Texas 30.06 question

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This would actually be a great test case.

The penalty for not abiding a 30.06 sign is fairly minimal.

RE: title 18 signage and fed property. My understanding is that it allows
for CHL. Note it states that you must be legal pursuant to state laws.
 
If it has the right verbiage for 30.06, then it is valid. It does not have to be in 1 inch block letters. We went over this in my renewal CHL class several weeks ago.

Excerpt from my CHL handbook referencing 30.06. Note 3(A) makes no mention of 1 inch. also, note the "or" at the end of 3(A).

(3) "Written communication" means:
(A) a card or other document on which is written language
identical to the following: "Pursuant to Section 30.06, Penal Code
(trespass by holder of license to carry a concealed handgun), a person
licensed under Subchapter H, Chapter 411, Government Code (concealed
handgun law), may not enter this property with a concealed
handgun"; or
(B) a sign posted on the property that:
(i) includes the language described by Paragraph (A) in both
English and Spanish;
(ii) appears in contrasting colors with block letters at least
one inch in height; and
(iii) is displayed in a conspicuous manner clearly visible to
the public

Scott
 
txgolfer45 said:
If it has the right verbiage for 30.06, then it is valid. It does not have to be in 1 inch block letters. We went over this in my renewal CHL class several weeks ago.

Excerpt from my CHL handbook referencing 30.06. Note 3(A) makes no mention of 1 inch. also, note the "or" at the end of 3(A).

(3) "Written communication" means:
(A) a card or other document on which is written language
identical to the following: "Pursuant to Section 30.06, Penal Code
(trespass by holder of license to carry a concealed handgun), a person
licensed under Subchapter H, Chapter 411, Government Code (concealed
handgun law), may not enter this property with a concealed
handgun"; or
(B) a sign posted on the property that:
(i) includes the language described by Paragraph (A) in both
English and Spanish;
(ii) appears in contrasting colors with block letters at least
one inch in height
; and
(iii) is displayed in a conspicuous manner clearly visible to
the public

Scott

Scott - which type of notice are you referring to???

Section 3A ONLY Applies to a Card or other document - in which case the other conditions of 3B do not apply, and only needs exact verbiage.

Section 3B - A Posted SIGN MUST HAVE All of the elements of 30.06 3B in order to be a VALID (enforceable) posting.
 
According the CHL instructor, the way the law is written, a store could have a sign that is smaller than the poster and you would be bound to follow it as it has the correct wording.

A card or other document could be a sign. "Other document" is vague. So, if they get the wording right, it is enforceable.
 
According the CHL instructor, the way the law is written, a store could have a sign that is smaller than the poster and you would be bound to follow it as it has the correct wording.

A card or other document could be a sign. "Other document" is vague. So, if they get the wording right, it is enforceable.

Wrong.

3A is for Cards or Other Documents (pamphlets, advertisements, etc.).

3B is for ANYTHING and EVERYTHING POSTED (any signage).... Hence the Key Word OR

Who was your instructor and Where?
 
TC-TX: IMHO you are correct. You have correctly analyzed the statute.

Does the difference between what is required of the sign and what is required on a card or another document make sense? Some would so "No -- this is just another example of sloppy statutory drafting by the legislature." I would dispute that. If you are handed a card as you enter a premises it is quite reasonable for a judge to conclude that you received personal notice. You have it in your hand. On the other hand, to fairly conclude that you have received personal notice from a sign it is reasonable to require that the sign be perhaps even absurdly visible.

txgolfer45: with respect, IMHO your CHL instructor is just as wrong as can be. He appears either guilty of the same thing we see here on THR all the time -- making an argument advancing a personal hangup, or he has trapped himself because of his inaptitude at reading a sometimes incomprehensible statute. Then his audience takes it as gospel because he has a piece of paper from the DPS -- after all, "HE IS A CHL INSTRUCTOR!!" The audience spreads it around through things like internet forums and confusion again reigns.

