Fake firearm bill fires up debate in Maine

WGME 13 News

AUGUSTA (WGME) – Safety and security at your schools is firing up debate at the Maine State House. A new bill would make it a crime for students to have fake guns on school property.

Maine State Senator Dawn Hill (D-District 1) proposed a new law that would prohibit non-firing, replica firearms, in other words, fake guns, from being on or near school property. Students who are caught with them could be sent to jail for six months and fined up to $1,000.  

Police across the country say they’re having a harder time telling real guns from knock-offs. California teen Andy Lopez was shot and killed last fall by a deputy while carrying a replica rifle; investigators say it looked like a real AK-47.

“We’re up against these issues, and we need to deal with them. These are different times, and there’s a heightened alert now,” Sen. Hill said.

Just last week a toy gun put the brakes on a school bus in Auburn. The driver called police when he heard students talking about a gun. School officials later told us the student had a toy gun in his backpack.

But Senator Hill’s bill on replica guns is getting push back in Augusta.

“If it’s in somebody’s trunk and it hasn’t been used to scare anyone, it’s as harmless as a shoe,” David Trahan with the Sportsman’s Alliance of Maine told us.

The Maine Civil Liberties Union and the Sportsman’s Alliance of Maine say the bill isn’t specific enough and the punishment is too severe.

“I’d hate to see a kid put a Lego kit like this together thinking he’s doing nothing wrong and then all of a sudden arrested and convicted of a crime,” Trahan said in an interview with CBS 13.

It’s already a crime to have a real gun on a school campus and most school districts have policies in place that ban anything that looks like a gun. But if this bill becomes law, instead of breaking a school rule, a student with a fake firearm, would be committing a crime.

The Maine Education Association says its main concern is safety but isn’t taking a position on the bill.

“These are complicated issues that need to be thought out carefully. There are school policies and laws that are impacted,” Paul Hamilton with the MEA said.

Our research found federal law requires orange markings on toy guns so police can quickly tell a real from a fake, but they can easily be removed or pop off creating confusion for police. That’s something else lawmakers on the Education Committee will consider and debate as they continue to talk about fake firearms and schools.

http://www.wgme.com/news/features/top-stories/stories/fake-firearm-bill-fires-up-debate-20867.shtml#.UvPLVfldWSo

2 thoughts on “Fake firearm bill fires up debate in Maine

  1. These people need to have a state where they cam all live and put their nose in each others business without bothering the thinking people who would like them to die off. Maybe we could give them a nice clean New Jersey, one rule they cannot leave for any reason ever. Their phones cannot call outside their state and no internet to the rest of the world. Just your own safe little state full of useless busy bodies. You can legislate all you want no one will ever care any more.
    I think it is high time to run all of then off. We do not need government is s way to hold back the natural process of social evolution.
    Can you name one thing gov ever improved? One thing? How about the number of things it screwed up?

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