If you do use a “rod”, i.e. a belt, brush, paddle, switch, or extension cord, to discipline your child, you will eventually end up having child protection workers taking your child and their siblings and the police investigating you for child abuse. How will they know? Every mandated child abuse reporter in the country such as nurses, doctors, daycare workers, teachers, counselors, YMCA workers are required to report any evidence of suspected child abuse. A mark on your child such as a bruise which indicates your child was spanked will cause that referral. I can guarantee that you will have a child protection worker within days interviewing your child/children at their school or at your home as to every phase of discipline used at home and every phase of your life at home. It is likely your child/children will be removed from their home by the child protection worker and put into a receiving home. An immediate referral will also be made to the police and they will investigate to determine if criminal charges should be filed against you.

Perhaps you attended a parenting seminar and a well-known  parenting expert told you to apply a “rod” of choice to discipline your young child–a belt, paddle, or switch–“severely” such that the event is never forgotten by the child. You may also have heard, “don’t use your hand to spank your child; that is what you love your child with.” You are further told to continue your spanking until the child is crying softly, indicating true repentance. If you have attended such a parenting seminar you know exactly what I am talking about. Doesn’t the Bible say, “Spare the rod, spoil the child.”? According to John Rosemond, author of a must-read book To Spank or Not to Spank, that phrase is not actually in the Bible. Reference to the phrase “use the rod” is found in Proverbs 13:24 (He who spares his rod, hates his son,/But he who loves him disciplines him diligently”) and Proverbs 23:13 (Do not hold back discipline from the child,/Although you beat him with the rod, he will not die”). John Rosemond explains in his book how these phrases should not be taken literally but are metaphors to be interpreted as a symbol of parental authority.

The law permits parents to use physical discipline but not “excessive punishment.” What is considered “excessive.” Social workers, child abuse doctors, and juvenile court judges will tell you leaving bruises or marks is excessive. They will say “you need to learn not to use physical discipline.” Just because you and I were disciplined this way and we believe it worked effectively, doesn’t count in the year 2013 or beyond. Most seven or eight-year olds and older know that they can report you for child abuse.

What is a parent to do when they have tried timeouts and other non-physical means of disciplining their young children and it is not working? What about the seven or eight year old who keeps getting referrals from school for misbehavior and will not change his or her ways? I recommend the following 3 things:

1. Read John K. Rosemond’s book To Spank or Not to Spank. It can be purchased on Amazon or found in most public libraries.

2. The safest thing to do and probably the best for your family is to find a therapist who specializes in Parent Child Interactive Therapy (PCIT). These therapists don’t recommend spanking. We have received very good feedback from parents who have used this type therapist. I realize in many communities you will not have therapists who specialize in PCIT therapy. Then get a therapist on board for your child. Seek their guidance in your discipline techniques. You can then tell the child protection workers and police officers that you are following their advice. Make sure it is not one of the “spare the rod, spoil the child” type therapists. Despite my being physically disciplined when I was young, my children never received any demonstrative physical discipline other than a poke from my wife when they got out of line. They are professional, well-adjusted adults and great citizens.

3. Read the advice posted on our website by Jeffrey Selzer, M.D., a pediatric specialist in San Diego, CA, on “Punishment for Wrong Behaviors.” Go to our website juvenilelawcenter.com/resources/for-parents/ and find it under Resources. I am not aware of any publication by child protection agencies or prosecution agencies outlining what is and what is not permissible physical punishment. Dr Selzer emphasizes not using a “rod”; use your hand and do not give any more than 2 swats to his/her bottom and not on the bare skin.

Keystone Sporting Arms, a Pennsylvania company, produces Crickett and Chipmunk rifles for children. They have a “Kids Corner” section on their website. The smaller rifles are in different colors to market to both boys and girls. The company’s slogan is “my first rifle.” On the website are pictures of young boys and girls with rifles. The company also markets guns for adults.

Enrique Chavez, a retired Los Angeles police officer, was paralyzed from the waist down when his 3-year old son shot him with his service revolver. He is in the process of suing Glock Inc. claiming the Glock 21 pistol lacked adequate safeguards against accidental discharge.  The 5-year-old could not have fired the rifle if an effective trigger locking mechanisms were part of the gun.   Keystone Sporting Arms reports all of their guns have safety locks, and some even have ones that require a key.  According to the AP articles, the police have not released the model of the rifle the 5-year-old used.

