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<br />
<br />Morton, Sherry
<br />From:Letitia Pepper <letitiapepper@yahoo.com>
<br />Sent:Wednesday, January 06, 2016 5:20 PM
<br />To:Melendrez, Andy; Gardner, Mike; MacArthur, Chris; Perry, Jim; Davis, Paul; Burnard,
<br />John; Russo, John A.; Geuss, Gary; Soubirous, Mike; Morton, Sherry; Diaz, Sergio
<br />Cc:Alicia Robinson; brokos@pe.com; Editor Press Enterprise; Kevin Dawson; Lanny
<br />Swerdlow
<br />Subject:[External] The Riverside Police Just Unlawfully Violated a Riverside Citizen's Second
<br />Amendment Rights
<br />Hon. City Council City Manager, City Attorney, Chief of Police and City Clerk:
<br /> Today's Press Enterprise reported that Riverside Police officers confiscated firearms belonging the the victim of a
<br />residential burglary. The confiscation was based entirely on the Riverside Police Department's decision to enforce a
<br />federal law that purports to prohibit medical marijuana patients, in states where possession of marijuana for medicinal use
<br />is lawful, from possessing firearms.
<br /> A Fourth District California Court of Appeal held that enforcement of federal anti-medical marijuana laws by state
<br />officers, which officers include state peace officers, is unlawful. (City of Garden Grove v. Kha (2007) 157 Cal.App.4th
<br />355, 391-392.) That opinion is controlling in Riverside, which is under the Fourth District's jurisdiction.
<br /> As the Court noted, a California peace officer has "a dual obligation to support and defend both the California
<br />Constitution and the Constitution of the United States. (See Cal. Const., art. XX, § 3.) [Fn. 15] This is because, as stated
<br />in footnore 15, "This provision of the California Constitution requires police officers to "take and subscribe the following
<br />oath or affirmation: [§] 'I, ___, do solemnly swear (or affirm) that I will support and defend the Constitution of the United
<br />States and the Constitution of the State of California against all enemies, foreign and domestic; that I will bear true faith
<br />and allegiance to the Constitution of the United States and the Constitution of the State of California; that I take this
<br />obligation freely, without any mental reservation or purpose of evasion; and that I will well and faithfully discharge the
<br />duties upon which I am about to enter.' " (Emphasis added.)
<br /> The federal legislation that purports to deprive California citizens of their Second Amendment rights for availing
<br />themselves of their state-constitutionally-protected right, under the Compassionate Use Act, of the medicinal benefits of
<br />medical marijuana, is not the federal Constitution. In contrast, the federal Constitution guarantees citizens the right to
<br />bear arms. Thus, (1) their oaths do not require California peace officers to support such mere federal legislation, when
<br />the holding in City of Garden Grove makes it clear that, under state law and its constitutional protection of voter-enacted
<br />legislation such as the Compassionate Use Act, they may not enforce any federal law that impairs medical marijuana
<br />patients' rights, and (2) the federal Constitution, which they did swear to support, gives all citizens the federal
<br />constitutional right to bear arms.
<br /> Given the applicable law, I call upon the City Council and City management to direct the police department to comply
<br />with well-established (since 2007) state law and to return this resident's guns to him. To seize them without any legal
<br />authority to do so, and to then retain them in the face of controlling authority that the seizure was not lawful, is tantamount
<br />to theft.
<br />
<br />Letitia Pepper
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<br />RIVERSIDE: Person’s home is burglarized, then he loses firearms to federal drug law
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<br />RIVERSIDE: Person's home is burglarized, th
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