VA/fed gun law question

[xphile]

Newbie here, so please be gentle

When I was 15 I got into some trouble with some friends, we were charged(I think, I do not have the case info as its a few states away) with one misdemeanor and a possible felony depending on the case information. This happened in NJ.

When we went to court, it was sent to the family division where we were sat infront of a judge. A plea was made and we were told to make restitution/community service and 1 year of probation. After all of this the case was dismissed.

Fast forward to today, Im 26, have an extremely high "ranking" job in the private sector of Government consulting(TS:SCI). I recently purchased a gun from an FFL here in VA(ordered actually) so I haven't done the background check yet. Im pretty nervous to say the least. Im not nervous so much about the NIC check as these records are sealed and there are clauses on the 4473 regarding sealed records, though I still am a bit weary.

My question is this:

I see that VA has state laws that say if I was adjudicated delinquent and those charges if commited by an adult are a felony then I could not own a firearm, but if the case was dismissed was I adjudicated delinquent?

http://www.lawyershop.com/practice-areas/criminal-law/juvenile-law/cases/
^ After reading that it would appear that I was not, but the NJ family court is NO help in telling me if I was or not. The lawyer that I had is out of state now and I cannot track him down :banghead:

Any insight? TIA

 

[NWCP]

No idea. Sounds like you'll find out soon enough though.

 

[johnmcl]

That is a complex question on the legal standing of your actions as a minor.

I think there's a simpler answer. Unless I'm mistaken, you can not get an SCI clearance with a felony on your record. The Feds did a deep dive on you to arrive at a conclusion. It seems likely that a considerably shallower dive will give the same results.

Make sense?

 

[Bubbles]

I also have a DoD TS/SCI. If you have a felony conviction on your record you will not get any sort of clearance, much less that one.

Another question - are you registered to vote in VA? If you are you should be ok to buy a gun as well, as typically the same things will DQ you for both.

 

[LaEscopeta]

I am not a lawyer; please take this with a grain of salt.

Im not nervous so much about the NIC check as these records are sealed and there are clauses on the 4473 regarding sealed records,…

As far as the Federal NIC and Federal form 4473, I agree I think you are fine.

I see that VA has state laws that say if I was adjudicated delinquent and those charges if commited by an adult are a felony then I could not own a firearm, but if the case was dismissed was I adjudicated delinquent?

I agree with you on this as well, this should be your concern.

With adult defendants a plea bargain almost always involves pleading guilty to something. Cases may be dismissed for other charges, but the defendant is adjudicated guilty for whatever charges the plea was copped.

Family and juvenile court/law may be different. I would advise finding out what specifically was decided in your case, rather than what the law says generally.

…the NJ family court is NO help in telling me if I was or not.

I’m sure you are aware of the legal principal “ignorance is not excuse for the law.” You can’t claim you did not know what you legal status is in VA state law or regulation concerning owning a firearm, even if it is difficult to find out your legal status. I would advise finding out everything you can about the NJ process of seeing your sealed records, or getting a copy of them, on the phone and by e-mail. I’m guessing you are going to have to show up at the court house in NJ to actually do this, but you will want to make sure you have everything you need, with all the correct signatures, have made the correct appointments, etc before you get there.

You should document the effort you go through, preferably with letters sent by certified mail, and some sort of written proof you went to the court house. If NJ does not give you your records your fall back position is your tried to fulfill your legal duty but capricious and unreasonable government action prevented you. I believe the precedent for this position is the cases from the 50’s and 60’s under the Jim Crow laws. Decisions found governments could not put conditions on citizens to exercise their rights and on the other hand make it impossible or unreasonably difficult to comply with these conditions. These cases were mostly about conditions intended to keep black people from voting but I’m guess this could apply to your case. Note defending this fall back position will require lawyers, time, money, etc.

Good luck and hope this helps.

 

[xphile]

I appreciate everyone's insight and their time. I have some updates as well. I called around to the family court today and faxed them a for releasing the final case charges to my Father.

Please correct me if im wrong, but adjudicated delinquent means what you were charged with a action that would be a crime if committed by an adult and you were found guilty or admitted guilt. The case would be closed and it would remain on your record.

