by Sarah Mouncey
Dear Loveland Magazine Readers,
Over the weekend we were alerted that the Ohio House is planning to vote on an alarming gun bill as early as tomorrow.
Sarah Mouncey is the Ohio Chapter Leader of Moms Demand Action for Gun Sense in America
Less than a week after a person armed with a gun shot and killed 12 people at a bar in California, our lawmakers are gearing up to make far-reaching changes to our state’s gun laws. And they’re trying to move quickly to force through this dangerous bill before the legislative session ends next month.
HB 228 would:
- Upend centuries of self-defense law by making Ohio a Stand Your Ground state;
- Make it easy for people, including some violent criminals, to carry hidden, loaded guns in public without a permit or safety training;
- Allow out-of-state special interest groups to sue Ohio cities and towns for attempting to enact or enforce local solutions to gun violence.
For months, volunteers like you and me have been writing, calling and making in-person visits to lawmakers to urge them to vote against HB 228, but pressure from the gun lobby is forcing this bill to come to a vote before the legislative session ends in just a few weeks.
We need to get loud and we need to do it quickly.
Thanks for all that you do.
Here are some facts about the bill:
https://www.buckeyefirearms.org/house-bill-228-passes-ohio-house-updated-vote-tallies
The concealed carry modernization bill has been debated extensively for over a year, and key provisions have been discussed for almost eight years in the legislature.
If enacted, the bill would:
Correct Ohio law on burden of proof. Currently the Federal Government, U.S. territories, and 49 states have the burden of proving someone committed a crime to convict them and deny them their rights. The same is true in Ohio, in almost every situation. This change simply makes Ohio like every other state, and prosecution of someone who wrongly claims self-defense like every other criminal prosecution. Innocent until proven guilty.
Eliminate “duty to retreat” from some sections of code. In Ohio and many other states, a person attacked in their home or car may defend their life. But in Ohio there are “duties” of the crime victim if they are in their own driveway between their home and car. Eliminating the “duty to retreat” will make the standard for defending one’s life uniform and not dependent on where the victim happens to be when they are attacked. It is important to note that it does not change the standard of what constitutes a deadly force threat or what constitutes a legal use of deadly force in self-defense or defense of another.
Add a requirement that hands must be in plain sight “unless impractical” for license holders during an official stop by police. There are times when complying with officer’s instructions and the law are impossible to do at the same time.
Eliminate the requirement of places that allow concealed carry to post signs prohibiting concealed carry.
Prohibit public housing from denying tenants their right to lawfully-possessed firearms.
Provide for a safe harbor for a spouse or other unlicensed individual driving a car that another person has left a firearm in.
Eliminate the requirement for license holders to carry a second form of ID while in possession of a firearm.
Increase penalties for people illegally buying a gun to sell to a prohibited person.
Modernize Ohio’s definition of a shotgun to match Federal law and allow for possession of guns that are specifically approved by BATFE (such as the Mossberg Shockwave).
Lovelandmagazine.com, you should fact check submissions like this before publishing them. The bill will NOT allow violent criminals to carry guns. Biased publishers and flat out lies are fake news.