LA sheriff clashes with county lawyer over closing gun shops

[sarisataka]

LA sheriff clashes with county lawyer over closing gun shops

The Los Angeles County sheriff reversed his own decision Tuesday to order deputies to make sure gun shops were closed during the coronavirus crisis after the county's top lawyer said the shops could be open.

Los Angeles, the nation’s largest county with 10 million residents, enacted a stay-at-home order last week that required all nonessential businesses to close to slow the spread of the virus.

Sheriff Alex Villanueva had said gun stores were not essential businesses and they had been selling to the public through a “loophole” allowing them to stay open, many attracting long lines of customers.

But the county order — and an executive order from Gov. Gavin Newsom — does not specifically mention gun shops, prompting the Los Angeles County counsel's office to issue a statement hours later on Tuesday saying it has “opined that gun stores qualify as essential businesses.”

https://finance.yahoo.com/news/los-angeles-sheriff-gun-shops-223914509.html

A few issues:
-first, the Constitutional one, can all locations that directly relates to an enumerated right be ordered closed as non-essential? If such an order applies to gun sales woul it not also then potentially be possible to be applied to other rights i.e. order all churches and/ or media closed as "non-essential"?

-regardless of what the business is, why is it being left to law enforcement to decide what is or is not an essential business?
-if the county attorney has declared a business is essential, how is the sheriff free to ignore that and order a business closed anyway?

[lark]

1. Sheriff is an asshole trumper who just follows the laws he likes

Like all trumpers, he supports rw criminality as long as it fits his beliefs.

[sarisataka]

2. Strange that he would want to close gun shops

Is he like Clarke but just anti-gun (at least for covilians)

[sanatanadharma]

3. Second Amendment does not guarantee gun stores

One may have the right to a gun.
Communities have the right to allow, disallow or regulate businesses.

Ya'all can get your umpteenth gun later. Suck it up snowflake 2nd-Amendment gun-humpers.

Remember, as you gather your supplies needed to kill people, the sheriff is the highest law in the land.
Or so many gun worshippers claim.

No forum members were harmed in the making of this message.

[DashOneBravo]

5. I don't know if the gungeon will recover

sarisataka will probably quit the internet

[sarisataka]

8. I am shaken

But will endeavor to carry on

[discntnt_irny_srcsm]

6. There are three ways to obtain a gun and...

...according to SCOTUS the RKBA is a right of individuals. Since it is impossible to keep and bear without first obtaining, which do you think embraces Democratic ideals? Here's the options:
First is to buy one at a licensed store from a licensed operator. These are easiest to regulate and audit.
Second is buy one from a friend or just a guy who placed an ad on the web. Regulation here depends on the individuals.
Third is to steal one or get one from someone who is breaking the law by selling it.

Eliminating the first option adds to those taking options two and three. Learn from history, from Prohibition. Arms are an enumerated right, alcohol is not.

[sarisataka]

7. Your concern for my situation is touching

But I have considered my needs at this time and determined I do not need to purchase an umpteenth gun nor do I need any more ammunition than I currently have. Even if I did, I would not travel several days to LA county to make such purchases.

I am inferring several points from your response:
- communities may regulate and even prohibit businesses. I agree with this to a point. I do not think communities may entirely prohibit businesses that are protected by the Constitution or SCOTUS ruling, abortion clinics for example

- law enforcement may, in the absence of community regulations, decide on their own which businesses must close. Any business not specifically named as essential by order may be allowed to operate or not at the whim of the local law enforcement chief.

- you are in agreement that sheriff's are able to disregard higher authority in their position as the highest level of law enforcement in their domain.

- lastly, though the Constitution may guarantee a right, that guarantee does not extend to the means to exercise that right. For example the 1st Amendment prohibits Congress from abridging the freedom of the press, but this does not mean a sheriff needs to allow a newspaper to print or distribute its papers, or by extension he may deem a television station's studio and transmitter facility to be "non-essential" and order them closed.

Please elaborate if I have drawn any incorrect conclusions.

[sanatanadharma]

10. Infer what you wish

I have no need to stop you. Everyone has the ability and perhaps right to be wrong as long as no one else is harmed.

I totally disagree with the 'sheriff is sovereign' idea that seems to be supported (nearly) exclusively by gun lovers.

[discntnt_irny_srcsm]

11. "sovereign":

-- one possessing or held to possess supreme political power or sovereignty

Individuals are sovereign except in the sense

"...That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed..."

[sarisataka]

12. The irony here

Is that I agree the sheriff is not sovereign. Yet that is the role the LA sheriff is taking on himself.

I do not believe such decisions should be left to the police.

[discntnt_irny_srcsm]

14. I concur

Article IV, Section 1. of the California Constitution: "The legislative power of this State is vested in the California Legislature which consists of the Senate and Assembly, but the people reserve to themselves the powers of initiative and referendum."

I recall some others posts on DU about some other topic that criticized some sheriffs for kind of making their own decisions that conflicted with state laws. Some of the DU folks didn't like the position of the sheriffs that time.

Times change.

[crono]

16. agree

- communities may regulate and even prohibit businesses. I agree with this to a point. I do not think communities may entirely prohibit businesses that are protected by the Constitution or SCOTUS ruling, abortion clinics for example

i believe there are a few states attempting to do just that to abortion clinics.
https://www.vox.com/policy-and-politics/2020/3/22/21189847/coronavirus-ohio-abortion-elective-surgeries

[HeartachesNhangovers]

4. The most surprising thing about this story is that

the LA County Counsel actually ruled in favor of gun-sellers in one of the most gun-hostile municipalities around.

But you're right, rather than have law enforcement define "essential", the governor's office - the issuer of the executive order - should clarify. This is just laziness or cowardice on the part of the governor's office.

As to the sheriff ignoring the County Counsel, there is probably no legal mechanism to force the Sheriff to comply because the Counsel is issuing a legal opinion, not a court order. If a court ruled that the gun stores could not be closed under the executive order, then the Sheriff would be bound to comply.

Of course, the fact that the County Counsel said that the closure order doesn't apply to gun-sellers means that the Sheriff's contrary action are likely to be contested in court, and assuming that an attorney knows more about the law than a sheriff, the Sheriff is likely to lose and then be bound by a court order.

[sarisataka]

9. I realize I initially made a mistake

I had read counsel as council. One letter makes a big difference.

I don't believe it is the job of law enforcement to determine my needs, be it guns, strippers or lavender scented shampoos. The governor's office such have provided clear guidance, especially regarding a business that would obviously be controversial whether declared essential or nonessential.

I see that the NRA plans to file a lawsuit. Of course it will not only be against LA county but the entire state of California. The sheriff's action may have widespread unintended consequences.

[crono]

17. " I don't believe it is the job of law enforcement to determine my needs,

be it guns, strippers or lavender scented shampoos."

hm someone has an interesting night planed.

[Lokilooney]

13. Sooo...

Are the liquor stores still open?

[sarisataka]

15. It sounds like liquor stores

Are open. Most states have them on the list of essential businesses. Colorado also has allowed marijuana shops to remain open for business.