Let me once again take the liberty to caution all our Texicans that CHL instructors are human beings just like the rest of us, and they sometimes make mistakes. They are not God. I have seen more than one CHL instructor make errors of varying magnitude at my original class and renewals. I sometimes think they should have renewal classes more often then CHL holders. After all, if a CHL holder misunderstands the law he is most likely only going to get himself in a jam, but an instructor who misunderstands the law is at risk of contaminating class after class.

I hasten to conclude that I am making no general condemnation of what is largely a devoted group of men and women who earn the label "CHL Instructor," but one will occasionally have a misunderstanding, and his or her position causes it to be passed along to the rest of us.

Jim
 
Can someone who is familiar with the procedures and steps involved in the average case of criminal trespass for the situation described (*) shed some light on what might be fairly likely to take place, and how much this would cost the accused in time, money, and /or freedom along the way?

Well, if you go the public defender route, you may get mixed results. Any public defender in Texas is going to have a heavy case load and may not have a lot of personal interest in your case. On the other hand, you might get lucky - Emerson's Second Amendment defense was an issue raised by his public defender. Also remember that the public defender will be working for, and is employed by, the same city officials who are probably trying to push an anti-CCW interpretation. Professional ethics rules would prohibit the public defender from allowing this to influence how he pursued the case; but some people are better able to follow this than others.

As to what it would cost you, criminal defense lawyers generally require that you pay up front and they vary the fee depending on the facts of a particular case. If you want a baseline reference though, contesting a non-traffic ticket Class C misdemeanor (burning leaves, attending a dogfight, disorderly conduct) can run from $150-$750.

So my guess would be that contesting any Class A misdemeanor will run you at least the price of a nice firearm.
 
ChickenHawk said:
What if they only post it in english? You understand english, don't you (I assume yes, since you started the thread). But the law clearly states that a valid 30.06 be in two languages, english and spanish. If not, it is not a valid 30.06 sign.
No it doesn't. The law was quoted a couple of posts before yours. Part 'A' says the sign must contain language identical to what follows ... in Part 'A'. That's in English only.

The part about in English or Spanish is in part 'B' ... and part 'B' comes after an "or." Bi-lingual signs are not required, they are optional.
 
TC-TX said:
The question was asked and I felt compelled to answer with a Factual Legal Answer.
Out of curiosity ... does capitalizing "Factual," "Legal" and "Answer" somehow make your response to Mr. Roberts more compelling?

As a former Texan now residing in another state, I have no real dog in this fight, so I regard my position as being "interested, but objective." And it strikes me that the statutory language is very much "A or B." And 'A' does not require 1" high letters, contrasting colours, or bi-lingual notification. Is it your position, Mr. TC-TX, that part 'A' applies only to a card which must be physically handed to a person in order for it to have any force? I don't see that in the statute.
 
Aguila, you have misread the statute. Section A discusses what constitutes effective written communication. Section B discusses signage. The statute does say "(i) includes the language described by Paragraph (A) in both English and Spanish;"

That gives us another fun hypothetical though. Suppose the 30.06 sign is only in English. You ignore it and get caught. You admit that you are a native-born English speaker and saw the sign; but ignored it because you decided the sign was invalid. Did you have effective notice of what the store owner wanted?

TC-TX said:
Section 3A ONLY Applies to a Card or other document - in which case the other conditions of 3B do not apply, and only needs exact verbiage.

Section 3B - A Posted SIGN MUST HAVE All of the elements of 30.06 3B in order to be a VALID (enforceable) posting.

Where does the statute define what a "posted sign" is? The difference between the conclusion that you are arriving at and the conclusion that Scott arrived at seems to turn on whether you consider the written communication he described to be a "posted sign" that must meet the requirements from Sec. B.

Now, you would probably argue that giving "posted sign" its plain English meaning makes the most sense and I would agree with you; but then we get into the problem we differed on earlier. In that case, I suggested that a court might favor interpreting the words "effective notice" according to their plain English meaning. If a court decides to interpret "effective notice" that way, then the exact details of the sign may not be as relevant as whether the court thinks you had effective notice.
 
TexasSIGman said:
It seems obvious to a clear thinking person that the Penal Code "says what it says" and in a pretty clear manner.