Should the parents be prosecuted? If you make a dangerous weapon accessible to a minor without proper parental supervision, you could be considered to be grossly negligent. I don’t care whether you live in rural Kentucky or anywhere else in this country. Does the prosecuting agency where the family lives want to make a statement to other parents that this kind of gross negligence will not go unpunished? The family lives in rural southern Kentucky. Should the fact that this terrible accident occurred in a rural area excuse the child’s death? Loller quotes the County Coroner Gary White, “Down in Kentucky where we’re from guns are passed down from generation to generation. You start at a young age with guns for hunting and everything.” The parents will need intensive therapy to deal with their guilt as to what has happened. One can only hope and pray their family can remain intact through this ordeal. Their 5-year-old son will also need intensive therapy.

We represented a 16-year-old girl whose father gave her a .22 rifle as a Christmas gift. Within two months she shoots and kills two adults, wounds 8 children and a police officer. This would not have happened without her being given access to the .22 rifle. Most of the school shootings by minors in this country would not have occurred if the minors did not have access to guns. We have represented over the years a handful of teenagers who have shot an acquaintance and killed them thinking the gun they were playing with was not loaded. See our blog GUNS–ONE OF THE LEADING CAUSES OF DEATH OF CHILDREN UNDER 18 IN THE UNITED STATES, PART 1 and PART 2.

A two-year-old is now dead through no fault of her own. This would not have happened without the 5-year-old having access to the loaded .22 rifle. You as a parent must exert strict supervision and control over the use of all guns by minors in your home. It is your parental responsibility to safeguard your children.

1. The older brother Tamerlan, age 26, said, “I don’t have a single American friend. I don’t understand them.”

2. The uncle of the brothers, Rusian Tsarni, called the two boys, “Losers.” He relayed that they struggled to settle in the U.S. and they ended up “thereby just hating everyone.”

3. For the past five years, Tamerlan, the older brother, was becoming a follower of radical Islamist religious groups as was his mother. His activities in Russia got the attention of Russian security personnel. The Russian authorities contacted the FBI in 2011 and asked the FBI for assistance in investigating Tamerlan. Recently he got into a heated argument with a 18-year-old neighbor and espoused how the Bible is a poor version of the Koran, that U.S. troops are killing innocent civilians in Afghanistan, and “the United States uses the Bible as an excuse for invading other countries.” He had become more confrontational about his religion. He was told anymore outbursts at his Cambridge, Mass., mosque and he would be “out.”

4. Tamerlan’s application for U.S. citizenship was on hold. He was not chosen for the U.S. Olympic boxing team because he was not a citizen. He was married with a young child, but reportedly had no job. He was a community college dropout and was a disappointment to his parents especially his father. His younger brother, Dzhokhar, was considered by his parents to be a “true angel” and the smartest of the two brothers.

5. The younger brother, Dzhokhar, was failing his classes at the University of Massachusetts. He had been a very good student in a prestigious high school, was well liked by his classmates, was captain of his high school wrestling team, and was liked by an attractive co-ed. His residential adviser in his dorm reported “he talked about his brother in good terms.”

I recently attended a seminar on violence. Experts set forth that people resort to violence when they feel that they can wipe out shame only by shaming those who they feel shamed them. The most powerful way to shame anyone is by means of violence. The boys uncle is correct. The boys would be considered “losers.” They hate everyone and want to engage in violence.

What can we as parents learn from this experience.

1. Don’t let your son/daughter associate with older classmates/acquaintances. We see on a regular basis how a younger student is manipulated by older friends into doing their dirty work or fighting their battles. A young minor should not be spending time alone with an eleven or twelve-year-old. An 8th grader should not be associating with high school kids. Likewise, a freshman should not be associating with 10th grade or older high school kids. The maturity level is significantly different and it is much harder for the younger minor to say “No.”

2. If an older sibling is a “loser” and into very questionable behavior, a younger sibling should be told to stay away and not associate with them. Suppose an older sibling is a drug addict. Would you want the younger sibling/s to be hanging around with them? I don’t think so.

