This is to be the first of a series of exhaustive looks at the CCW practices of specific counties.

Ironically, Marin is first because compared to many other counties, they're actually pretty good - others are fighting the Public Records Act Requests tooth and nail.

Still, what we have here in Marin is an entrenched pattern of violations of due process, equal protection and the plain text of California's CCW laws.  Some of it clearly violates Federal law, in addition to state law, and at least in theory is blatant enough that a Federal Grand Jury needs to be involved ASAP.

In California, access to CCW ("Carry Concealed Weapons") permits are "discretionary" on the part of your county's Sheriff, or your PD Chief as a "second option" if you live inside a town's boundries.  The actual CCW issuance process is contained in Penal Code 12050-12054, linked here.

There have been a number of court cases brought by people who've been denied, which resulted to date in two key, binding court decisions.

The first was Salute vs. Pitchess 61 Cal. App. 3d 557 (1976), in which a California appelate court absolutely condemned a practice of restricting CCW to government employees.  The court found that "It is the duty of the sheriff to make such an investigation and determination, on an individual basis, on every application under section 12050" and found that "to refuse to consider the existence of good cause on the part of citizens generally and is an abuse of, and not an exercise of, discretion".

As you'll see, Marin flaunts this regularly.

The Federal 9th Circuit found in Guillory vs. Gates 731 F.2d 1379 (1984) that CCW issuance was subject to scrutiny on the basis of Federal equal protection law, and that people underneath the rank of the actual "top cop" who supported their boss's discrimination could be sued for aiding in the problems.

California's CCW system was created in 1923, as part of a larger set of firearms restrictions, the rest of which was primarily aimed at alien residents.  In People vs. Rappard , 28 Cal.App.3d 302 (Calif. Appelate Court, 1972) the restrictions on alien resident access to arms was gutted as unconstitutional and racist and in due course, the clause in the CCW penal codes restricting CCW to citizens was stripped.  So first problem is that we've established a racist history behind this whole concept - second problem is that there's a citizen-only clause in the Marin Sheriff's policy manual that's illegal as hell.

Finally, CCW records are subject to public review per the California Supreme Court in CBS vs. Block 230 Cal.Rptr. 362 (1986) wherein the court noted the extreme level of "unfettered discretion" given to law enforcement and made the records public specifically to allow scrutiny of various forms of abuse, including corruption and equal protection violations.  This document is a direct result of that court decision, and will confirm the court's worst fears.

I filed a "Public Records Act Request", also known as a PRAR, which is California's version of the better-known Federal Freedom Of Information Act.  California's PRAR law is patterned after the FOIA, are generally constructed in the same manner.

The text of the request I used can be viewed here: http://www.ninehundred.com/~equalccw/superprar.html

I also spoke with various Marin County RKBA activists, including Mr. Michael Harper whose assistance was invaluable as you'll see.  He was given right of review on this document because his highly instructive situation and mistreatment is discussed in detail.

First paragraph, no real problems, although the law itself certainly is.

Second paragraph, starting with the sentence "Notwithstanding this provision...", what we have is proof that all of the Police Chiefs in the county have asked the Sheriff to discriminate against residents of incorporated towns.  First, this is conspiracy to violate equal protection.  Second, it's a case of "legislation by cop", which they have no right to even contemplate - as the Sheriff freely admits, this is not a type of discrimination specified in the permit laws.  Third, it's NOT applied equally, as you'll see.

Third paragraph, we learn that "personal protection, personal convenience, position or job classification alone" will not ensure CCW.  What that really means is that the Sheriff refuses to see equal protection as a factor in all this - despite how anybody else has been treated, he reserves the right to issue to anybody regardless of their circumstances - because every single CCW application is going to fall into one of those categories.

Under the various "criteria", two stand out as illegal:

* The citizenship requirement, see also People vs. Rappard and the fact that such a rule isn't in Penal Codes 12050-54 - last I checked, Sheriff Doyle wasn't a legislator.  Allegedly, he's a cop, although you couldn't tell from his handling of CCW.

* The notation that "anyone previously denied" is unqualified is a horrendous joke.  First, it means that per the Sheriff's policies, anyone who first tries to apply with a PD Chief and gets inevitably denied, cannot then apply with the Sheriff.  Most of the towns issue no permits at all, except for some PD reserves...which is illegal per Salute vs. Pitchess.  So the Sheriff ends up supporting illegality among the towns.

That's not even talking about what happens in other counties.  In 1994, a drunk in Sacramento County was arrested after threatening somebody with a gun.  He turned out to have a CCW permit, and upon being questioned by deputies, freely admitted having purchased the permit through bribery, and named the Sheriff Glen Craig, UnderSheriff (and now Sheriff of that county) Lou Blanas and #3 man in the deparment Moe Bailey as being in on the scandal - see also page 1, page 2, page 3 and page 4 of the resulting police report.  Point is, with evidence of outright corruption in the public eye, this barring of anyone previously denied is downright sick.

