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Florida\u2019s Attorney General is making the case that non-violent felons should not have their right to own a gun taken away.<\/p>\n
In Florida, and nearly everywhere else in the United States<\/a>, when a person is convicted of a felony they lose their Second Amendment rights.<\/p>\n In Florida, that suspension is permanent, short of being granted clemency, which is a process that can take years or even decades.<\/p>\n Second Amendment Attorney James Phillips argued he often sees cases where the penalty simply seems too harsh.<\/p>\n \u201cBack in the 70\u2019s when they were 19 years old, they get in trouble for something that was deemed a felony charge and then they haven\u2019t been in trouble since,\u201d said Phillips. \u201dYou know, and for someone like that to permanently be banned from possessing a firearm, a right that our constitution provides us in order to defend ourselves, I think it\u2019s just too extreme.\u201d<\/p>\n And now Florida Attorney General James Uthmeier is making the case it\u2019s unconstitutional to suspend non-violent felons\u2019 firearm rights.<\/p>\n Uthmeier laid out his argument in a brief filed in a case<\/a> involving a man who lost his right to bear arms after being caught possessing a firearm without a license in another state.<\/p>\n In the brief, Uthmeier argued laws disarming nonviolent felons are \u201cnot consistent with the Nation\u2019s historical tradition of firearm regulation\u201d.<\/p>\n Uthmeier explained he believes drug offenses should still count as violent felonies as the drug trade is \u201cnotoriously violent\u201d.<\/p>\n \u201cTo do a blanket allowance of gun ownership without there being some sort of process of oversight is very concerning from a public safety perspective,\u201d State Representative Anna Eskamani (D-Orlando) said.<\/p>\n Eskamani argued Uthmeier is once again attempting to circumvent the legislature to loosen Florida\u2019s gun laws.<\/p>\n Recently, Uthmeier intervened in a case dealing with open carry of firearms and argued against the state\u2019s open carry prohibition.<\/p>\n As a result, a state appeals court declared the state\u2019s open carry ban unconstitutional<\/a>, which led to a statewide policy shift.<\/p>\n \u201cI think it\u2019s really important for the legislature to be the body that defines laws and the executive branch to enforce them, not to leverage their position to continuously change them,\u201d Eskamani said.<\/p>\n Even if Uthmeier succeeds in overturning the state law, the issue wouldn\u2019t be fully settled.<\/p>\n Federal law also suspends felons\u2019 Second Amendment rights, violent and nonviolent alike.<\/p>\n But Criminal Defense Attorney Chris Carson argued the federal government could turn a blind eye if Florida were to move in another direction, as it does in states that have legalized marijuana.<\/p>\n \u201cBecause there would just be a lot of volume and a lot going on. So, I think it would, not that it would never happen, but it just makes it less likely,\u201d Carson said.<\/p>\n The Florida Prosecuting Attorney\u2019s Association filed a brief opposing the AG\u2019s view<\/a> on suspending non-violent felons\u2019 gun rights.<\/p>\n The group represents 20 State Attorneys in Florida.<\/p>\n >>> STREAM ACTION NEWS JAX LIVE <<<<\/a><\/p>\n [DOWNLOAD: Free Action News Jax app for alerts as news breaks<\/a>]<\/p>\n [SIGN UP: Action News Jax Daily Headlines Newsletter<\/a>] <\/p>\n Click here<\/a> to download the free Action News Jax news and weather apps, click here<\/a> to download the Action News Jax Now app for your smart TV and click here<\/a> to stream Action News Jax live.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Florida\u2019s Attorney General is making the case that non-violent felons should not have their right to own a…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":175277,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[8232,97093,28,7912,30,29,97091,4260,97092,97090,97094],"class_list":{"0":"post-212252","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-florida","8":"tag-attorney-general","9":"tag-firearm-rights","10":"tag-florida","11":"tag-florida-attorney-general","12":"tag-florida-headlines","13":"tag-florida-news","14":"tag-james-phillips","15":"tag-james-uthmeier","16":"tag-non-violent","17":"tag-second-amendment-rights","18":"tag-violent-felonies"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/212252","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=212252"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/212252\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/175277"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=212252"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=212252"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=212252"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}