sheriff's Office also will voluntarily keep
running the background checks, Sheriff Jack Dieken said.
"We probably have a duty to be aware of who is carrying
weapons," Dieken said. "It is a service to the community
and it's not causing us any undue labor problems. I would rather
be in the position to deny an applicant for good cause than not
to scrutinize any applicants and have something tragic happen."
Martin added that he hopes that other law enforcement agencies
will also opt to continue checking backgrounds for handgun sales.
"There's still a federal law that mandates a check must
be run before a federally registered dealer makes a sale,"
Martin said. "And if we don't do it, I don't know who will.
It would really back things up if we didn't."
However, both Martin and Dieken agreed that the Supreme Court's
decision was probably valid constitutionally, and also probably
good.
"Each state can apply the handgun laws as they see fit,"
said Dieken, who believes that shifting the power back to the
states is appropriate. "The key issue is the state's ability
to make their own law pertaining to handguns."
The police and sheriff's departments have been performing background
checks since the Brady Law became effective in 1994.
Only about one percent of the 1,400-1,500 background checks
that Abilene police run each year are rejected, said Sgt. Casey
Bradshaw.
Bradshaw, who spends a couple of hours a day on the task, checks
local records, the National Crime Information Center and the Texas
Crime Information Center for felony or domestic violence convictions.
Dieken said the sheriff's department runs about 500 background
checks a year, and only 15 applications have been denied to date.
"Most of them were denied because the applicants indicated
that they had not been convicted of a felony or any other crime
when they had," he said.
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Abilene Reporter-News / Texnews / E.W. Scripps Publications
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