Pages 2 through 4 of the policy manual contain no significant problems, at least not where the Sheriff's handling of CCW is concerned.  Those interested can view all four pages of the policy manual linked here.  The biggest shock is that he actually got the fee structure right - that's highly unusual among urban California counties.

I'm going to do something controversial here.  I'm going to show y'all a database printout of all permitholders, including (in some cases) a summary of their "good cause", accurate as of June 25th, 2001.

I'm taking this fairly extreme step because as the Michael Harper case and other evidence shows, it's highly UNlikely that any of this Sheriff's permitholders are "regular folks".

As you go through the printout, notice how lots of people DO score permits from the incorporated towns of San Rafael, Mill Valley and even San Anselmo.  Notice the case of Richard Keith on page 3 - at that time permits were issued yearly (it's now every two years) so when Michael Harper (page 2) was denied on 5/6/99 based on being "outside the Sheriff's jurisdiction", Mr. Keith of San Anselmo was happily packing on a Sheriff-issued CCW, and had been for five months.

What the HELL is going on here?

Understand, this wasn't about Keith having better "good cause" than Harper.  I'm aware of what Mr. Harper's "good cause" consisted of, and it was extremely compelling stuff - so the Sheriff needed to come up with "some other excuse" to deny Mr. Harper, a "peon".

I don't know whether to laugh or cry.

Remember, this isn't about different standards for "good cause", this is a difference in application procedure, what's known in legal circles as a "due process violation", when a government agency doesn't follow the law in handling somebody's situation.  By turning Michael down the way they did, they prevented anybody comparing his "good cause" details with the various elite and cronies who were successful.

Also, notice that gov't-connected people DO NOT need a "good cause", and are judged totally independently of their town of residence.  This is in violation of Salute vs. Pitchess.





The level of preference being shown to government employees, at least to a degree they're willing to admit to on paper, is unusual enough that I asked for clarification.  The letter I got back:

The newest PD Chief in San Anselmo gained an appreciation of how insane a snakepit this entire issue is, and "declared G" - which means he backed completely out of the CCW processing system.

Penal Code 12050(G) allows a PD Chief to "exit the CCW business" and dump the whole process on the Sheriff:

(g) Nothing in this article shall preclude the chief or other head of a municipal police department of any city from entering an agreement with the sheriff of the county in which the city is located for the sheriff to process all applications for licenses, renewals of licenses, and amendments to licenses, pursuant to this article.

Sheriff Doyle didn't like that one bit.  Check out his response:

Spot it yet?  The problem is in the paragraph starting with "Additionally...".  The Sheriff doesn't want to hand out the application forms to San Anselmo residents without doing a check with the Chief first.

But that's not how PC12050(G) (quoted previously) works.  Note the use of the word "all" - once the PD Chief dumps it, that's the last decision on CCW he makes.

But the Sheriff wants to use the San Anselmo Chief as one additional barrier to permit access regardless, which is how all the other towns act.

A Federal Grand Jury must take a closer look at this disaster.  They can do so purely on the basis of equal protection, due process and "rule of law" issues that aren't in the least bit controversial. We could see reforms without even getting into controversial areas of Second Amendment law that would be contrary to current incorrect holdings on that subject in the 9th Circuit.

Law abiding gun owners in Marin are expected to disarm when denied access to CCW permits, yet we now have solid evidence that the entire criminal justice system in the county is engaged in an illegal conspiracy against us, discriminating against us to a degree unimaginable if carried out against any other population.

If law-abiding gun owners who could otherwise qualify for CCW were actually the sort of violent threat that corrupt politicians masquerading as law enforcement describe us as, it would be dangerous to abuse us to this degree.

Instead of lashing out violently, we are absolutely determined to see the rule of law restored in the area of self defense.

The next major step is a Public Records Act lawsuit against Santa Clara County.  They have absolutely stymied Nadja Adolf's PRAR request for CCW data, including the "good cause details" which they're trying to hide.  That and several other clues lead us to believe it's one of the worst CCW misconduct cases in the state.  It's going to take $3,000 to litigate the PRAR lawsuit - Nadja is ready and waiting, the attorney is on board, and all of the evidence we need is gathered.

(For those who don't recall, Nadja was the co-investigator into the MMM investigation previously published on KABA, which Ashcroft took full notice of.  See also the KABA article that has her name on it (and mine) at http://www.keepandbeararms.com/mmm)

If anyone is willing to contribute to this current effort, drop me a line in EMail.  I intend to gather pledges, and arrange funds to be sent directly to the attorney involved, law office of David Beauvais in Berkeley.

When we win in Santa Clara and publish the data from there, per the Public Record Act we'll get all attorney's fees and costs back - next target after that will probably be Sacramento County.

There are 58 counties in this state.  At least 40 handle CCW in a bigoted, biased, illegal and/or corrupt fashion.  We'll hit them one by one with reports at least this detailed, recycling the PRAR lawsuit money with the winnings each time for the next target, until John Ashcroft finally takes notice.

Jim March - jmarch@prodigy.net
Equal Rights for CCW Home Page
http://www.ninehundred.com/~equalccw