Kansas law backsliding

[Charlie_K]

So according to Critter, HB 2578 has made it to Governor Brownback's desk. And according to Presz the following language was included in the bill:

"Daggers, dirks, dangerous knives, straight-edged razors, and stilettos are added to the list of prohibited weapons, and the possession of any such dangerous weapon with the intent to use it against another person now constitute the crime of criminal use of a weapon."

But I've been searching, and searching, and searching all of HB 2578, and I can find absolutely ZERO mention of anything related to knives, daggers, dirks, stilettos, straight razors and such. Can somebody PLEASE point me to exactly where these items are mentioned in the bill? I'm sick and ****ing tired of being told that it's there, but not seeing it when I try to read the bill myself.

Because if Presz is correct about this latest development, then I want to know exactly why Knife Rights didn't fight against the passage of this blatantly terrible bill in the first place, and instead allowed for the hard earned victory of last year to be completely undone, and let Kansas wind up back at square one all over again. If this is really how it is then now some of us are really screwed. How did this **** up come about developing, and why wasn't it stopped? How come in all the updates we got about the bill, this prohibition on daggers, dirks and "dangerous knives" never once got mentioned?

 

[Critter]

It would be nice if legislation was simple and straightforward, but often it isn't. Let me be clear upfront that the intent language that was added to our bill was done without Knife Rights’ knowledge or agreement, and we are not happy about it.

Knife Rights Knife Law Preemption fix in Kansas was necessary because of an adverse opinion by the Kansas Attorney General on last year's comprehensive knife law reform bill which stated that ordinances existing on the day of enactment would be grandfathered.

We came up with a simple fix which our sponsor filed. At the same time as our bill was submitted a major gun bill was moving through the legislature. Our bill stalled and we were offered an opportunity to add our Knife Law Preemption fix to the big gun bill, as otherwise there was a little to no chance we would get the bill done this year. We accepted. Our language was added to the gun bill, intact and with nothing about "intent."

While in conference committee about 25 amendments were made to the gun bill. When the gun bill sponsor was in the final negotiations there was major opposition to our Knife Law Preemption fix from law enforcement and prosecutors who were not happy that the original bill last year deleted the "intent" part of the law.

Unfortunately, the sponsor of the underlying gun bill did not consult with us and agreed to the amendment on his own. This was done without Knife Rights’ knowledge or agreement. He never told us or our original sponsor about the addition and as a result we only found out about it when the engrossed version of the bill was finally published.

Most critically, this bill does fix the AG's opinion, repealing all local knife laws and preventing new ones from being enacted. That part is a huge win that affects many Kansans.

As to this unwelcome addition, it DOES NOT create a POSSESSION prohibition, which we got repealed last year.

This language that law enforcement and prosecutors insisted upon clarifies that the protections afforded by the state’s revised knife laws do not apply to someone acting with criminal intent against another person. While we don't like it being there, the intent language that was added is actually very narrow, only applying to crimes against other people.

We will be taking a hard look at what we can do to fix this going forward.

The governor is expected to sign this bill shortly. I hope this helps explain what happened and how we got here. Kansas knife owners will still be in a far better place than they were previously with the patchwork of local restrictions voided.