Peaceable Journey
Missed flights only inconvenience most people. A late flight landed Utah gun owner Greg Revell in jail for 10 days after he got stranded in New Jersey with an unloaded firearm he had legally checked with his luggage in Salt Lake City.
The Supreme Court could decide Tuesday whether to consider letting Revell sue Port Authority of New York and New Jersey police for arresting him on illegal possession of a firearm in New Jersey and for not returning his gun and ammunition to him for more than three years.
This case could be interesting. An opportunity to tell NY/NJ that, yes, the Firearms Owners Protection Act applies there.
January 18th, 2011 at 11:15 am
NJ sure is getting popular in a hitler sort of way.
January 18th, 2011 at 12:10 pm
Supreme court won’t hear it
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20110118/ap_on_re_us/us_supreme_court_gun_arrest
January 18th, 2011 at 1:18 pm
FOPA has no teeth. There should be penalties for government officials who violate its provisions.
This is another one to add to the list when some gun control con artist patronizingly says, “No one is trying to take away your guns”.
January 18th, 2011 at 4:10 pm
I met a guy who had this happen to him. The NYPD actually called his name over the intercom and asked him to step off of the plane when they landed to do a layover at JFK. He did, they arrested him, threw him in jail for 4 days, confiscated his firearm, and terrorized his wife. They were on their way to a wedding, which they missed, and he never got his pistol (a Glock 19 as I recall) back. Some lucky NYPD cop probably has it as his throw away.
January 18th, 2011 at 6:38 pm
The Supremes refused the case, and correctly. Although his situation sucks, FOPA clearly does not apply to a gun possessed overnight in a hotel. If FOPA was supposed to apply outside of a plane/bus/train/car then they should have spelt it out in the bill when they passed it.
As others have noted, you might be able to make a case for this on general 2A rights but not on FOPA, which is what he tried to do.
January 20th, 2011 at 2:20 pm
I believe the problem was: The gent had to physically take possession of his luggage, and he **really was** in possession of unregistered guns & ammo. The problem was the airline did NOT have his gear; he did. Notice the following sentence quote from this Miami Herald article online:
“He collected his luggage, including his gun and ammunition, and decided to wait in a nearby hotel with his stuff until the next flight in the morning.
“When Revell tried to check in for the morning flight, he again informed the airline officials about his gun and ammunition to have them checked through to Allentown. He was reported to the TSA, and then arrested by Port Authority police for having a gun in New Jersey without a New Jersey license.”
Read more: http://www.miamiherald.com/2011/01/18/2020958/traveling-mans-gun-arrest-appealed.html#ixzz1BbJeGIxu
I think it stinks, but he was in violation of NJ’s idiotic laws.