Illinois Bill Would Authorize Gun Confiscation Without Owner’s Input

Illinois Senator Julie A. Morrison (D-29) is pushing a bill that allows judges to confiscate guns without input from the firearm owner.

This is part of the continuing effort to fight gun crime that gun control has failed to stop in Chicago and the rest of the state.

SB 1291 would create a “Lethal Order of Protection” whereby the firearms of Illinois residents could be confiscated if a family member or “law officer” files a petition stating the gun owner “poses an immediate and present danger of causing personal injury to himself, herself, or another by having … [a firearm] in his or her custody or control.”

SB 1291’s summary states:

[The bill] provides that the petition shall also describe the type, and location of any firearm or firearms presently believed by the petitioner to be possessed or controlled by the respondent. Provides that the petitioner may be a family member of the respondent or a law enforcement officer, who files a petition alleging that the respondent poses a danger of causing personal injury to himself, herself, or another by having in his or her custody or control, owning, purchasing, possessing, or receiving a firearm. Establishes factors that the court must consider before issuing a lethal violence order of protection. Provides for the issuance of ex parte orders and one year orders.

The inclusion of “ex parte” orders means an order to take the guns of an Illinois resident could be issued without that resident’s presence during the process in which the order was issued.

The NRA-ILA states, “An ex parte order would be issued by a judge based solely on a brief, unsubstantiated affidavit made by a petitioner and absent any input made by the individual on which the order is targeted.”

Once an order is issued, the firearm owner must “(1) refrain from having in his or her custody or control, owning, purchasing, possessing, or receiving additional firearms for the duration of the order; and (2) turn over to the local law enforcement agency any firearm, Firearm Owner’s Identification Card, or concealed carry license in his or her possession.”

AWR Hawkins is the Second Amendment columnist for Breitbart News and host of Bullets with AWR Hawkins, a Breitbart News podcast. He is also the political analyst for Armed American Radio. Follow him on Twitter: @AWRHawkins. Reach him directly at awrhawkins@breitbart.com.