3. Be a parent. Parenting doesn’t stop at age 18. Don’t enable an older sibling who is on a self-destructive path to involve others. Banish them from the family until they are willing to stop their harmful ways. Warn other siblings to stay away from the older sibling. From what we know of the two brothers, the younger brother had a chance to lead a productive life if he had been kept away from the older brother’s jihad philosophy and his conspiracy to “shame” the United States.

What role the boys’ mother played in their turn toward radical Islamic beliefs is still not fully known. There is no question she became very strict about Islam and how she should dress upon Tamerlan’s urgings. Her marriage broke up about two years ago reportedly in part due to her fundamentalist Islamic beliefs and actions. The mother is wanted for stealing dresses from a department store and is subject to being prosecuted if she returned to the United States. Parents have no conception how their views can incite their children towards violence. The parents may be able to control their behavior, but their children may not be able to with devastating results.

We have attempted in a series of blogs to warn parents of the absolute need to put all guns in their homes under lock and key and only the parents have access to them.  I can guarantee you this story and far worse will be replayed and replayed ad nauseum if parents don’t do this.

These terrible offenses by minors would not take place if they did not have access to guns and other weapons that can kill. Parents blindly believe their minor(s) are not capable of doing such horrific acts. I would venture to say that every part of this country has heard these terrible stories of minors using guns to kill.

By allowing your minor(s) access to weapons YOU are putting them at risk for potential lifetime incarceration, life threatening injuries to themselves, their friends and others.
Educate your minor(s) to never threaten to kill or do seriously bodily harm to others.

Don’t fool yourself that minors are not capable of committing atrocious and horrifying offenses. Here are a couple of real cases where young minors committed terrible offenses without the use of guns. Two 10-year-old boys in England were convicted of abducting and killing a 2-year-old boy whose mother had left him at the front door of a butcher shop while she quickly purchased some items. The boys punched, kicked, picked up and dropped the little boy on his head. They sexually assaulted him, flung paint in his left eye, threw stones at him, beat him with bricks, and hit him with an iron bar. I recall one of the boys took out the dead boys’ eyeballs. When asked why, one of the boys reported “so he could not identify me.” The dead boy was left on a train track. Mary was 11 at the time of her conviction. She strangled to death a
3-year-old boy. The boys hair was cut away, puncture marks were found on his thighs, and his genitals were partially skinned. She imprinted the letter “M” on his stomach.

I have some serious questions whether a number of the minors that commit these serious offenses truly understand the gravity of what they are doing and the fact they are taking human lives. The enormity of what they have done does not impact them until after the fact. They are usually in shock for quite some time afterwards. The odds are your well-behaved minor will not do something terrible. Why take a chance that they or one of their friends will not do something crazy with a gun or other deadly weapon that has not been securely locked up.

Email us and tell us your comments. If you would like us to do a blog on a particular subject, please let us know. Share experiences you may have had that could be helpful to others. Visit our educational videos on You Tube at JuvenileLawCenter.com or McGlinn & McGlinn, Attorneys at Law.

When I read these articles it reminded me of the time I was present in a football stadium at the University of California Santa Barbara in 1970. Attorney William Kunstler delivered a speech to the students railing against the United States Government. There was a lot of student unrest at the time for many reasons. I left the stadium saying to myself that his speech will incite the students to riot. Sure enough what followed thereafter were students rioting in Isla Vista, a community located beside the campus and where a lot of students resided and shopped. Places were burned and a lot of damage done.

Young minds are very impressionable. My point is that parents should not assume your minor is not capable of doing something horrendous. The number of teenagers killing in our schools should convince you of that by now. If you allow minors access to guns or deadly weapons, it is likely they do not have the same maturity to control their behavior as more mature adults. A minor threatening to kill someone, shoot up a school, or do serious harm to others will cause fear to many. If there is a cache of weapons in the home, the concern goes up dramatically even if reportedly under lock and key. Tell your minors to never threaten to do serious bodily harm to others. Regularly review their texts, Facebook, and Instagram messages. Examine any computer they are using as to the sites they are visiting and emails they are sending.

I would like to believe that those who espouse warnings of our government going to war against its citizens can control their behavior; but can we have the same confidence that other men, women and teenagers hearing and reading this type conspiracy-theorist rhetoric will not be incited to violence.

