BEN NEARY Associated Press writer | Posted: Thursday, February 26, 2009 12:00 am
CHEYENNE - Wyoming residents accused or convicted of domestic violence may find it easier to regain their federal gun rights thanks to recent action by the state Legislature.
"For those that want their guns back, it's good," Suzan Pauling, public policy director of the Wyoming Coalition Against Domestic Violence and Sexual Assault, said of the changes to Wyoming law. "I think for domestic violence victims, it's not very good."
Congress in 1996 expanded the law that bans convicted felons from owning guns to apply to people convicted of misdemeanor domestic violence. Wyoming, where hunting and gun ownership are cherished ways of life, has been trying to find a way around the domestic violence provision for years.
"Judges in the state seem to be hesitant to take away gun rights because it's such a huge thing in Wyoming," Pauling said. "Having your gun in Wyoming is kind of like being a Wyomingite."
Gov. Dave Freudenthal on Thursday signed House Bill 106. It will allow Wyoming residents who have been convicted of domestic violence to apply to the court to expunge their record and regain their gun rights. It requires them to wait at least five years following the conviction before they apply to court and limits them to one expungement.
Freudenthal said he's comfortable that judges will be able to review people's conduct for five years after a conviction before considering their expungement requests. "I think that gives you a pretty good chance to look at it, and evaluate their conduct," he said Thursday.
Rep. Tom Lubnau, R-Gillette, sponsored HB 106 and also is a sponsor of House Bill 297. The second bill, which hasn't yet gone to the governor, would rewrite the state law on criminal assault to strip out provisions specifying that a person could be guilty if they unlawfully touched another person "in a rude, insolent or angry manner."
The bill would specify that the crime of assault consists of intentionally or recklessly causing bodily injury. It would specify that mere rude or insolent conduct amounts to "unlawful contact."
Lubnau said the change will allow prosecutors to press cases that wouldn't have been handled before. He said they'll be able to "do it in a way that doesn't cost people the right to hunt, the right have firearms, the right to certain federal jobs."
Lubnau said the bill also clears up the language of the state's assault law in response to a federal court decision that said it was unclear.
Lubnau is co-sponsor of a third gun rights bill, Senate File 70. Freudenthal signed that bill into law on Tuesday. It will require judges to warn domestic violence defendants that they stand to lose their gun rights if they plead guilty.
Sen. Cale Case, R-Lander, sponsored Senate File 70 and co-sponsored HB 297, the revision of the state's assault statutes. Case said he believes making sure that defendants understand the consequences of pleading guilty will improve the state's judicial system.
Case also said that changing the assault law will give prosecutors a new option in dealing with cases where defendants didn't intend to harm anyone.
"I think that's going to separate out people who were wrongly caught up in that on a going-forward basis," Case said.
Case said HB 106, allowing people convicted of misdemeanor domestic violence to expunge their records, will have the most dramatic effect of any of the three bills. He was not a co-sponsor of that bill.
"That can catch people that have already been convicted, so that could have dramatic consequences, basically positive," Case said. "I think that if you have spent five years of your life without getting into trouble, having turned around, that is a remedy that we didn't have before."