Ever since March 15 2019, the Police have been on a jihad against licensed firearms owners. They have also pushed for an arms register in the mistaken belief that criminals will start registering their firearms.
They already maintain an arms register for prohibited firearms, pistols and collectors, yet it seems they can barely manage to do that without screwing up.
I know several collectors who have been approached by Police inquiring about long sold firearms that are still on their lists. Some were even handed back in the failure that was the gun buy back.
They even managed to breach the privacy of thousands of those submitting firearms to the buyback process.
Prior to Christmas, we saw yet another reason why Police cannot be trusted with an arms register:
A gun owner says police shouldn’t be in charge of firearm licenses after they mistakenly sent him an approval for a license intended for someone else, with enough information to “rob them blind of their collection”.
The approval letter – which included the intended recipient’s name and address – was for a special P-endorsement addition to a gun license.
The endorsement allows holders to possess or use otherwise prohibited items like pump-action shotguns with a detachable magazine, or semi-automatic firearms, magazines and parts. Under certain circumstances, it allows holders to use these weapons for pest control.
The P-endorsement was introduced last year as part of a raft of sweeping changes to New Zealand’s firearm laws in the wake of the Christchurch terror attack on March 15, 2019.
The recipient, who wishes to remain anonymous, told Newshub it’s “pure luck” that the letter was sent to him and not a gang member, who may have tried to use the letter to rob the intended recipient of his weapons or access the endorsement themselves.
“I could have redirected his license to another address and used it to buy prohibited firearms, or restricted firearms,” he said.
“The worst-case scenario is that the police could accidentally send private information to someone who would then misuse it to acquire the most restricted firearms you can get.
“It appears to be plain carelessness. This could have gone to anyone.”
The man believes he got the letter because he shares a similar email address to the intended recipient – not because he’s a B-endorsement license holder himself.
Police wouldn’t comment on how the mistake happened, other than to say it was “human error”.
“Police acknowledge that information was erroneously sent to a member of the public regarding their endorsement approval letter that only provided the name and address of the successful applicant,” a spokesperson said.
The Police won’t accept human error from you if you infringe the law. They especially won’t accept human error as an excuse when it comes to offences involving firearms, yet they roll out the human error excuse when simultaneously breaking the law and breaching someone’s privacy.
They simply cannot be trusted to manage an arms register when they can’t even manage the one they’ve got.