Bill Extending Assault Gun Deadline Passes Committee : Legislation: Measure would allow owners who failed to register weapons an extra 90 days without threat of punishment. Proposal by National Rifle Assn. and other groups for more time is defeated.

Legislation “forgiving” assault gun owners who failed to register their weapons by the Jan. 1 deadline and offering them an extra 90 days to do so without the threat of criminal punishment won approval at its first legislative hearing Wednesday.

The bill, sponsored by Republican Atty. Gen. Dan Lungren and carried by Senate leader David A. Roberti (D-Los Angeles), was proposed last month in the wake of the massive failure of owners to register their combat-style semi-automatic firearms.

While approving the Roberti bill on a 6-0 vote, the Senate Judiciary Committee rejected a measure backed by the National Rifle Assn. and other gun owner organizations to give assault gun owners until next Jan. 1 to register their weapons. The Roberti plan went to the Appropriations Committee, the last stop before expected approval by the Senate.

The bill, however, is likely to face stiff opposition in the Assembly from Democrats who have suggested privately that their support hinges on the addition of other semi-automatics to a list of nearly 60 assault guns included in the 1989 assault gun ban. Possession of these weapons is prohibited in California unless they are registered.

Sen. Ed Davis (R-Santa Clarita), a member of the Judiciary Committee and a former Los Angeles police chief who steadfastly opposes registration, suggested that giving gun owners 90 days more to register their firearms will have little impact. He told the hearing that some gun owners would never register their arms because the ban on assault guns had created “distrust among gun owners in California.”

If a period of “forgiveness” needs to be enacted, Davis said, “six months is better than 90 days. I think it takes time to turn a revolution around.”

Under the ban, owners of such legally acquired assault weapons as high-capacity Uzis, AK-47s and AR15s were given 18 months or until last Jan. 1 to register them or face stiff fines or possible prison sentences. However, only a relative handful of those who own the estimated 300,000 such guns statewide complied.

Lungren blamed failure by local police agencies and his own Department of Justice under his Democratic predecessor, John K. Van de Kamp, to adequately publicize the registration requirement. Some gun owners indicated they had merely procrastinated too long. Others said they tried to register their weapons but were rebuffed by police. One top NRA official suggested that the failure to comply represented a demonstration of civil disobedience against what many gun enthusiasts consider an unjust law.

Roberti conceded that this may be the first time the Legislature offered “forgiveness” to people who had broken a criminal law. But he insisted that a 90-day extension of registration would encourage compliance.

“Implementation of the law is more important than the precedent,” he said.

Lungren testified that although only about 5,200 assault weapons had been registered a month before the Dec. 31 deadline, a flood of registrations during December brought the total to 24,160. He said a backlog of unprocessed registrations would bring the total to 30,000.

The bill also would order the Justice Department to embark on a program to publicize the extension period. Lungren said he is developing such a campaign, which would include public service announcements for broadcast and posters that will hang in the stores of licensed gun dealers.

Roberti told the committee his bill was drafted to assure that owners who sought to register their assault guns during the 90-day period could do so without fear that they would be prosecuted for possession of an illegal firearm. But he said other provisions of the 1989 ban remain “in full force and effect.”

As an “urgency” bill, the Roberti proposal would become effective as soon as it was signed into law, perhaps in April or May. No witnesses from gun owner organizations opposed the Roberti bill, but they favored the extension of the registration deadline until 1992 as proposed in the bill by Sen. Don Rogers (R-Bakersfield).