I'd have to say "no" based upon my ideals. Stealing is stealing and what was stolen isn't concern for the punishment of the crime. However, as romulus pointed out, that all breaks down when you deprive somebody of something essential to life.
I would not support a law that made stealing a 50 cent bottle of water a felony. I would however support such a law if it had clauses in it that restricted it to a life and death situation. Stealing a bottle of water is small, but taking it from a dehydrated man is horroble.
Same can be said for guns. I don't worry about my collection being stolen for financial reasons -- I worry because it'd mean I'm TOTALLY unarmed for a period of time. A new Remington 870 would be in my hands PRONTO but there would probably be a period of a week or two where I'd be unarmed again.
So, Jim, I would say if you could get the above sentiment into the law then yes -- it's good. If you cannot and must use it as a bargaining chip then "Ok" but please for the Love of God make sure that it's nearly ineffective.
I'm going to go off the deep end here, and many of you may not wish to follow this, but it's something I've been pondering about for some time. The premise is that I would make a good law maker based upon my experienced in my current occupation and former hobby: computer programming.
It's not that I'm smart, or that I'm gifted in some way, shape, or form: It's simply because I take ideas and rules and then codify them into exacting instructions and tests to determine the eventual outcome. Bear with me here, this will get somewhere.
I am notorious for finding holes in specifications for software. They leap out at me it seems. I'm also fairly well respected for not allowing "weird" bugs to creep into my software. It's something that I've had to work on over the years and required a fairly extensive shift in the manner in which I structure my logic. It has worked though, and the same applies very much to laws I think.
I'll take a common example, and one that I've seen people make over and over again. Let's say a computer program crashes when you use, oh, an apostrophy (') as an input character in something. Let's also assume that the apostrophe character should never, ever, be used in this field. It's non-sensical.
Far too many in my field would modify the program to include conditions that would reject input with an apostrophe in it. They're happy with this solution and the program no longer crashes when you use the evil ' character.
Ok, so two weeks later somebody finds out that the & character does the same thing. Crap, modify program.
And then the ; character makes funny things happen.
This tends to continue on for some time. You end up with a big list of exceptions to the general rule that "everything can be inputted into this box."
This approach is wrong, and this approach should also NOT be used with our laws.
The correct way to handle the situation is to define a very strict list of things that you know with 100% absolute certainty are in the "OK" list. An example would be to state that you accept lowercase a-z and uppercase A-Z and digits 0-9 for input. It may be OK for use to use _ in the input, but it's better to have an extra restrictive set of rules that make absolutely sure nothing happens outside normal operating parameters.
Laws should work the same way. Craft them in a manner that they cannot be used against their original purpose. Laws are created by humans and therefore imperfect so we will never get a 100% success rate with them. Conditions will not always be clearly defined. Since this is the case the laws should create a very narrow window for prosecution. Craft them in such a manner and the "tin foil hat" crowd won't have to worry.
I'll try and give a concrete example of what I'm talking about now. Take the situation in question and try and draft an actual list of rules for it. If it were me, in my rushed thinking and without giving this a really large amount of thought I would end up with something like this:
Basic requirements:
- The firearm in question must be stored within the primary residence of the victim.
- The firearm must not be contained within any container, or if in a container that firearm must have been reasonably marked as containing a firearm.
- The firearm must either be in posession of the criminal at time of arrest or a case must be made that it was disposed of for profit by criminal.
- The firearm must be of modern design and capable of functioning at a reasonable level for defense or agression in the current day and age.
I've got a VERY narrow window of scenarios there... and it allows for what seems to be the #1 case: Burglar breaks in, sees gun along with other stuff and purposly grabs gun for either a) selling or b) employment by self.
Point number 1 removes the possibility of a criminal getting hit with extra penalties because he's an idiot and car-jacked me while I'm on the way home from the gun show with God Knows What in the trunk of my car. That was MAY have been his intent but you cannot prove it.
Point number 2 removes the possiblity of them accidentally grabbing a gun during a robbery. If I've got a couple of pistols hidden in the bottom of a trunk with stuffed animals and blankets in it and they take it you cannot be certain that they actually grabbed it for the firearms. Ok, so stuffed animals and blankets are a bad example -- lets say computer equipment was at the top. A Glock was at the bottom. They just grabbed it and ran. Fair enough. No intent.
Point number 3 gives the criminal an "out" if point #1 or #2 were false and gives them a chance to "ditch" the gun. "Oh crap, this idiot kept a Glock inside of his damned computer case! Ditch the gun, I don't want that rap!"
Point number 4 removes the penalty if they stole an antique firearm that's considered collectable. It's a "fuzzy" line but the law in question most certainly is not trying to corner the crook that steals a fairly heirloom or collectable antique front-stuffer. If it's not considered likely that the device could be employed in modern day crime the punishment shouldn't exist.
From there you work in explicit exceptions from the law that begin making it more broad. Such as:
- In addition to a primary residence a lodge primarly used for hunting purposes is also included.
In such a case they KNEW there was a friggen gun in there and if they stole it it's very easy to show that that was their intent. There's only four things you're guaranteed to find in a hunting cabin: Guns, ammo, beer and liquor.
- If the firearm is removed from the actual person themselves, the law qualifies that as an offense subject to higher penalties.
Took a gun FROM a man directly? Yeah, we can all see that qualifies.
I think you get the point. There's holes in my above rules that actually let criminals "go free" of the extra prosecution. I'm sure of that... so you begin inserting rules for known problem areas as you ID them.
There is no way on God's Green Earth that a judge could use the above rules and convict somebody for accidentally buying a stolen firearm from somebody else. It's just not in the cards. This IS California we're talking about so the laws must be crafted to defend against possible use against law abiding citizens. Well, that goes for all of the USA really.
Sorry that was so very long -- but I've been stewing on the subject for a while and this sorta presented a forum for me to express it.
:banghead: