Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Hunter's Campfire Massachusetts cops are NOT your friends

Police chiefs in Massachusetts are blasting state lawmakers for shooting down a provision that would have given them sole discretion over who can get rifle or shotgun permits.

The Bay State, which has some of the nation's toughest gun laws, has long left it up to a community's top cop to sign off on handgun permits. Lawmakers were considering extending that to include the Firearms Identification Card, or FID, needed to possess long guns. But lawmakers, leery of the constitutionality of the law, which critics say can result in law-abiding citizens being denied their Second Amendment rights, have stripped a proposed bill of that provision. This week, police chiefs from throughout the state and gun control advocates converged on the Statehouse in Boston to blast state senators for removing the provision.

�Our position is really very, very simple,� said Wayne Sampson, executive director of the Massachusetts Chiefs of Police Association. �We, as an association, believe that it�s unconscionable that if we determine a person is unsuitable to carry a handgun, that they can then turn around and apply for a Firearms Identification Card, which allows them, by law, to purchase rifles and shotguns. And there�s no way we can impose any restrictions on that. It just doesn�t make sense.�

Yeah, I know. The police chiefs in Mass are different than cops everywhere else. Right? Yeah.
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and as always, more at the link..........

Bet they can't hold a candle to the NJ Gestapo .

Mass cops showed what they were all about during the marathon bombing, they showed sheer imcompetence, if it were not for a neighbor tipping them off they still would not have found the lone bomber. Their staged show of force to the MSM during the whole thing was disgusting. They clearly believe they rule the citizens in that state.

And there�s no way we can impose any restrictions on that. It just doesn�t make sense.�

Police departments seem far more often to be on the wrong side of things (the side of the elites) than Sheriff's Departments. One wonders if that's a manifestation of the fact that Chiefs are political appointees with relatively secure positions while Sheriffs are holders of elective office, directly answerable to their constituency via the ballot box. No mystery to me.

Police departments are controlled by city councils, are they not? Who controls the city councils? As I recall, it's the VOTERS. Why don't more voters take action to replace councils who allow this crap?

Police departments are controlled by city councils, are they not? Who controls the city councils? As I recall, it's the VOTERS. Why don't more voters take action to replace councils who allow this crap?

It isn't crap!! Why do you want police denied the power and tools they need to keep civilians in line?

That's a disconnected and indirect means of popular control over the police. What happens there is that often all major parties running for council agree on militarizing the police, but differ on other points that earn the votes of their constituency, thus, in that case, the people have zero control over the police. Elites, however, have plenty of control over issues that will be agreed upon by all major parties by prior arrangement.

Sheriffs, on the contrary, are directly answerable to the people in the communities they serve.

Police and the Government or one and the same , it is all about controlling the Sheep they are supposedly serving

That's a disconnected and indirect means of popular control over the police. What happens there is that often all major parties running for council agree on militarizing the police, but differ on other points that earn the votes of their constituency, thus, in that case, the people have zero control over the police. Elites, however, have plenty of control over issues that will be agreed upon by all major parties by prior arrangement.

Sheriffs, on the contrary, are directly answerable to the people in the communities they serve.

Correct me if I am wrong, but I am under the impression that your Sheriffs are pretty much autonomous with regard to Government beaurocracy...in that he or she can kick the traces and go a different way if he or she considers a particular Government action/law un-constitutional?