Three Deputies File Suit Over Gun Law

Three Los Angeles County sheriff’s deputies convicted of misdemeanor spousal abuse sued Thursday to block enforcement of a recently enacted federal law prohibiting those who commit domestic violence from carrying a firearm.

Sheriff Sherman Block has stripped the three unidentified deputies of their weapons and given them 90 days to either accept a demotion to civilian status or tender their resignations from the force.

The deputies, joined in the federal court suit by their union, the Assn. of Los Angeles Deputy Sheriffs, maintain the law, adopted by Congress in September as an amendment to an appropriations bill, is unconstitutional.

“It deprives a law enforcement officer of a tool of his trade,” said their attorney, Richard A. Shinee, Thursday night. “It seems primarily directed against law enforcement and the military, since anybody else in the same circumstance doesn’t lose their job.”

But two attorneys active in fighting family abuse strongly defended the new legislation, which also bars violators from possessing ammunition.

“Many law enforcement agencies separate out people who are convicted of crimes,” said Abby Leibman, executive director of the California Women’s Law Center.

“Theirs is a job requiring an appropriate use of power. But these are individuals who have not demonstrated an adequate degree of self-control to keep them from hurting others.”

Attorney Margaret Henry said, “It is a question whether anybody convicted of spousal or child abuse should be a deputy sheriff, never mind carrying a weapon.”

The lawsuit from the officers, identified only as “Doe 1,” “Doe 2” and “Doe 3,” is expected to face an early hearing before U.S. District Judge Harry L. Hupp.

A spokesman for Block, Sgt. Ron Spear, said the Sheriff’s Department thus far has found that those three deputies are the only ones among its 8,300-force to be judged subject to the new law. The deputies were convicted of domestic violence infractions in 1991, 1992 and 1993 respectively.

He said all three have been placed in temporary positions in the department that do not require them to have a firearm.

Shinee said that the new law “violates the commerce clause and equal protection provisions of the U.S. Constitution,” as well as being an impermissible ex post facto law punishing purported violators for acts committed years ago.

He said he is seeking a preliminary injunction against the Sheriff’s Department that would also have the effect of blocking enforcement of the law by other law enforcement agencies as well.

The Los Angeles Police Department has not yet publicly identified officers under its command who may come under the new law.

Shinee charged that adoption of the rider to the appropriations bill represented a “political payback” by the National Rifle Assn. to law enforcement organizations that had supported gun control.

President Clinton at this year’s Democratic Convention, however, supported a similar idea as a gun control measure, proposing that those convicted of domestic abuse be barred from purchasing handguns.

The U.S. Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms specifically ruled that the rider applied to law enforcement as well as civilians.