{"id":98467,"date":"2023-12-11T02:26:36","date_gmt":"2023-12-11T08:26:36","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/milesfortis.com\/?p=98467"},"modified":"2023-12-11T02:26:46","modified_gmt":"2023-12-11T08:26:46","slug":"98467","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/milesfortis.com\/?p=98467","title":{"rendered":""},"content":{"rendered":"

Hawaii Resident Challenging \u2018Suitable Person\u2019 Criterion for Carry Permits<\/a><\/p>\n

It\u2019s been awhile since I\u2019ve had to say aloha to new litigation in Hawaii. In our post\u00a0NYSRPA v. Bruen<\/i>\u00a0world, there\u2019s been all kinds of shenanigans that jurisdictions have been playing that keeps permitting systems \u201cmay issue.\u201d There are also pre-Bruen standards that need to be revisited, as is the case here. Any subjective standard in an application scheme is de facto \u201cmay issue\u201d criteria, and goes against\u00a0Heller\u00a0<\/i>and\u00a0NYSRPA v. Bruen<\/i>. Resident of the Aloha State, Blake Day, was denied a permit to carry for allegedly being \u201cnot of \u2018good moral character\u2019 and\/or \u2018suitable.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n

Drawing details from the complaint that was filed on the 6th of December, 2023, Mr. Day\u2019s alleged lack of \u201cgood moral character\u201d and suitability arises from what the Hawaii County Chief of Police stated was \u201cdue to \u2018recent violent conduct.\u2019\u201d The so-called \u201cviolent conduct\u201d is in reference to an incident where Mr. Day was forced to defend himself \u2013 with non-lethal force \u2013 while executing his duties as a contractor for a bank. The conflict resulted in no criminal charges.<\/p>\n

In January of 2023, the job Day was tasked with was cleaning up and securing a vacant property. \u201cMr. Day was led to believe (by his contact at Five Brothers) that the property had been foreclosed upon by Home Street Bank, the mortgagee identified on the Work Order.\u201d The complaint states. It was further noted that Mr. Day believed the property was vacant based on the information he received from Five Brothers.<\/p>\n

While Mr. Day was at the property, the owner of the property, Darren Rodrigues, Jr., who had in fact previously vacated the property, was alerted by a Ring doorbell camera that someone had entered the property.<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

Mr. Rodrigues called the police and then drove to the home.<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

Mr. Rodrigues aggressively entered the driveway at a high rate of speed. Mr. Rodrigues came to an abrupt stop directly behind Mr. Day\u2019s vehicle which had also been parked in the driveway. Mr. Rodrigues\u2019 vehicle blocked Mr. Day\u2019s exit and Mr. Day could not leave.<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

Mr. Rodrigues quickly exited his vehicle and stood by the driver\u2019s side door of the vehicle yelling obscenities and \u201cwhat are you doing at my house?\u201d<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

Mr. Rodrigues appeared to have something in his right hand and Mr. Day believed it was a weapon. Mr. Day used lawful non-lethal force, i.e., a pepper spray air gun, firing it several times in self-defense.<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

Mr. Rodrigues threw the object that was in his right hand, which Mr. Day learned to be a Coca-Cola can shortly after it struck Mr. Day in the face.<\/strong><\/span><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

The complaint details that the police responded and \u201cupon completion of the investigation, neither Mr. Day nor Mr.Rodrigues were arrested or booked. No charges were ever brought.\u201d<\/p>\n

In May of 2023, Day filed for a permit to carry through the County of Hawaii Police Department. In June, Day received a denial letter stating that he did not meet the suitability requirements in order to be issued a permit to carry. According to the complaint, Mr. Day suffers from no statutory state or federal disabilities which would create disqualifiers for him to own or carry a firearm.<\/p>\n

This is the same issue we\u2019ve been dealing with which\u00a0Bruen\u00a0<\/i>struck down \u2013 subjectivity. While many will concede that jurisdictions that have \u201csuitability\u201d requirements like the County of Hawaii and New Jersey, they have been issuing permits to carry \u2013\u00a0mostly\u00a0<\/i>without issue. However there are also a whole slew of situations where they haven\u2019t been, and the old guard needs to surrender their grip on civil liberties. Mr. Day unfortunately is being weighed against the subjective opinion of a government employee and not measured to an objective statutory standard.<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

From a memo in support of a preliminary injunction that was filed, the conflict is clearly outlined.<\/p>\n

At issue here is the Hawai\u2019i Police Department License to Carry (concealed and unconcealed) Application Processing Procedure Manual (\u201cManual\u201d) which precludes an individual from obtaining a license when the Chief of Police uses his discretion to determine they lack good moral character and\/or appear unsuitable. In Plaintiff Day\u2019s case, he is being denied his Second Amendment rights solely because he used non-lethal self-defense.\u2026<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

The challenged provisions of the Manual are unconstitutional.\u00a0Bruen\u00a0<\/i>commands that government officials cannot be given authority to use their subjective discretion to deny Second Amendment rights. It is also unconstitutional for the County to deny Second Amendment rights based on an encounter that did not lead to a judicial determination that a person is dangerous.<\/strong><\/span><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Attorney Alan Beck, along with attorney Richard L. Holcomb, filed\u00a0Blake Day v. County of Hawai\u2019i<\/i>. They\u2019re seeking preliminary and permanent relief in the form of restraining the County of Hawaii from enforcing any suitable person and or good moral character policies in the regulations.<\/p>\n

I reached out to Beck to chat with him about the filing and the case. He seems optimistic about the outcome.<\/p>\n

The County\u2019s regulations are unconstitutional because it grants the Chief of Police unbridled discretion in the issuance of permits to carry. Bruen makes it clear it is impermissible to grant government officials discretion as to who is allowed to exercise their Second Amendment rights.<\/strong><\/span><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

According to\u00a0the Hawaii District Court\u2019s calendar<\/a>, there\u2019s a telephonic hearing scheduled for February 5, 2024. I\u2019m doubtful that this case will make it that far. Beck has an impeccable record of dicing up unconstitutional law in short order and I suspect the County will try to settle without litigating. We shall see.<\/p>\n

We\u2019ll be keeping a watchful eye on how this case fleshes out. Regardless of tactics and means to the end, provisions in law and policies, such as the County of Hawaii\u2019s, need to be repealed and cast as an archaic relic of American history to join the likes of literacy tests in order to vote.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Hawaii Resident Challenging \u2018Suitable Person\u2019 Criterion for Carry Permits It\u2019s been awhile since I\u2019ve had to say aloha to new litigation in Hawaii. In our post\u00a0NYSRPA v. Bruen\u00a0world, there\u2019s been all kinds of shenanigans that jurisdictions have been playing that keeps permitting systems \u201cmay issue.\u201d There are also pre-Bruen standards that need to be revisited, … Continue reading “”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[23,8],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-98467","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-courts","category-rkba"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/milesfortis.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/98467","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/milesfortis.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/milesfortis.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/milesfortis.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/milesfortis.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=98467"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/milesfortis.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/98467\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":98468,"href":"https:\/\/milesfortis.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/98467\/revisions\/98468"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/milesfortis.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=98467"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/milesfortis.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=98467"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/milesfortis.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=98467"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}