1. School. All schools prohibit students from selling, furnishing to others, possessing or being under the influence of marijuana or any other drug. If a student sells or furnishes marijuana to others at school, they will likely be referred for expulsion. Possession alone, if a first offense, will usually not result in a suspension if the student takes a mandatory drug awareness class. It is likely the school will call and involve the school police. Depending on what occurred, Juvenile Court prosecution will also likely follow.

2. Grades. It has been our experience that a minor’s grades will significantly improve if they stop using marijuana. If your minor has a precipitous drop in grades and behavior at school, the first thought should be drug use.

3. Juvenile Court. Furnishing marijuana is legally the same as selling marijuana. Possession of not more than 28.5 grams of marijuana at school in grades 1-12 during school hours or at school-related programs is a misdemeanor. Health & Safety Code 11357(e).
Depending on how the case is handled in Juvenile Court, if a conviction is entered against the minor and an abstract of the conviction is sent to the Department of Motor Vehicles, the minor will have their drivers license suspended for a year or their ability to obtain a drivers license delayed for a year.

4. Child Protective Services. If for some reason Child Protective Services (CPS) visits a home and discovers marijuana is accessible to the minor children in the home, it is likely they will take the children into protective custody and initiate juvenile dependency proceedings. A medical marijuana card does not give an adult a license to have marijuana in their home that is reasonably accessible to their children.

5. Department of Motor Vehicles. Just like alcohol, if a minor under the age of 18 is found to be in possession of marijuana, they will have their drivers license suspended for a year or a have to wait an extra year to obtain their license. We have represented minors who were under the influence of marijuana and nearly killed themselves and others because of their dangerous driving.

Minors who use marijuana and associate with other drug users are likely to start experimenting with other hard drugs.

Condoning marijuana use can only lead to further legal and social issues when the minor reaches adulthood. If your minor is regularly using marijuana, it is likely that as an adult that behavior will continue. If your son or daughter has children, it is likely your grandchildren will be raised in a home with open marijuana use. Marijuana use affects a students grades; it can have the same effect on a persons job performance.
There have been a couple of cases where we have recommended to the Juvenile Court that our client be permitted to continue to use marijuana as a condition of their probation. In both cases, the Court did approve the minors continued use. Both minors had profound issues and had taken psychotropic medication for many years. They refused to take those medications any more. They found that marijuana use enabled them to go to school and be able to function in their daily lives. In both cases, they had medical marijuana cards and their psychiatrists wrote letters to the Court explaining that marijuana use was beneficial for them to attend school and stay out of trouble. Except for these two very special cases, we strongly advise parents to not permit the use of or the possession of marijuana by their minor/s.

Regularly administer surprise drug tests to your minor if marijuana or other drug use is suspected. Marijuana stays in the system for as long as 30 days. If drug use is suspected, don’t stop testing after a few clean tests. Repeat surprise tests until your minor leaves home. A watered down or diluted test should be considered a dirty test. Let your minor know it is not acceptable to use any illegal drugs. Be a good example to your child. If you use, it is likely your children will do the same.

If your minor batters you, call the police and insist they be arrested and taken to Juvenile Hall. Battery is the non-consensual touching of another without permission of the person. If your minor slaps you, pushes you, throws the phone and it hits you, threatens you with a knife or other weapon, restrains you, takes your car, or steals from you, they are committing a crime. When physical violence or domestic violence is involved, the police are most likely to intervene. If the police will not arrest your child, insist charges be requested from the Juvenile District Attorney’s office. Call the Juvenile Probation office in your area and insist on a petition being filed. I can guarantee you your child will not like being in Juvenile Hall. Once they have been there long enough, you will hear a different tune from them. They eventually will be saying they will change and behave. Talk is cheap. All the kids say they will reform. If allowed, some will revert to their old ways. Let your minor know in no uncertain terms all probation violations will be reported to the probation officer. The goal is regaining control of your house and of your minor. If it has gotten this bad at home, you will not be able to do it on your own without the assistance of Juvenile Probation and the Juvenile Court. You don’t want to risk getting too personally involved with discipline and being accused of excessive discipline which could result in police and court involvement for your actions.

