Executive Summary
A prominent aspect of the debate surrounding crime and gun ownership, lost and stolen gun laws represent a particularly heated point of contention in an ideological debate between gun owners and anti-gun interest groups. After the Pennsylvania State House refused to pass a statewide lost and stolen law in 2008, lobbyists presented these ordinances to local governments throughout the state as a commonsense way to reduce crime.
Today, lost and stolen ordinances exist in approximately 45 communities – ranging in size from Philadelphia to Munhall – in Pennsylvania and their existence has prompted court cases that have yet to resolve whether or not such laws are legal. However the courts have ruled, it is clear that lost and stolen gun laws enacted by local governments in Pennsylvania are unenforceable and redundant.
It is also likely that, if these ordinances are ever enforced, their enforcement would engender a costly legal battle that, based on previous cases pertaining to local gun laws, would result in the overturning of lost and stolen gun laws enacted at the local level. In light of this situation, lost and stolen gun laws must be understood as posing more of a liability than a benefit in local governments’ struggle to fight crime.
In proving this contention, this briefing examines four distinct aspects of lost and stolen gun laws in Pennsylvania:
- An Unenforceable, Unnecessary Law: To our knowledge, no lost and stolen ordinance has ever been enforced in Pennsylvania and, because of its dubious legality, prosecutors and district attorneys are unlikely to attempt enforcement. Furthermore, these local ordinances are made redundant by harsher federal and state laws that criminalize straw purchasing.
- Pennsylvania Firearms Law: The Pennsylvania Uniform Firearms Act and current judicial precedent are both clear that local governments have no legal right to enact legislation impacting gun ownership. Lawsuits challenging local lost and stolen ordinances have been dismissed only because, due to lost and stolen laws not being enforced, no plaintiff has had standing to challenge these ordinances.
- An Invitation to Costly Lawsuits: Understanding Pennsylvania firearms law as it stands today, local governments that enact lost and stolen ordinances are in violation of judicial precedent and the Uniform Firearms Act. This makes local governments vulnerable to costly lawsuits by gun owners and pro-gun lobbying organizations.
- Criminalizing Victims: Lost and stolen ordinances not only constitute poor fiscal and anti-crime policy, they also threaten to criminalize individual gun owners who have already been the victims of a crime. In this way, lost and stolen ordinances violate our understanding of fairness in the law.
To download the full policy briefing as a PDF, please click here.
Giles Howard is the founder and president of the Publius Foundation. Email Giles at ghoward[at]publiusfoundation.com.