PA: Auditors want CHL holder names; Sheriff refuses

[ELB]

...so the auditors sued the sheriff, and lost the first round it looks like.

Perry County sheriff, auditors' attorneys weigh in on court ruling throwing out gun lawsuit

And on Monday, a judge backed Sheriff Carl Nace's preliminary objections to the lawsuit filed against him by the auditors.

"We're obviously pleased with the judge's decision, and it was the correct decision under the law," Nace's attorney, Joshua Prince, said Monday. "We're still kind of stymied as to why the auditors even sought this action in the first place."

The county's three auditors, Barbara Hench, Donna Jones and Kimberly McMullen, filed a lawsuit against Nace on June 11, and said in order to complete a proper audit of the county, they needed the full applications, including names and personal information, filed with his office by those seeking permits to carry concealed firearms. The sheriff told the auditors he can give them the financial data, but is prohibited by the state's Uniform Firearms Act from giving the names to anyone but law enforcement officials.

...

The Pennsylvania Sheriff's Association even filed a friend-of-the-court petition in conjunction numerous state lawmakers and Second Amendment groups, and was granted permission to be a party to the suit in support of the sheriff.

I read elsewhere that in Pennsylvania, providing CHL holder's info to the wrong people is a felony.

If memory serves me correctly, the attorney representing the Sheriff, Joshua Prince, also does legal work in gun trusts/NFA items as well.

[LDB415]

Sounds like 3 members of MDA looking for information they don't need and have no right to obtain, likely wanting it for nefarious purposes. Good for the Sheriff and the courts. Hopefully they will continue to do the right thing.

[Jumping Frog]

I'd love it if someone publicly posted on "The Interwebz" the addresses, birthplaces, dates of birth, SSNs, bank account, credit information, and marital histories for Barbara Hench, Donna Jones and Kimberly McMullen. Then for good measure, post the same stuff for their spouses.

[ryanj]

Joshua Prince, Esq has been doing a great job with this. PA has strong privacy laws for gun owners, so much so in fact that the privacy requirement even made the reference check for a PA LTCF illegal.

[ELB]

I read some more background on this. Interesting kerfuffle, got statewide attention. It seems to me that if there is an apparent conflict between two state laws, one would go to the state attorney general for an opinion?

I believe in past years permit holder info was publicly available, but the last legislature changed that to make it not releasable to the public, only to law enforcement (not sure of exact wording of this).

In any case, the commissioners for the county hired an outside auditor to audit the sheriff's office without getting the names and personal info of permit holders. That audit has been completed with no problems found. The attorney for the auditors says the outside audit is incomplete without the names; other county sheriffs have been quoted as saying in their counties the auditors do audits without the names. In some cases for years, altho names were publicly available in the past.

The commissioners also allotted $2000 to the auditors for their lawsuit against the sheriff (prior to hiring the outside auditor I think); the articles seem to indicate this has long been spent and then some, but no indication how the attorney for the auditors is still being paid.

Oh, and the permit is $20. $19 goes to the county coffers, $1 goes to the state.

[cb1000rider]

Kudos, Sheriff, Kudos...

[ryanj]

The fee varies by county but is generally around $20.

[Jumping Frog]

Centre County charged me $20.