I don’t want my child to have an arrest or a juvenile record? Of course you do not.  However, your child is beyond control and needs intervention and help now. You may not be able to do it yourselves and your best bet is to get them the help they need while they are still minors and can be handled in the juvenile system. Once they are 18 and they get into further trouble, they will be tried as adults and will have arrest and criminal records for life. The adult court system is focused strictly on punishment while the juvenile court’s mission is to rehabilitate and punish. The emphasis is on rehabilitation.

In the juvenile court you, as the parent, are responsible for support costs, attorney and investigator fees, restitution and fines, and psychological services rendered for your child. Depending on how long your child is incarcerated or detained out of the home, the costs can amount to thousands of dollars. However, if the court finds the father, mother, spouse or other person liable for the support of the child is the victim of the crime, the court can make what is called and Welfare and Institutions Code Section 903(e) finding. This means you are not liable for these costs. It is critical that your attorney requests this finding from the court.

The Individual Education Plan (IEP) is also an additional way to try and get assistance for your beyond control child. The schools can provide services, counseling, tutoring, non-public schools, and residential programs. Request in writing with your school for an IEP evaluation for your minor. The IEP process will be the subject of a future blog.

This family lived in a rural area southwest of Albuquerque. The Associate Press reported a records check by the Children, Youth and Families Department indicated no trouble with the family and that the 15 year old had never been in trouble with the law.

Tragic killings like this can occur in families without guns. However, the number of such killings are few compared to those killings that have occurred using guns. We have represented kids who have killed parent(s) not using guns. A baseball bat was used in one of the cases. A very similar case occurred in East County, San Diego, CA. where a similarly aged son used a knife to kill his mother and father and stab his brother causing him to lose the function of his legs. A fourteen girl old girl recently bludgeoned her mother to death with a hammer in San Diego.

WHAT CAN PARENTS DO?

1. If you have guns in the home, lock them in a safe or something similarly secure that has a lock. Store ammunition in a separate secure site. Do not allow your children access to the guns without parental or other appropriate adult supervision. This means they cannot get the guns unless you yourselves physically remove them from their secure location.

2. Do not assume your child would never kill. I can assure you most of the parents of teen killers did not expect their kids could or would kill.

3. Just because your child may be familiar with guns, shoots them with his/her family, and knows how to act safely with them, do not assume that your child will never use a gun to unlawfully kill. We represented a 16-year-old girl who would shoot with her father in the hills and knew how to handle a .22 rifle. One morning she shot and killed 2 adults and wounded 8 kids and a police officer on a school playground across the street from her home. I can vouch for the fact that her father never believed his daughter would do that, but he did allow her to own and possess a .22 rifle with ammunition.

4. Do not allow your or anyone else’s family to be a statistic of gun violence due to your negligence.

Write to us and tell us your comments. If you would like us to do a blog on a particular subject, please let us know. Share experiences you may have had that could be helpful to others. Visit our educational videos on You Tube at JuvenileLawCenter.com or McGlinn & McGlinn.

While America’s cultural tradition of individualism and determination are commendable attributes of our cultural identity, it is unfortunate that these traits of our national character have been usurped and skillfully employed by the gun industry to block legislation that would restrict access to guns. It would be an understatement to state that America has a gun problem. Considering how pervasive gun ownership is and how jaded we are as an audience to the daily news of gun violence and mass killings it seems to have gotten to the point that we as a society accept gun violence as a normal part of our lives. The fact is that the mass tragedies that occur with disturbing regularity, where an emotionally unstable individual decides to act out his violent fantasies and embarks on a killing spree are the inevitable result of our cultural obsession with guns.

If guns are in abundant supply and readily accessible, it only makes sense that people will use them. The use of guns and the undeniable social, economic, and physical damage that it does is without doubt to our society’s overall detriment. The very existence of our vibrant gun culture in the face of the terrible social injury caused by the proliferation of firearms shows the cultural power of the gun industry, whose highly emotionally-charged, yet irrational arguments that gun ownership is somehow intrinsic to our preservation of fundamental rights, liberties, and national character has usurped our national common sense and obfuscated the real issue.