Until I read this.....

http://tsra.com/docs/AboveTheLaw.pdf

I've posted the link a few times and I encourage Texas residents to read it.
This shows how some District Attorneys and police leaders are ignoring Texas handguns laws and specifically advising police to break the law and arrest and "let the DA deal with the legal niceties" later.
I respectfully submit that this is an unrelated discussion. Your link pertains to the "traveling" law, not to 30.06 signs.

The honest fact is, the Texas legislature tried to do a good thing but they went about it in a truly bass-ackwards manner. As the article in your link explains, Texas always had an exemption in statute for carrying a handgun in a vehicle "when traveling," but "traveling" was not defined. If memory serves (and it may not), the traditional de facto definition became when a journey crossed county lines. I don't recall if that was anywhere stated in law or if it was a "working" definition, but it is obviously somewhat unwieldy at best.

However, in attempting to rectify the confusion, the legislature for some reason avoided doing the simply thing, which would have been to simply revise the statute to allow carry in vehicles. Instead, they left the underlying statute unchanged (i.e. it is STILL against the law to carry in a vehicle except when "traveling") and attempted to make it easier to claim that one is traveling. But, again, they didn't take a clear and simple path and just state that all use of a motor vehicle is "traveling." Instead, they inserted some namby-pamby verbiage to the effect that "the presumption is that you are traveling unless you are not."

Now, what, exactly, does that mean? If Suzie Soccermom is stopped with a car full of kids and bags full of groceries, inwhich the frozen foods haven't yet defrosted, and she is two blocks from home, is a police officer supposed to rationally "presume" that she is "traveling"? Hell, no. She's bringing the groceries home from the stupidmarket, and the law hasn't been changed to say that it's okay to carry when doing that.

The bottom line is that the intent of the legislature may have been clear, but the result is anything BUT clear. And courts are not always bound by legislative intent, when the letter of the law manages to say something other than what the idiot legislators thought it said when they wrote it.
 
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Desperately hoping to avoid a debate about malum prohibitum and malum in se, which I do not think appropriate here, the underlying rule is that a citizen has a right to receive advance notice of what a criminal trespass is before she can be arrested, prosecuted, convicted and punished for committing that crime.

Before we broadly brand Texas legislators as all being idiots, let us think about it a little bit.

The Texas legislature enacted a statute basically saying that a person holding a valid CHL can carry a concealed handgun anywhere in the great state of Texas -- anywhere -- except…. There came the rub. Except where?

The legislature knew that if it wanted to put some certain place “off limits” to a CHL holder that it had to provide a mechanism for the holder to receive effective notice before getting arrested for something she didn’t know was a crime.

There are two basic ways of getting notice, “actual notice” and “constructive notice.”

The statute recognizes that oral notice is effective. If a business owner tells her that she cannot carry concealed in his establishment then it is illegal for her to do so. To paraphrase something I said in an earlier post, sufficient oral notice is given if a business owner says, “Hey, Bubette, you can’t carry a concealed handgun in here even if you have a CHL!”

A citizen has constructive notice of a statutory enactment. She is “presumed to know the law.” (A pretty big presumption when you read a thread all over the place like this one, isn’t it?) Therefore, she is presumed to know that she cannot rely on her CHL to carry concealed into a polling place or other place specifically enumerated in the statute.

When a sign in two languages is carefully worded and printed as required by 30.06 and put in a conspicuous place for those entering to see, then it is reasonable for a judge to conclude that constructive notice was had. If Jane Doe, CHL holder, is unconscious to a sign of this size then it is not unfair for the state to punish her for violating the law anyway. Any reasonable person would have seen the sign. She had constructive notice. Things would be different if the sign was at the back door and she went in the front door. It just wouldn’t be right – and that pretty well defines “due process of law.”

That leaves us with cards and other documents. IMHO these can provide either actual notice or constructive notice, depending on the circumstances.

If a properly worded card or document is handed to a person I would think it would be reasonable to consider this to be actual notice. Of course a judge would undoubtedly require evidence that it was handed to her. This could be disputed, but this is why we have judges and juries. Ditto for cases of oral notice. Judges and juries sometimes have hard choices to make.

Now we come to the properly worded card or document posted on the front door of an establishment. Actual notice? Constructive notice? No effective notice at all? I would say it depends, and once again that is why we have judges and juries.