In my case, we (put in front of a judge) at a disposition. We were told that we must do the above said things and that the charges would be dismissed, and in fact all of the charges were "dismissed". The final court document says nothing about pleading guilty, adjudicated delinquent, etc etc... but it does apparently state that the charges were dismissed. From my understanding, I would not be in violation of any VA firearm purchase laws. Any other insight is welcomed.

also, if I were in fact adjudicated delinquent wouldn't the charges not be dismissed because of a plea or admission of guilt?

I plan to speak to a lawer, preferably one here in VA with experience in firearms. Anyone have any recommendations? I also did speak with my old attorney that represented me but he had destroyed the case files(7 years is the limit I guess), so he wasn't much help.


btw, I verified that my virginia voting rights are active but I figured that these are a different set of rights.
Thanks again!

 

[HOV]

11 years ago as a juvenile, current active clearance

You are wasting your time and money pursuing this any further.

 

[Demitrios]

HOV that's not necesarily true. Even though I've never been convicted of any crime I my arrest record, even prior as a minor, is still with me today, that never goes away without expungement in which case you have an expungement on file. However, I still live in NJ, have had three "arrests" (two times I was picked at a mall for disturbing the peace and I was handed a subpoena for assault with a weapon that was dismissed. As I found out the hard way a subpoena counts as an arrest here.) and I have a FID car, carry permit from Utah and have never been questioned regarding any Pistol Purchase Permit I've applied for.

With that said I wouldn't be too nervous with things. If NJ has been level-headed enough with me in these situations I can't see VA being any worse.

 

[627PCFan]

"TS:SCI"...Sorry, this was not an intelligent post. I would ask the mods to delete the thread immediately-

 

[xphile]

Not an intelligent post? On a completely anonymous forum?(from the perspective of regular members of course) Are you one of those people who think that people shouldn't disclose their security clearance due to targeting issues? While I appreciate that you may think its an issue, I can assure you that disclosure of security clearance's is extremely normal(especially on job boards, etc).

But if you're referring to a chance that my security clearance could be taken away, that's just laughable as the DoD knew from day 1 about my previous incident. Thanks for caring though, heh.

Oh well, thanks for everyones help and insight again.

 

[NavyLCDR]

Did they do a SSBI to adjudicate your TS/SCI?

I would think you would be just fine.

By the way, you should only disclose that you have a TS/SCI to other member's who have a TS/SCI such as myself...

Oh, wait... that didn't come out right....

 

[NavyLCDR]

Did they do a SSBI to adjudicate your TS/SCI?

I would think you would be just fine.

By the way, you should only disclose that you have a TS/SCI to other member's who have a TS/SCI such as myself...

Oh, wait... that didn't come out right....

 

[xphile]

Did they do a SSBI to adjudicate your TS/SCI?

SSBI, of course... adjudicate, I highly doubt it as it was completed in about 3 months from my SF-86 filing for upgrade I was surprised at how quickly it was processed actually.

 

[wishin]

Based on this case, it would seem you'll have no problem. (This BTW was a VA case).

Federal law defines "juvenile delinquency" as a violation of law by a minor that "would have been a crime if committed by an adult." 18 U.S.C. § 5031 (2003). A juvenile is not "convicted" under federal law; a court adjudicates whether he or she is a juvenile delinquent. If so, the juvenile is subject to a disposition hearing at which the options are restitution, probation or commitment to official detention for a limited period of time. See 18 U.S.C. § 5037 (2003). The Walters court concluded that the "FJDA demonstrated Congress's perspective that juvenile delinquency adjudications are distinct from criminal convictions." 225 F.Supp.2d at 685-86.

 

[kingpin008]

On a completely anonymous forum?

This is NOT an anonymous forum. Virtually nothing on the internet is truly anonymous anymore, in fact.

The email address you used to sign up is traceable, as is the IP address that you connect from every time you log in here. These things are stored, and searchable.

Welcome to the (totally not-anonymous) internet.

That said, I have no idea why JRSPICER would think that this thread needs deleting.

 

[xphile]

Kingpin,

You didn't fully quote me! From the perspective of non moderators/admins(like you) its fully anonymous. Unless you coarse the moderators/admins to tell you my IP address which you would then need a subpoena to give to my ISP for personal information retrieval as would any government agency(most ISP's take lawful intercept extremely seriously) . Email well, again... anonymous from your perspective. While I agree with you that the internet is for the most part not anonymous(TOR anyone??), its not really in the scope of this conversation.

btw, I do network engineering and security for the DoD(once again, making me far less anonymous)

Wishin,

thanks.