L.A. County Carry Licenses Reserved for the Well-Connected

[txradioguy]

With 42 states and the District of Columbia now recognizing the Right-to-Carry, California’s retrograde may-issue Carry Concealed Weapon licensing regime is atypical. However, a recent state audit of three of California’s CCW license issuing authorities shows that Los Angeles County does operate much like another large jurisdiction, New York City, when it comes to granting licenses. That is, licenses are reserved for the well-connected and officials don’t bother to follow the rules when issuing them . . .

Under California law, a sheriff of a county may issue a CCW license to an applicant upon receiving proof,
(1) The applicant is of good moral character.
(2) Good cause exists for issuance of the license.
(3) The applicant is a resident of the county or a city within the county, or the applicant’s principal place of employment or business is in the county or a city within the county and the applicant spends a substantial period of time in that place of employment or business.
(4) The applicant has completed a course of training as described in Section 26165.
Statute does not further define “good moral character” or “good case,” which gives a local sheriff’s department significant discretion to determine the criteria necessary to acquire a permit in their jurisdiction.

Los Angeles County has a written Concealed Weapons Licensing Policy that elaborates on what the sheriff’s department considers sufficient “good cause” to merit a license. The policy states,

good cause shall exist only if there is convincing evidence of a clear and present danger to life, or of great bodily harm to the applicant, his spouse, or dependent child, which cannot be adequately dealt with by existing law enforcement resources, and which danger cannot be reasonably avoided by alternative measures, and which danger would be significantly mitigated by the applicant’s carrying of a concealed firearm.

Moreover, the policy makes clear that “No position or job classification in itself shall constitute good cause for the issuance, or for the denial, of a CCW license.”

It is exceedingly difficult for a law-abiding citizen to meet Los Angeles County’s criteria for a CCW license. Los Angeles County has issued 197 licenses to its 10.2 million residents. This works out to about 1 license for every 50,000 residents.

The audit, conducted by the California State Auditor, researched samples of 25 CCW licenses issued by three sheriff’s departments, Los Angeles County, Sacramento County, and San Diego County.

For Los Angeles, the auditors concluded that the county “did not completely adhere to its policies when issuing any of the 25 CCW licenses we reviewed.” The researchers also determined, “Los Angeles issued all but one of these licenses without the level of documentation it expects to demonstrate that the applicant has met the good cause requirement.”


http://www.thetruthaboutguns.com/2017/12/robert-farago/nra-ila-l-a-county-carry-licenses-reserved-for-the-well-connected/