Let us suppose that it is a 5 x 8 card, appropriately worded, posted on the door to the business. Is it a “sign,” thereby giving constructive notice? I doubt it. The legislature placed more of a burden on the business owner. In most, if not all, cases, it would not be fair to prosecute a citizen for not seeing this inconspicuous card.

On the other hand, let us suppose this. Before entering the business Jane Doe is seen by a bystander to spot the 5 x 8 card, and lean over to read it. She rolls her eyes, shrugs, and says to the bystander, “That is not a valid 30.06 sign. The print is too small and it is not in Spanish.” She then pats her purse, winks at the bystander, and walks into the business carrying her concealed handgun. The bystander witnessing all this happens to be very anti-gun, and he reports to the nearest sales clerk that he suspects Jane of carrying a concealed handgun. The clerk calls security, which calls the police, and Jane ends up in court charged with criminal trespass. The bystander gives his evidence. Would the judge be justified in finding that Mrs. Doe had actual notice? I think so.

If all our laws were transparently clear and incapable of being misunderstood or construed in different ways our economy would crater when all the lawyers went out of business. We couldn’t let that happen. :)

This, by the way, is my opinion, IT IS NOT A FACT!. ;)

Best,

Jim
 
I respectfully submit that this is an unrelated discussion. Your link pertains to the "traveling" law, not to 30.06 signs.


What it pertains to is District Attorney interpretation of the law rather than the law itself.

The sign thing may very wll be interpreted more loosely by a DA just as the travelling thing is being interpreted very loosely.

Betting a possible arrest because letters on a sign are 3/4 inch tall instead of 1 inch could be a real bad idea if you get one of these same District Attorneys who has decided that he knows the legislative intent regardless of what the law says.
 
Bartholomew Roberts said:
Did you have effective notice of what the store owner wanted?

What the store owner wanted is irrelevent...

If the Sign is Not Valid, It DOES NOT Give Effective Notice under Texas PC 30.06 3B.

Non-Compliant signage is not valid and therefore non-enforceable.

The prohibition allowed under 30.06 is not enforceable if The Sign is NOT enforceable.


Period.
 
TC-TX, hopefully you'll be the judge in that case when somebody in Harris county disagrees with your take on it. Until then, I think I've made my point as clearly as a human being can make it.
 
OK- here's a new twist. A place wants to post a 30.06 sign and does so. Eventually the sign deteriorates so that it is no longer in compliance. I know what the sign is supposed to be, but no one else could tell. Is it still legally binding? See pic:
 

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1) THAT particular sign was NEVER Valid - the required verbiage is not - nor ever was - present.

2) If the words used are not identical to that REQUIRED in PC30.06 it is not valid.

3) If the sign does not comply with PC30.06 it is not considered Effective Notice, therefore it can not be enforceable.
 
Obey the signs and all applicable laws, including the one that says your firearm MUST be concealed. Combining those two basic approaches has always worked for me.
 
Some of you people............

You'd be real lucky to lose a case based on the 30.06
requirements 'cause you'd have a good case
against the DA on many other fronts.

If your that worried, are you not concerned that
the law itself is likely to be misinterpreted by
the state legislature?

Heck, I'd love to lose the case based on the letters
being only 3/4" tall. 'course I'd be prepared with lawyers
and money ahead of time.
 
You'd be real lucky to lose a case based on the 30.06
requirements 'cause you'd have a good case against the DA on many other fronts.

What type of fronts did you have in mind?

I was thinking of the guy that Chuck Rosenthal charged. I forget his name; but he was a doctor, no criminal history and had just bought a handgun from a friend. He was driving home with the pistol and had the 2005 law that said he was presumed to be travelling on his side.

Despite this, he was arrested and had his pistols confiscated and was subsequently charged by the DA. He hasn't "lost" his case yet and probably won't since the law will be changed on September 1, 2007 and his case will be moot. All it cost him was whatever he has spent on lawyers thus far and the temporary loss of his property - and I don't see any countersuit brought against Chuck Rosenthal yet either, let alone a successful one - so I question how "lucky" someone would be in this situation.