The real questions are: Does a man need a gun to be a man? Does the proliferation of firearms and easy access to guns make America safer? Does individual gun ownership actually make our homes and our persons safer from attack, or is this just fantasy? Do we benefit from an emotionally unstable fringe element that feels that individual gun ownership or stockpiling dangerous firearms is some sort of safeguard against the tyranny of the majority? Isn’t armed uprising something we want to avoid and doesn’t it signify a complete breakdown of democratic government? Do we really want guns to solve our individual personal and emotional problems in society? Why are our politicians so afraid to take on the gun lobby and make the necessary reforms to deal with the public health problem caused by gun violence?

America certainly has a violent past. However, what distinguishes the US from other high income, democratic nations, is the level of gun violence that plagues our schools, streets, and homes. David Hemenway, a professor of Public Health at Harvard, examined the problem of gun violence from a public health perspective in his book Private Guns Public Health. Hemenway observes that our public health crisis caused by gun violence is a product of the easy access to firearms and a permissive cultural ethos where an extremely high tolerance for lethal violence is thought necessary in order to bulwark against state infringement of individual liberty. It is instructive to ask, if society is a whole is not benefitting on the aggregate from the widespread proliferation of guns, then who is benefitting from our gun culture? The answer: the gun industry, whose money funds the gun lobby, which is the puppet master that pulls the politicians’ strings and makes sure the puppets do not sign any legislation that would cut into the gun industry’s profits.

Pro-gun advocates reflexively consider any gun control measures as veiled attempts to take away their guns and use the 2ndAmendment to shoot down many state laws that would restrict access to firearms. While the 2ndAmendment states in relevant part the right of “a well-regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed,” this is typically ambiguous legislative language that does not directly say citizens have a fundamental right to own guns. The two interpretations of this are (1) that it supports the right of individual to keep and bear arms or, alternatively (2) it merely condones the right of the military and police to keep and bear arms in defense of the public. As many astute commentators have observed, it is ridiculous to assume that allowing individual citizens to stockpile weapons would in any way serve to strengthen a lawful, democratic society or protect us from tyranny. As Hemenway notes, if widespread access to guns actually promoted self-defense and security then America would be one of the safest places instead of being a place where gun violence is rampant and out of control. Discounting the random shooting rampages and mass killings that happen with increasing regularity, everyday gun violence in American cities like Chicago and Detroit is a serious social and public health issue that demands attention.

In recognizing the cultural tradition of the gun as the iconic American symbol it is of instructive to appreciate the origin of this cultural mythology. While pro-gun advocates will attest to the fact that guns were central to the historical experience in America this fact does not distinguish the US from other countries whose past is marked by violent struggle. Obviously the development of the gun is relevant in so far as a country’s military history is concerned, but how did the gun become such a dominant icon in the minds of the citizenry such that it represents freedom, autonomy, and masculinity. A lot of that image had to do with marketing. Samuel Colt is credited with being the true great innovative genius in the gun industry. Not only did he employ mass production manufacturing techniques that made guns, particularly pistols, readily affordable, he had a gift for marketing his product. His advertising posters helped to create and perpetuate the myth that a man was not a man unless he owned and could shoot a gun. Colt commissioned artist George Catlin to paint his legendary advertising posters that depicted classical images of the masculine, patriotic man and his gun. He creatively exploited the images of America’s heroic past and in the process made himself a wealthy man. He also created a cultural legacy that we have inherited to this day.

The image of the gun as a symbol of masculinity was perpetuated by Hollywood and popular culture. Archetypal heroes in Westerns and gangster movies played upon our cultural fascination with the gun and the god-like power of destruction that it bestowed upon its possessor. These fictional heroes acted out the public’s repressed fantasies of violently subduing its enemies in defense of a cowering and inept society. Even today gun violence is glorified in movies in socially irresponsible ways that perpetuate the ideology that extreme violence is an acceptable way to solve problems, resolve conflict, and assert one’s individual will.

Hemenway acknowledges that our cultural attitudes toward guns stand in the way of effectively approaching the problem of gun violence and working toward real solutions. Instead of portraying guns as cool, masculine, and courageous symbols of the archetypal American hero, it would be more responsible to show how guns are actually used and the results that follow. Instead casting the gun-toting individual as heroic, it would often be more appropriate to project the perpetrator of gun violence as cowardly and devious, often ambushing an unarmed, unaware public or shooting his adversary in the back. Most of the mass shooting tragedies in Aurora, Columbine, Tucson, and Virginia Tech have resembled the kind of senseless, systematic violence characteristic of violent video games. Our popular culture creates the image of the omnipotent gun-wielding hero, which is fueled in imagination by the violent video games and movies that flesh out this fantasy. It is the easy access to firearms that make these violent fantasies an unfortunate reality that forces the deadly cost on society as a whole.

