Officials say handgun permit law not being enforced

For years, courts across the state have failed to seize the permits and the Department of Safety, which oversees the permits, apparently didn’t notice the laws weren’t enforced. In addition, officials said the department hasn’t instituted a procedure for law enforcement agencies to report the arrests of people with permits, as required by law.

In 1997, the handgun permit law was amended to order the department to create such a procedure.

“Anytime we have a law that’s not being followed, we need to be concerned, and it needs to be checked into,” Sen. Steve Cohen, D-Memphis and co-sponsor of the original handgun permit law in 1994, told The Knoxville News-Sentinel.

The law at that time switched responsibilities for issuing carry permits from local sheriffs to the Department of Safety. The amended law also empowered the courts to ask anyone charged with a felony if they had a handgun permit.

If the suspect was accused of burglary, a felony drug offense or a crime involving violence or the use of a firearm, the law commanded judges to immediately seize the permit and send it to the Department of Safety.

The 1997 law also ordered judges to seize the permit of anyone convicted of a Class A misdemeanor, which included charges such as drunken driving, assault and domestic violence.

However, court administrators in Memphis, Nashville and Knoxville acknowledge they have not followed the law.

“It’s not been done by the judges I’ve talked to, and I talk to judges across the state,” said Knox County General Sessions Court Judge Geoff Emery.

Walt Drapper, chief administrative officer for the criminal court clerk in Davidson County, said he planned to investigate the law, and Roy Turner, chief administrative officer with the Shelby County Criminal Court Clerk’s office, said “we will call this to the attorney general’s attention.”

Emery said one reason judges haven’t complied with the law is because the statute is “very confusing” in the sense that it doesn’t delineate when judges should ask accused felons whether they have a handgun permit.

“Is it at arraignment, the first appearance in court or when they appear before a night judicial commissioner?” Emery asked.

John Harris, executive director of the Tennessee Firearms Association, agrees with Emery. Harris said he helped draft Tennessee’s original permit law, which he said is modeled on the concealed carry laws in Florida.

“What I drafted was a lot simpler than what they’ve adopted,” said Harris, whose organization represents the interests of individuals, business and guns clubs in the Legislature. “I think the gun laws are too complicated in Tennessee.”

In Florida, the Department of Agriculture and Consumer Services, which oversees the handgun permits, runs weekly checks to determine whether permit holders have been arrested, said Susan Harrell, senior section administrator with the department.

Harrell said computers crosscheck databases of permit holders and people arrested statewide. Then the department determines whether the arrest is a disqualifying offense and suspends the permit. Police officers and sheriff’s deputies also regularly seize permits upon the arrest of a permit holder, she said.

In Nashville, Police Department spokesman Don Aaron confirmed officers are directed to seize the handgun permits of people charged with disqualifying offenses.

“Our officers have been told there are no forms to complete, but if they seize a permit for a felony arrest, they’re supposed to send it and a copy of the arrest report to the Department of Safety,” Aaron said.

Meanwhile, Knoxville Police Department spokesman Darrell DeBusk said officers don’t seize the permits and don’t report the arrests of permit holders to the Department of Safety, saying “it’s the courts’ responsibility.”

“We can’t find any regulations enacted by the Department of Safety regarding the reporting (of arrested permit holders) and we’re not aware of any such reporting requested by the Department of Safety,” DeBusk said.

Safety Department spokeswoman Melissa McDonald said Safety Commissioner Fred Phillips was unaware police agencies had not been reporting the arrests of permit holders, nor did he realize courts statewide hadn’t been seizing permits of accused felons.

“He was not aware of it and would like to look at it to determine if it needs more attention,” McDonald said.

Meanwhile, Sue Allison, spokeswoman for the state court system, said judges statewide will be informed of the 1997 handgun carry permit law provisions next month at a judicial conference.

“If we had been aware of it, or if the Department of Safety had made us aware of it, we would have already addressed it,” Allison said.