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Good job, 2barearms. I am glad you got through to someone who was willing to listen.

2barearms wrote: Well, you better go have a talk with the DPS then, that's exactly what I was told this morning and if you'd like his rank, name and telephone number
and the Trooper who pulled me over and disarmed me and ran the SN's of my pistols, I'll gladly let you tell him how he should do it. I don't think they
care to be honest. I plan on talking to his Captain tomorrow, this crap takes a lot time out my very busy day. I'm a Life Member of TSRA, Houston Gun
Collectors and Gun Owners of America and I've been in contact with TSRA about this and the suggestion was to try to work it out first. If this doesn't
get resolved to my satisfaction this week I'll take the podium in front of a hundreds of Members at the Houston Gun Collectors Association meeting
next month and let them all know what going on. Also know I have many close friends in LE in 3 jurisdictions, they'd be the first to tell you I'm the guy
you want driving by when some bad guy has you down.

PM me and I'll send you the info maybe they'll listen to another cop.

If I thought it would do any good, I would call the trooper for you and tell him exactly where he went wrong. But I have beat my head against that wall too many times. There are lots of good troopers out there that will listen, and some that support CHL, but they are not as common as I would like. I hope that you can get a better result by seeing his supervisors (I normally suggest starting at the sergeant and then working the way up the chain to the Colonel if necessary). The current Colonel is much more concerned about their relationship with citizens though, so you might have some good luck.

2barearms wrote:

chabouk wrote:

CompVest wrote:4t5, I don't know if you have your CHL or not but either way perhaps you should read Texas Government Code 411.207(a). It is a law whether you agree with it or not that LEOs can disarm you.

Sec. 411.207. AUTHORITY OF PEACE OFFICER TO DISARM. (a) A peace officer who is acting in the lawful discharge of the officer's official duties may disarm a license holder at any time the officer reasonably believes it is necessary for the protection of the license holder, officer, or another individual.

Nothing in there about running serial numbers, nor about SOP, nor about departmental policy.

Contrary to what you believe a Commisioned Officer can disarm anyone including other LEO during a
traffic stop and run the serial number of your weapon against the NCIC Stolen Gun Database. Welcome
to the NWO. If you refuse he probably will arrest you. I got pulled over Saturday and the Officer took
both pistols and ran the SN's, while I complained about it of course.

Man what's up with 4t5 guy?

Contrary to what you believe, an officer cannot legally disarm anyone as a matter of course. Given some articulable reason to believe it is for safety, he can disarm a CHL. Given some more reason to be suspicious, he may disarm almost anyone. But he better be making an arrest or have some excellent reason to try to disarm another peace officer. Other than arrests (or supervisors taking a weapon during a suspension), I have never seen this done in my career. I certainly would never have disarmed another peace officer unless I was arresting him. Of course, to be fair, i have never disarmed a CHL either.

chabouk wrote:The problem starts with being disarmed. There are two occasions when a peace officer has authority to disarm a licensee:
1. When he reasonably believes it is necessary for the protection of himself, the licensee, or a third party. (Government Code 411.207(a))
2. When entering the nonpublic, secure portion of a law enforcement facility, if properly marked. (Government Code 411.207(b))

There is no blanket authority to disarm every licensee, whether to check serial numbers or for any other purpose.

I fully agree with what Chabouk has said here, with one minor proviso. There is no definition in the law of what constitutes protection of himself or others and, obviously, reasonable is a great big gray area. So, until a court case makes it to the appellate level to make a decision, there is a de facto authority to disarm you, even if it is not de jure. In other words, you do not get to argue, fight, or even question the officer at the scene. Doing so will only confirm his opinion that you are dangerous and will be made to show that if this ever gets to court. The place to debate these things is the courtroom, either your trial for whatever he charges you with or his trial for the civil suit against him for infringing your rights.

And I really do not expect this to ever be settled in court since the good guys with CHLs won't fight or argue and the bad guys won't have CHL's. As much as I agree that this is a civil rights violation, it is a gray enough area that I doubt you could get a lawyer to take it to court. The chances of winning are just too slim (unless there is something else going on that makes it worse and this becomes just a sideline).

That said, under the plain view doctrine, he can run any number he can plainly see, whether it's your license plate number, VIN, serial number on the lawnmower in the back of your truck, etc. He just doesn't have the authority to force you to reveal those things so that he can check. Taking your gun from the holster in order to run the numbers is no different than making your remove the stereo from your dash so he can run the numbers.

This is also an accurate statement, along with the proviso. The trick to this one is that the officer cannot legally tell you to give him your pistol JUST so he can run it. That would be an illegal search. But if he disarms you under the authority given him by the law above, the numbers are then in plain view and are fair game. And if it does come back stolen, that search is legal and can be used in court.

Of course, to prove the case in court, they will also have to prove you knew it was stolen, something I sincerely doubt would ever happen with a CHL. Again, I have a lot of faith that CHLs are the good guys. You might end up with a stolen gun from another purchase, but I cannot see a CHL deliberately buying one.

Some side notes on running gun numbers. The serial numbers kept by the factories are totally irrelevant. The number on the gun is all that counts. The same serial number can legally be used on multiple guns by the same factory, let alone other factories. As long as there is some easily discernible difference, such as the model or caliber. Soem companies include the model as part of the serial number, which causes problems if the person reporting it to the police gives just the serial number part and not the full number. When you run a serial number, there is a good chance you will get a hit on a different gun with the same serial number. You have to look at the manufacturer, model, caliber, and serial number before being sure it is a hit. This has caused some new dispatchers and officers problems when the "hit" comes back to them.

As for drawing the pistol when the officer tells you to, that is exactly what you should do. It should not scare the officer since you are just obeying his instructions. Ayoob's rule is good advice in general but does not apply to not obeying the officer. He probably never considered it because I can't see him disarming too many CHLs either.

I never really considered the problem of unloading the weapon before giving it to him. I don't know how an officer will react. Ther eis a strong safety argument that can be made either way. If the officer is just taking the weapon and putting out of your access, there is no need for either him or you to unload it. trying to manipulate it when ther eis no need seems like an extra danger to me. The flip side is that not all officers know every pistol (I doubt any officer does other than Tackleberry), and the officer trying to unload and make the pistol safe is much more dangerous if he doesn't know what he is doing. I seem to recall reading about a new tire for an ATV caused by this recently. I guess I would say that it can't hurt to ask the officer if you can unload it, but then do whatever he says.

As you might guess, I have never disarmed a CHL on any kind of stop and I generally advised my trainees not too also. I will have to consider how they should react to some of these points, especially unloading.