I won't go into tremendous detail here as Bill Harriman is writing an article on it: On 28 April I appeared in Birmingham Crown Court to appeal against a decision to refuse to vary my firearm certificate. Essentially, I had applied to possess two pistols of 'aesthetic quality' under Section 7(3) of the 1997 Act and the police had turned me down. Their stated reasons were that in the case of one of the pistols (a factory tarted up SIG) that 3,000 of them had been made so it was so common that it could not be of 'particular aesthetic quality' and the other gun they contended (a Walther) could not qualify because it was still being manufactured. When we got to court it was clear that the real reason they weren't keen on granting authority was that it would "open the flood gates", to quote from an internal memo they produced in evidence: "The principle of this case is made more important because we expect to have our own 7(3) site in the near future, when further applications can be expected." The police had attempted to say that Home Office Guidance supported their view, but it obviously didn't and this internal memo said they had contacted the HO and the HO disagreed with them. Not only that but I had a letter from Richard Worth in which he expressly stated that he thought one of the guns did qualify! In court I quickly demolished the "flood gates" argument, with the judge commenting: "I'm not very impressed by this 'flood gates' argument." Obviously only someone with an FAC who is a bona fide collector can get the authority, and the judge pointed out: "The provisions of the Act provide sufficient safeguards in relation to public safety." The judge was also highly unimpressed with the idea that there can be limits on the number of guns: "I don't care if there were 3,000 made or 50 million, they can still be of 'aesthetic quality' - if Parliament didn't intend to allow that they should of phrased the Act more clearly." The judge also gave his view that the word: 'particular' at the start of Section 7(3) applies to firearms of aesthetic quality and technical importance. I disagreed on that point but the practical implications of it were unclear. The police contended that as the Walther was a mass-produced item it could not be of 'aesthetic quality' - I pointed out this was a very limited production engraved version of the gun. At this point the police started to get a bit desperate in my opinion, and started coming out with things like: "Well, your honour, if you take the engraved grips off the SIG, you will see that the only real embellishment is the gold-plating and inlaid lettering." I responded: "Well, your honour, if you take the seats out of my car I dare say it won't be quite as nice a car." Another thing the police attempted (not very well) to get across was that they thought the reason I wanted the guns was for target shooting, not collecting, which is prohibited by section 15 of the secure site regulations. The judge was highly unimpressed with this argument as he considered the fact that I had appealed "prima facie" proof that I was a collector. I stated in evidence that you would have to be "mental" to shoot the SIG because it was gold-plated and the gold would come off if you shot it. The police came back with: "Well, why doesn't he have it deactivated then?" An argument I demolished by pointing out that would be vandalism. The court then retired to consider their verdict. Much to everyone's surprise (most certainly mine) they ruled in favour of the police, because the court felt that the Act required the court to take a "personal view" of the aesthetic quality of the guns, and as I could not produce the guns they had to give the police the benefit of the doubt. This was despite my having introduced high-quality photos into evidence. The judge stated that they were two-dimensional and given that he was not a firearms expert he could not possibly form a view based only on a photograph. This was also despite Bill Harriman submitting a 20-page report giving reasons as to why they did qualify. So there you have it - justice in action. Steve. -------[Cybershooters contacts]-------- Editor: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Website & subscription info: www.cybershooters.org