In the debate on gun control it is unfortunate that we are locked into the paradigm where we mistakenly equate our ready access to guns with freedom, instead of acknowledging the real costs of this deadly legacy. Hemenway advocates approaching this problem from a public health perspective that seeks to minimize the injuries that result from firearms as opposed to focusing on punishing the perpetrator of gun violence and assigning blame. He argues that an intelligent policy toward gun control would not focus exclusively on the individual user but would direct efforts to more effectively regulate the manufacture and distribution of firearms and the gun culture that fosters the climate of violence. His mantra is damage control.

However, we have seen time and time again that efforts at intelligent reform and gun control are stymied by the gun lobby, which employs the 2nd Amendment and its current, amicable judicial interpretation to block these measures. The gun lobby, spear-headed by the NRA, is a very well-funded movement with considerable political influence. Pro-gun advocates are so intransigent in considering the need for tighter gun control and so emotionally charged that the current political situation regarding the issue of gun control is effectively at a stalemate. Just mentioning the issue will cause politicians to freeze up or throw out some lame cliché about more aggressive enforcement of existing gun laws. The gun manufactures that fund the gun lobby are obviously interested in protecting their bottom line and the only way to do that is to protect relaxed regulation of gun control laws. Any law that threatens the public’s access to firearms and their right to stockpile weapons poses the risk of cutting into the gun industry’s profits. And that cannot happen, as far as they are concerned. Not until social norms regarding guns are changed can this problem be effectively approached in ways that will enable us to resolve the epidemic of gun violence that plagues America.

A practical way of approaching the issue is to examine the costs and benefits associated with our current gun culture. The costs are obviously steep in human and economic terms and are often born by the public. The benefits, in real terms are negligible. How important is hunting in today’s world and how many ways are there to hunt besides using guns? Does the infatuation with handguns make society safer or does it merely create a climate of fear and insecurity? Is shooting someone an act of bravery or is it actually just cowardly and disgraceful? Obviously the gun is an important tool for the military and in the hands of the police to maintain social order but the mindset that individual stockpiling of guns is an inalienable right is too costly to sustain. The most telling question is do we want a stable society buttressed by law and order where guns are regulated and gun violence is rare or do we want a society of fantasy vigilantes, heightened insecurity, and regular eruptions of mass violence? It is about time that the current gun-industry-friendly judicial interpretation of the 2nd Amendment, where it is used as an impediment to intelligent gun policy, be retired as a relic of our violent past, so that we as a society can effectively deal with the very serious public health problem of gun violence.

This blog was written by David Kaufman a newly admitted attorney to the California State Bar. Email us and tell us your comments. If you would like us to do a blog on a particular subject, please let us know. Share experiences you may have had that could be helpful to others. Visit our educational videos on You Tube at JuvenileLawCenter.com or McGlinn & McGlinn, Attorneys at Law

All school districts, State Colleges and the University of California ban the possession, selling, and/or furnishing any pellet or pellet-type guns, paint ball guns, lasers, pepper sprays or instruments expelling projectiles. Included within this ban are Spring Air-Guns, Pneumatic Guns, Pump Pneumatics, Gas Guns, and CO2 Guns. Students face serious consequences for the possession and/or use of air-soft type guns, up to and including expulsion from the school district. This applies while on school grounds during school hours, during lunch whether on or off campus, while going to or from school, and during, going to or coming from a school-sponsored activity. In addition to school suspension and expulsion proceedings, the offender may be charged with felony or misdemeanor offenses. A number of cities in California prohibit the discharge of BB guns and air guns within city limits. Many cities prohibit the discharge of any firearm or air-soft gun that forcefully discharges any type of projectile, including metal or plastic BBs, anywhere within the city limits. As such, use of air-soft type guns is unlawful and the violator, whether an adult or juvenile, is subject to arrest and prosecution under the provisions of the municipal code.