The good news for us is that because of his plight, the Texas legislature made the law even more clear and I imagine that this is what would happen if a DA tried something similar with 30.06 signs - of course, the legislature doesn't meet for another two years so that might not be much solace to those who take one for the team - and based on the 13 DAs who decided to interpret the new travelling law as narrowly as possible, I submit that there is some chance of this happening. I don't think it is a big chance; but it is a potential problem I can avoid real easily by just not giving gun-grabbers my money or business - which is something I try to do anyway.
 
I have seen the 51% signs posted every which way at bars and restuarants. I go out of my way to find them and respect them when I find them.

Under the law, you are required to stay out of places that derive more than 51% of their income from on-premises sales if you are carrying. However, unless the business posts the 51% sign like it is supposed to, you have practically no way of knowing whether they did or not. Since the intent requirement for this crime is "recklessly", you could theoretically be convicted if the jury believes that you should have known that the place derived more than 51% of its income from on-premises sales, even though no sign was posted.

The 51% requirement has to do with 51% of GROSS SALES coming from such sales to patrons for ON SITE CONSUMPTION. This is really only aimed at bars. I went into the Cheesecake Factory in Northstar Mall in San Antonio, and they had a 51% sign posted. IMHO, they don't come close to 51% of gross sales from alcoholic beverages sold for on site consumption. I called the TABC and asked them, and they informed me that they'd dealt with DPS about the issue, and that they had a BIG problem with merchants incorrectly posting the 51% sign. You see, EVERY MERCHANT with a license to sell alcoholic beverages for on site consumption gets a 51% sign in its licencing package from TABC. HOWEVER, unless you're talking about a bar, they don't rise to the level of 51%. TABC is interested in hearing about cases like this, and they will send out an investigator and get the signs removed if the 51% level isn't met.

Therefore, I'd urge ALL CHL holders to call the nearest TABC office when a restaurant has the 51% sign posted, and get the removal process started. 90+% of the time you'll be correct. Forget about bars.
------------------------
As to the idea of telling a business that its 30.06 sign is incorrect, I think that is a serious mistake (if you value your right to carry, that is). First, maybe the business (or a pro-gun employee) did it purposely, to provide the sheeple with comfort while still allowing "in the know" CHL holders to carry legally. Second (and FAR more likely) if you are dealing with dedicated antis, you are making sure that you and every other CHL holder that might want to carry there will have NO excuse. I can't give anyone a definitive answer as to the results of a case where the right language was posted in 7/8" letters (though I'd suspect you'd win at great financial cost, and the 1" sign would go up immediately after you challenged an employee or officer on premises about it), but surely if the sign was EXACTLY in compliance with the statute then no one would argue that you'd win the case. Why take the chance for yourself or your fellow CHL holders? Let sleeping dogs lie, and help to prevent yet another place from definitively becoming a gun-free zone.
 
while still allowing "in the know" CHL holders to carry legally.
So then you are saying that if I see a non-valid 30.06 sign that I can ignore it, since it does not meet the letter of the law? And by so doing I will still be carrying legally?

Let sleeping dogs lie, and help to prevent yet another place from definitively becoming a gun-free zone.
Even though one knows the intent of the business clearly by their having posted an invalid 30.06 sign, does the "Effective Notice" part negate their intentions? You mean an invalid sign makes the place a definitively PRO-gun place?
 
State law prohibits carrying a handgun on these premises
If I were to see a non 30.06 compliant sign, such as the one above, I would stop and ask myself if I was about to enter a place that is off-limits for carry by statute.

If so, I would silently thank the person who posted the sign, and I would not enter.

If not, I would consider it a political statement by the owner, and I would not enter, as I avoid doing business with anti-gun bigots.
 
Grayrock, if the sign is incorrect, it is not valid under the law. Therefore you can ignore it. If the owner/manager figures out that you're carrying, he has the legal right to ask you to leave, under trespass law. He still has control of the premises, and needs no sign to control who does what and how within those premises.

The law is specific as to the 30-06 sign. If the sign doesn't meet the law, it is not a lawful bar to entry for a CHL person. It's just that simple.
 
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