felons and shot guns

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my sister lives in coupville with her husband who is a convicted felon. my sister is a good girl but scared of guns. last night she seen a male walking around her house and she got scared. she asked me if she could have a shot gun in the house or a pistol for protection even though he is not allowed to have any. I tried to look up the laws on this stuff and could not find anything on it so i decided to come here and ask all you smart people about it.

thank you

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blowfish852252000 wrote:

my sister lives in coupville with her husband who is a convicted felon. my sister is a good girl but scared of guns. last night she seen a male walking around her house and she got scared. she asked me if she could have a shot gun in the house or a pistol for protection even though he is not allowed to have any. I tried to look up the laws on this stuff and could not find anything on it so i decided to come here and ask all you smart people about it.

thank you

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No.



http://www.thenewstribune.com/2010/01/08/1020614/man-convicted-for-wifes-firearms.html

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gogodawgs wrote:

blowfish852252000 wrote:

my sister lives in coupville with her husband who is a convicted felon. my sister is a good girl but scared of guns. last night she seen a male walking around her house and she got scared. she asked me if she could have a shot gun in the house or a pistol for protection even though he is not allowed to have any. I tried to look up the laws on this stuff and could not find anything on it so i decided to come here and ask all you smart people about it.

thank you

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No.



http://www.thenewstribune.com/2010/01/08/1020614/man-convicted-for-wifes-firearms.html

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Which should be a good baseline for a lawsuit to overturn that ridiculous restriction.

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NavyLT is correct as I understand it.

My step son got into some trouble several years ago and got a felony rap. After a year he got out. Because he was coming to live with my wife and I the parole officers had to inspect our home. They showed up with vests and guns to interview us .

My first question was my concern with my firearms under the same roof. The officer had no problem at all with firearms being in the home as long as my step son had no access to them. He did not even care where or how they were stored. He just took my word for it.

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NavyLT wrote:

gogodawgs wrote:

blowfish852252000 wrote:

my sister lives in coupville with her husband who is a convicted felon. my sister is a good girl but scared of guns. last night she seen a male walking around her house and she got scared. she asked me if she could have a shot gun in the house or a pistol for protection even though he is not allowed to have any. I tried to look up the laws on this stuff and could not find anything on it so i decided to come here and ask all you smart people about it.

thank you

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No.



http://www.thenewstribune.com/2010/01/08/1020614/man-convicted-for-wifes-firearms.html

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The answer to the OP's question is YES. Notice this about the case:

“What convinced us is that he admitted he took the police to the guns,” said juror Darci Baker-Spicer of Bremerton.

The felon husband of the OP cannot have ACCESS or POSSESSION of the firearms. If the firearms are kept either in a safe that the felon does not have the combination to or the firearms are in the actual possession and under the control of the wife, as in the wife is carrying them in her hand or in a holster on her person, then there is no law broken.

And, under no circumstances, allow police entry into the safe where the firearms are stored.

And, in relation to the Groves' case, notice this from his own motion to dismiss the charges:
http://media.kitsapsun.com/media/static/Groves_motion_to_dismiss_.tif

"On November 28, 2008, the defendant, Mr. Luke Groves contacted law enforcement when he returned to his home in Bremerton and found the window on his front door broken. He reported the he believed he may have interrupted a burglary. When officers from the Bremerton Police Department arrived and walked through the residence, Mr. Groves informed them that he had made sure that his guns were still there."

For instance, suppose you are giving a co-worker a ride to somewhere because their car is getting repaired and you are carrying your gun. The co-worker turns out to be a felon that you did know about. Are you guilty of providing a gun to a felon and are they guilty of possession of a firearm? Or, how about the guy behind you in the checkout line at Wal Mart? If the mere presence of a gun near a felon constituted possession, then we would have to ask every person who came within arm's reach of us, while we are carrying, if they are a felon or not.

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I would have to say yes and no (leave it to a lawyer ). I agree with LT that the sister can be in possession of a firearm and not get her felon husband in trouble. Possession in the law, however, is not necessarily exclusive and it also may be actual or constructive.

Actual possession is easy - it's in your hand or in your pocket or otherwise on your person, e.g. in a holster on your belt. Presumably the felon husband won't put himself in that position. The issue then becomes constructive possession which in the criminal law is defined as having "dominion and control". The odd word there is "dominion" and the pattern jury instructions (WPIC 133.52 which refers to WPIC 50.03 if you want to look them up) do not define it. The comments do say that the phrase should be regarded as a single term of art and not as two separate words. It also suggests that it could be defined as the power or authority to determine what happens to the item. Simply being in the same room or car with something does not give you constructive possession of it, even if you know it is there.

So, the firearm locked in the sister's safe to which the felon husband does not have the combination or key should do the trick, preventing both actual and constructive possession.

The harder question is whether the sister can have a firearm that is readily accessible for defensive purposes without causing a problem and that's where my "no" arises, given the scenario provided. Unless she is going to carry it constantly on her person, which is unlikely since we're talking about a shotgun, she's going to have to have it locked away and that will likely render it useless in an emergency.

I guess my bottom line, for what my $.02 is worth, is legally, yes but practically, not so much. :banghead:

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What crime could the sister be charged with? Complicity? I don't think so.

She can have a gun, with impunity, whether it is locked up or not. Her husband is the one who could get into trouble.

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well her husband is a dumb@ss any way but thank you every one for input i will tell her just to program 911 in to the phone and hopefully the police show up in time. hope the island county sherriff response time better than that of bellinghams

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blowfish852252000 wrote:

well her husband is a dumb@ss any way but thank you every one for input i will tell her just to program 911 in to the phone and hopefully the police show up in time. hope the island county sherriff response time better than that of bellinghams

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I wouldn't count on the 911 response time to be any better on Whidbey than it is up north. My parents live on Strawberry Point, and when I was 16, I had an AVM rupture. It was faster for my dad to load me into the car and drive to the hospital in Coupeville so they could get me a helo than it was to wait for an ambulance to take me there so the helo could take me to Harborview.

I know, not the same set of circumstances, but still potentially life threatening.