Tennessee has long had a law (Tenn. Code Ann. 39-17-1306) which until 2017 prohibited weapons in “while inside any room in which judicial proceedings are in progress”. Frankly, most people understood that ordinary citizens could not take a gun into a courtroom if the court was in session.
As a result of an amendment offered in 2017 by Rep. William Lamberth (R.) and Sen. John Stevens (R.), the “courtroom” language was deleted and the prohibition now reads “while inside any building in which judicial proceedings are in progress”. Thus, the prohibition was massively expanded to include the entire building. With this expansion, for which there was no apparent need, there is no “notice” or “posting” requirement. A violation is a Class E felony.
Representative Terri Lynn Weaver worked with concerns raised by Tennessee Firearms Association and sought an Attorney General opinion to better understand the new language and to assess what kind of legislative changes need to be made to fix this mess.
On June 18, 2019, the Attorney General answered those questions in Opinion 19-07. The opinion illustrates how bad the legislative policy that Lamberth and Stevens carried into effect really is.
For example, according to the opinion, it may be a Class E felony for a gun owner, even a permit holder, to carry the firearm anywhere in the “building” even if there is no posting so long as the individual acted “intentionally, knowingly or recklessly” and so long as some kind of judicial proceedings or hearings (even if not in a courtroom) were taking place. Thus, the individual might be going to a clerk’s office, to register to vote, to record a deed, or any number of other activities that do not even involve the court system and still be charged with a felony. But, if there were no “court proceedings” in progress anywhere in the building the exact same conduct by the individual could be perfectly legal.
Further, people who work in the building – for example the mayor or other elected officials or their staffs – might be able to have their personal firearms in the “building” on days or at times where no court proceedings are being conducting but at other times the same conduct could result in felony charges.
This opinion shows once again that the Republican controlled Legislature over the last 9 years is not 2nd Amendment friendly. It shows that these Legislators perhaps intentionally, knowingly or reckless are writing bad and confusing laws that create potentially serious criminal problems for otherwise law abiding citizens. It shows that there are numerous statutory problems that need and have needed to be addressed and corrected rather than continually being made worse.
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