"The supposed quietude of a good mans allures the ruffian; while on the other hand, arms like laws discourage and keep the invader and the plunderer in awe, and preserve order in the world as well as property. The same balance would be preserved were all the world destitute of arms, for all would be alike; but since some will not, others dare not lay them aside... Horrid mischief would ensue were one half the world deprived of the use of them..."
-- Thomas Paine
SB 102 and SB 117 will be heard Friday morning, Feb. 8, at 8:00 a.m. in room W130 of the West Office Building behind the State Capitol, by the Senate Judiciary, Law Enforcement, and Criminal Justice Committee.
SB 102 (sponsored by Sen. Gene Davis) would make it a 3rd-degree felony to "torture" an animal. This is a back-door gun-control bill because:
GOUtah! has no problem with the existing laws against cruelty to animals, and we believe that if these laws were rigorously enforced and if people who deliberately and maliciously did horrible things to animals ended up in jail for six months or longer (which can happen under the current law, though it rarely does), an adequate level of justice and deterrence would be established and there would be few if any repeat offenders.
However, the animal-rights activists have long wanted to felonize the mistreatment of animals and are now using one or two recent high-profile cases of severe cruelty to push their agenda.
Our problem with SB 102 is that felony-level "animal torture" is so broadly and vaguely defined in the bill that a farmer who shoots a feral dog or cat and wounds it with the first shot instead of killing it instantly could be faced with a felony charge, especially if he lives in the rural portion of one of Utah’s mixed rural-urban counties where the local district attorney’s office is likely to be staffed by urbanites who detest the whole rural culture and who simply can’t stand the idea of an animal being shot under any circumstances.
SB 102 exempts wildlife (including endangered species), rodeo animals, livestock, zoo animals, animals used in medical research, etc. We speculate that the bill’s backers know that their definition of "torture" is so vague and so broad that it could be used to shut down hunting, fishing, rodeos, farms, ranches, medical research labs, etc., which would generate enormous opposition to the bill. So they exempted these kinds of animals from the bill in order to avoid such opposition. But this doesn’t do much good for those of us who, for example, live just outside the fringes of suburbia, where city-dwellers often abandon unwanted pets, which then become feral and reproduce. If you’re a farmer living in a rural section of Summit County, for example, and there’s an abandoned dog roaming the area that has turned feral and that’s harassing your chickens or your own pets, and you call animal control, they’ll probably tell you to catch the dog and confine it and then maybe they’ll come out within a day or two to retrieve it. You realize that this is either impossible or impractical, so you shoot the dog but you wound it instead of killing it, and it runs off and dies slowly and eventually ends up dead in your neighbor’s driveway. The neighbor, a former urbanite who hates guns, calls the cops. You get arrested on an animal-cruelty charge. The district attorney turns out to be a Los Angeles native who now lives in Park City and who hates hunters, ranchers, shooters, and other rural types. He looks closely at the new law and decides that he can charge you with a felony because you inflicted pain and suffering on the dog. You end up having to spend $10,000 to hire an attorney to defend against this felony charge. The jury ends up being stacked with anti-gun anti-hunting Park City residents who are former urbanites (not an unrealistic scenario, given that most of Summit County’s population now consists of former urbanites living in the Park City area). Best-case scenario: you get acquitted but you still owe your attorney $10,000 (as opposed to $1,500 for a typical misdemeanor defense). Worst-case scenario: you get convicted and, regardless of the sentence handed down by the judge, you automatically lose the right to own a gun or to even hold a gun in your hands for the rest of your life. And you still owe your attorney $10,000. After that, if you so much as go target shooting with a .22 rifle and someone turns you in, you’re looking at a MAJOR federal felony charge for being "a felon in possession of a firearm" and, quite probably, a stay in federal prison.
Again, the whole issue for us is that we don’t want to see any new laws passed that could enable the authorities to automatically and permanently strip a person of his gun rights for a relatively minor act. In our opinion, SB 102 falls in this category. Felony status should be reserved for heinous crimes against people, in our view.
SB 117 (sponsored by Sen. Allen Christensen) is a somewhat lighter version of SB 102, in that it creates a felony for "animal torture" only upon a second conviction that occurs any time within 5 years of a first conviction, with the first conviction being a misdemeanor. While this bill would not be as bad as SB 102, it still has problems. If it passes, the animal-rights activists are likely to work to get the 5-year statute of limitations extended to 10 years, or removed completely, which would essentially turn SB 117 into the equivalent of SB 102.
SB 102 and SB 177 will be heard Friday morning, Feb. 8, at 8:00 a.m. in room W130 of the West Office Building behind the State Capitol, by the Senate Judiciary, Law Enforcement, and Criminal Justice Committee. We encourage you to contact one or more of the following committee members and encourage them to oppose SB 102 and SB 117. If you happen to live in the district of one of these senators, please mention this fact when contacting him. Also, if you can attend the hearing and speak against these bills, even if it's just a 30-second statement that you oppose the bill, this would help a lot.
Sen. Greg Bell cell: (801)971-2001
Sen. John Valentine home: (801)224-1693
Sen. Jon Greiner home: (801)621-0423
Date:
From:
To:
Dear Senator :
I encourage you to oppose SB 102 and SB 117, the "animal torture" bills. These bills serve as back-door gun-control legislation, due to the felony clauses they contain.
The current law regarding firearms in private cars is highly confusing in its definitions (particularly the definition of "concealed"), and can really only be understood by lawyers. Many decent gun owners have probably unknowingly violated this law at one time or another.
Under federal law, any felony conviction results in the automatic and permanent revocation of the convicted person’s right to possess a firearm, no matter how minor his criminal act might have been. While this may be appropriate for murder, rape, robbery, and other heinous violent crimes against people, I’m concerned that the definition of "animal torture" in SB 102 and SB 117 is so broad and vague that it could result in felony prosecutions for relatively minor acts, such as a rural Utahn shooting a feral dog or cat and wounding it with the first shot – especially if the local district attorney is an urbanite who hates guns and shooting and other rural activities. This scenario can easily be envisioned in many of Utah’s mixed rural-urban counties such as Summit County, Utah County, Weber County, etc.
I have no problem with the existing misdemeanor laws against cruelty to animals, and I believe that if these laws were more vigorously enforced, with violators serving 6 months of actual jail time, they would provide an effective deterrent and there would be few if any repeat offenders.
Thanks for taking time to consider my opinion on this matter.
Sincerely,
That concludes the GOUtah! Political and Legislative Alert #283 for 7 February 2008. We hope this information will be of assistance to you in defending your firearms rights.
Remember that getting this information is meaningless unless You Act On It Today. If you just read it and dump it in the trash, your gun rights, and the gun rights of future generations go in the trash with it. Get involved, get active and get vocal!
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