By Denise Richardson Staff Writer
A website listing pistol permit owners in New York state has sparked a debate about constitutional rights, public information and privacy.
Any New Yorker interested in knowing if a neighbor has a pistol permit may check online at
www.whospackingny.com, a recently anonymously launched website.
The New York State Rifle and Pistol Association is working to shut down the website because of concerns that pistol owners will be targeted by criminals who will steal the firearms. The 70,000-member association had its annual meeting this weekend and pledged in a media release Monday to protect licensee's Second Amendment rights to bear arms "without the danger of their names and addresses being placed in the public domain."
But the Brady Campaign to Prevent Gun Violence supports the right to publish information that is public record, Peter Hamm, spokesman, said Tuesday.
The list is from records held by state police, who said the information likely was obtained through a request filed under the Freedom of Information Act. State penal law, which covers firearms licenses, states "the name and address of any person to whom an application for any license has been granted shall be a public record."
Anyone who wants to know who has a pistol permit can go to a county clerk's office and request the information, said Joseph Strnad of Oneonta, who opposes the broad publication on a website.
"This is an open invitation for Mr. Crime to come visit," said Strnad, a handgun instructor certified by the National Rifle Association. "It's nobody's business whether I have a pistol permit."
Pistol permit data, like medical information and Social Security numbers, should be protected, said Strnad, who this weekend taught gun safety and secure storage to about 18 women in an NRA Women on Target course.
Lt. Dennis Nayor of the Oneonta Police Department also said the accessibility of website information was a concern.
"There are people who could use it in an illegal way," Nayor said. A person with a pistol and no permit could be charged with fourth-degree criminal possession of a weapon, a misdemeanor, he said.
Hamm said when a state deems the information public, the right exists to publish the information. A citizen has a right to know if his child has a playdate in the home of a pistol owner, among other situations, he said.
"It certainly should be everyone's right to know those individuals are armed," Hamm said. "It's a First Amendment issue."
New York is among about one-third of states nationwide that allow disclosure of pistol permit data, said Lindsay Nichols, staff attorney with the San Francisco-based Legal Community Against Violence, which advocates to end gun violence. In Florida and Texas, researchers have used such information to identify felons who acquired weapons permits despite prohibitions, she said, but the gun lobby has worked hard to reduce accessibility.
"If this information isn't public, researchers can't do this type of work," she said. "This is really kind of tragic."
The Brady Campaign to End Gun Violence reports that in one year, on average, more than 100,000 people in America are shot or killed with a gun.
Otsego County Sheriff Richard Devlin said copies of approved applications are sent to the county clerk's office and to state police for record keeping. Callers have contacted the department in the past few days to ask if the website is legitimate.
"The bottom line is, it's public information," Devlin said Tuesday.
In New York, the Pistol Permit Bureau, established in 1936, has records of every legal handgun transaction in the state, according to state police website. Current ownership and the legality of a person's possession of the weapon can be determined, the site said, and at the end of 2006, information on 1,200,980 firearms was on file.
A disclaimer on
www.whospackingny.com said the records were provided as disclosed by the state and no representations were made regarding accuracy. Permits are issued, revoked and amended daily, the site said, and records presented "were extracted on or about April 5." An "old" list has about 900,000 names, and a "new" list has about 300,000 names.
A pistol owner in Otsego County and a local gun shop owner refused to comment Tuesday.
Lt. Glenn Miner, director of public information for the state police, said multiple requests have been made in recent years for the database of pistol permit holders, and troopers have no choice but to release the information.
"We have to follow the law," he said. "I don't know who is behind this particular website."
Tom King, president of the NYSRPA, said the server company for
www.whospackingny.com has told the association that it doesn't know who launched the website.
A request for comment through an e-mail to an address on
www.whospackingny.com wasn't answered by 7:30 p.m. Tuesday. The site suggests that visitors with objections to state law contact their legislators, and errors should be brought to the attention of law enforcement officers.
New York state Sen. James Seward, R-Milford, is the main sponsor of a bill that would prohibit disclosure of pistol permit application data, except to police and prosecutors, spokesman Jeff Bishop said. "It protects lawful gun owners from being targeted by thieves."
Seward has introduced the bill in multiple years, Bishop said, and the legislation and a like Assembly bill are in committees in the respective houses.
Hamm said criminals are more likely to pick a target who isn't armed. Pro-gun groups "always have some reason the laws shouldn't apply to them," he said, and gun owners who want criminals to know they refuse to be victims cannot say they might become a victim because they have a weapon, he said.
"They can't have it both ways," Hamm said. "It's hypocritical."
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