Air-soft guns and BB guns are included within the prohibitions for imitation firearms as defined in the California Penal Code. According to an article published by the American Academy of Pediatrics, “Non-powder guns-ball bearing (BB) guns, pellet guns, air rifles and paint ball guns-are extremely powerful and continue to cause serious injury, disability and even death to children and adolescents. ” (American Academy of Pediatrics, “Injury Risk of Non-Powder Guns.”) “The Center for Disease Control and Prevention and the United States Consumer Product Safety Commission (CPSC) claim there were approximately 21,840 non-powder gun related injuries treated in emergency departments in 2000. Between 1990 and 2000, the CPSC reported 39 non-powder, gun-related deaths, of which 32 were children 15 and younger.” “According to the CPSC, 80 % of non-powder guns have muzzle velocities (the speed of which the object leaves the gun) at 350 to 450 feet per second, and 50 % between 500 and 930 feet per second. A traditional firearm pistol has a muzzle velocity of 750 feet per second to 1,450 per second. Eye penetration can occur at a muzzle velocity of just 130 feet per second. Of the non-powder gun injuries in 2000, approximately 12 % were to the eye, 24% to the head and neck, 63% to extremities, and 1% was to other body areas. Most were males.”
FN Herstal is a world-famous manufacturer, designer and supplier of small caliber weapons. The M249, M249 PARA, and the P90 firearms have been featured in various popular video games, including the popular Call of Duty and Battlefield Games. Millions of purchasers have been exposed to these guns by virtue of their appearance in these and other popular video games, famous movies and television shows. Air-soft gun dealers like Cybergun, S.A. and JAG Precision market and sell air-soft guns and paint ball guns which are replicas of firearms designed and trademarked by FN Herstal. You can also purchase Airsoft guns similar to the Colt AR-15 type rifle used by Adam Lanza to kill 26 children and adults in a school in Newton, Conn. These companies advertise heavily to entice minors and adults to buy their products because they look like the real guns. Some of these air-soft guns have orange or colored tips which can be removed. There have been reports from throughout the country of police responding to a minor with a gun, then shooting and/or killing the minor only to find out later the minor had a pellet gun which looked like the real gun. Countless robberies have been committed where the victims believed they were being confronted by robbers armed with real guns. The courts have treated those robberies as armed robberies with a real gun. In many of those cases where the gun was not retrieved, the defense attorney argued the gun was an air-soft gun or pellet gun. Without the gun actually being left at the scene of the crime, the defense has lost that argument and the defendant facing extremely serious penalties. In California, use a gun go to prison. Enhancements of 10-20 years or life imprisonment for use of a firearm can be added to certain crimes.

WHAT CAN PARENTS DO?

1. Do not buy your minor a gun or imitation type gun, especially if you live in a urban area. Where is the minor going to shoot it? As mentioned above, a number of cities prohibit the firing of any such weapons within their city limits. It is illegal to sell any of these imitation weapons to minors or to furnish them to minors without the parent’s express permission.

2. Use the Boy Scouts or similar types of organizations that have controlled and properly supervised use for these type weapons. We have had clients who have excelled in paint ball competitions both at the state and national levels. In those types of organized competitions, the participants are properly clothed, protected and supervised. The minors and their parents can participate together.

3. Each semester review the school’s discipline policy for what is and is not permitted in the school zone. Impress on your minor that they are not to take any weapon into the school zone. It doesn’t matter whether they find it in a canyon or a friend gives it to them and they put it in their backpack to take home. The chances are if your minor displays or tells anyone they have it on their person it will get reported. Your minor will face expulsion charges and criminal charges for the possession of the weapon at a school site. We have had many cased of boys who have left their knives in their pant pockets, taken the knife to school and it has been discovered by school administrators because someone has told on them.

4. If your minor has a gun or an imitation firearm at home, keep it secured in a locked box and secure any ammunition in a separate locked box. Only an adult should be in charge of the keys for the boxes. Any use of these types of weapons should be properly supervised in a controlled setting.

Email us and tell us your comments. If you would like us to do a blog on a particular subject, please let us know. Share experiences you may have had that could be helpful to others. Visit our educational videos on You Tube at JuvenileLawCenter.com or McGlinn & McGlinn, Attorneys at Law