imported post
SGT Jensen wrote:
swillden wrote:
It's not illegal to carry in a courthouse (the law allows them to establish secure areas, but Utah courthouses don't do it), but the courts will hold you in contempt if you do. However, it's not hard to remember this rule, because the police at the door with the metal detector and x-ray machine will remind you to take your gun back to your car
What is your opinion on this. I understand that the Legislature has given Courts of Record to regulate firearm. What about Justice Courts? How do you think it would play out if somebody challenged their "secure area" and fought it in the legal system?
I think they'd lose.
For a full understanding of the issue, read this:
http://www.utahbar.org/barjournal2000/html/june_july_2003_11.html
For those who don't want to read the whole Utah Bar Journal article, I'll summarize.
The courts aren't blithely ignoring the requirement for signs and lockers at courthouse secure areas (yes, this does relate to judicial courts; I'll get there). In fact, they started addressing the issue as soon as the bill that established those requirements was proposed, well before it passed.
The Utah State Judicial Council, which is a group established by law to set up administrative rules for Utah courts (all of them, courts of record and judicial courts), was concerned that it would be impractical to abide by the requirements of the law, and that if they didn't abide by the requirements that they might have to choose not to have "secure areas".
The Utah Sixth District court issued a general order in May, 2002 recommending that courts
not establish secure areas as provided by the legislature. At all! Instead, the order included a finding that providing security for court operations is a "core or essential" function of the authority of the courts.
What does that matter?
Well, under Utah's constitution, the three branches of the government (executive, legislative and judicial) are equal. They have interactions, and in some areas one branch gets to make decisions which another branch must abide by, but no branch is wholly subservient to any other. This is a key principle of the system of checks and balances.
It was established in a 1902 ruling (
Young v. Salt Lake City) that where the "core or essential" functions of one branch overlap with the authority of another branch, the one branch can't tell the other what to do. In this case, if providing security is a "core or essential" function of the judicial branch, then the legislature
does not have the authority to tell the judiciary how to do its job.
Therefore, the 2002 order recommended that the statutory secure area provisions provided by the legislature not be used and that, instead, the courts use their own authority to define, implement and enforce secure areas. Enforcement was to be done through the court's contempt power.
The Judicial Council endorsed the 2002 order and it became the official policy for all courthouses in the state. Each courthouse has a Local Security Plan which is defined by the local judges, under the statewide guidelines.
The question of whether or not security is a "core or essential" function has not been taken to the Utah Supreme Court, but it's pretty reasonable to expect that the judges there would agree with their fellows on the council. If that ever happens, then the matter will be completely settled.
So, the current state of affairs is that no courthouse in the state has a "secure area" as defined by 76-8-311.1, so it's not a
crime to carry there, but if you did you'd be jailed for contempt of court. As a practical matter, you'd have a hard time getting past the cops with their metal detectors and x-ray machines.
