80% of domestic abusers ordered to surrender guns in Kitsap County ignored it

[NewsVine_Mariyam]

80% of domestic abusers ordered to surrender guns in Kitsap County ignored it

Hundreds of domestic abusers are ordered by the court to surrender their guns, but a KING 5 investigation finds that only a small percentage comply.



Author: Chris Ingalls

Published: 6:56 PM PDT May 4, 2018

Updated: 1:30 PM PDT May 5, 2018


Twenty-eight days passed after Heather Kelso was granted a protection order against her abusive ex-boyfriend to the night he pointed a gun at her and shot her in each leg and twice in the face.

He used the same Smith and Wesson 9mm handgun that Kelso had listed in her protection order. It was also a gun her boyfriend was legally barred from possessing once he was served with the protection order.

...
More than three years after Heather Kelso’s murder, Kitsap County’s criminal justice system is still failing to get guns out of the hands of accused domestic abusers, even though that’s what is required by Washington law.

The KING 5 Investigators analyzed 215 “weapons surrender” orders filed in Kitsap County Superior Court in 2017. The data shows a stunning lack of compliance – 80 percent of people served with protection orders in the county did not respond after being served with a weapons surrender order signed by a judge. Only 19 percent complied with such orders and surrendered their guns or signed a form swearing that they did not possess firearms.
​

WA State has a new "Extreme Risk Protection Order" which allows the police among other individuals close to the subject of the order, to remove their legal access to firearms. The Seattle PD has utilized this order to remove weapons from "at-risk" individuals but one of the first cases I heard of was from an individual who openly carries. It was later revealed that he wasn't targeted because of the open carry issue but because he had previously failed to comply with an order to surrender his weapons.
How Seattle is using ERPO laws to remove guns from at-risk people

 

[Crepitus]

If they wee ordered, and didn't, arrest them.

 

[NewsVine_Mariyam]

If they wee ordered, and didn't, arrest them.

For violation of a court order? I never even thought of that as an option, probably because that's not something they generally do. Good point though, thank you.

 

[QuickHitCurepon]

If the police are going after someone they don't trust who has a gun, they would often like to call in SWAT... or they can ignore it.

 

[QuickHitCurepon]

They have to turn them in at the police station? A lot of people are probably afraid they will get shot somehow trying to do that.

 

[LuckyDuck]

I say, let the carnage begin.