I'm back from a fantastic vacation, and am grateful to Jamie for keeping the blog afloat while I was gone. Blogging is a lot of fun but it can also be a little bit of work, and it's great to have colleagues who are willing to shoulder the load when needed. Because I have a short presentation coming up about gun control in North Carolina, I spent some time looking at the legislation enacted this session regarding firearms. There are quite a few changes of note, so I thought I'd share the key points. The General Assembly considered a number of bills related to the regulation of firearms in the 2011 session. The most important enacted bill was S.L. 2011-268, Amend Various Gun Laws/Castle Doctrine, legislation strongly supported by the NRA. As the short title suggests, the bill contains multiple provisions, most but not all of which expand gun rights. Significant components of the bill are as follows: Repeals existing G.S. 14-51.1, Use of Deadly Physical Force against an Intruder, and effectively replaces it with new G.S. 14-51.2 et seq. The new provisions codify some aspects of the law of self-defense, specifically guaranteeing the right to use deadly force against an intruder into a home, motor vehicle, or workplace, whereas the previous statute applied only to homes. The new statute also provides that there is no duty to retreat before using such force. Amends G.S. 14-269.8(a) so that individuals subject to domestic violence protective orders are no longer prohibited from owning [...]
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