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Reminder: You can't bring a loaded gun into a Boston hospital
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By adamg on Sat, 07/25/2020 - 10:49am
Boston Police report arresting a Dorchester man they say walked into Boston Medical Center with a loaded gun Friday afternoon.
The officers were contacted by BMC security after they located and recovered a loaded .40 caliber Glock 23 from inside a bag the suspect was carrying. During a subsequent pat frisk, BPD officers recovered additional rounds of ammunition from the suspect’s pockets.
Dana Johnson, 40, was charged with unlawful possession of a firearm, unlawful possession of ammunition and possession of a loaded firearm.
Public entrances to BMC have signs warning guns are not permitted.
Innocent, etc.
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Comments
False headline
First, obviously it is possible to bring a gun into the hospital because that's exactly what happened here! Apparently this person wasn't duly licensed, hence the charges. The fact that this happened in a hospital is irrelevant to the criminal charges. Anyone can ask you to leave it you're not following their policy, but putting up signs like "no guns" doesn't magically create a new law.
Not True
MA law prohibits guns on school property even if the owner has a license. Schools include Colleges and BMC is part of Boston University so it counts as a school as it relates to the gun law.
nice try but
That's not what happened here according to the charges filed.
BMC is not actually part of
BMC is not actually part of Boston University. They've even decided to get their own security services since they sold the East Newton campus and therefore didn't really need to encompass the BU owned buildings between that and the Harrison Avenue campus any more.
It's a completely separate legal entity, run completely separately as well. Over the past years they've been more and more dissociating themselves with the BUMC (Boston University Medical Campus) although they remain the primary teaching affiliate of Boston University.
You can't be this obtuse.
You can't be this obtuse.
I have an acute sense of justice
I have an acute sense of justice and know the law.
What we should all be asking is why was he even searched to begin with?
Service information
Most hospitals have policies that if a patient is being admitted for any reason two staff members are to take inventory of all personal belongings. Very detailed description of items are to be logged for the protection of the hospital from lawsuits and the patients protection of their personal belongings. With the patients permission high value items should be locked in a safe after being documented.
Also, you *can* bring a gun into a hospital
if you're a police officer.
My take
Yes, were the guy properly carrying the firearm, he wouldn't have been arrested, but an establishment is also within their rights to not allow firearms. He would have been asked to leave and return sans weapon, or he would have been trespassing, which is a violation of the law (assuming the step of noting that he couldn't stay with the gun was pointed out to him.)
Certainly: your property,
Certainly: your property, your rules, or get out--and if you persist then you're trespassing and breaking the law.
That's not what happened here though. The guy was arrested for carrying a gun without a license and associated charges thereto.
Well, yeah
You get a gold star for reading. You should go show it to your parents.
Thanks for the gold.
Thanks for the gold.
OK, OK ...
The reason I wrote that headline was partly because every time I go to Boston Medical Center (not a lot, fortunately), I marvel at the signs on the doors that basically say "Guns are prohibited in the hospital," because who would be stupid enough to bring a gun into a hospital full of security guards and cops and troopers and sheriff's deputies?
In fact, the guy could have been arrested on Harrison Avenue or on Mass. Ave. or, really, anywhere because, at least according to the police, he didn't have a license for the gun. That alone is illegal in Massachusetts (sorry gun humpers, the Second Amendment is not absolute, not even under the Heller decision, and you can't just wander around Massachusetts with a gun and ammo without a license, and please don't make me start citing all the relevant court cases on this matter, because you know I will). He was also charged with carrying a loaded firearm in public, which is also illegal in Massachusetts.
>He was also charged with
>He was also charged with carrying a loaded firearm in public, which is also illegal in Massachusetts.
Again, very misleading. With an unrestricted License to Carry (LTC) firearms, you may carry a loaded handgun in Massachusetts.
My point was precisely that most "no guns allowed" signs on private property are not typically enforceable by law in Massachusetts. The owner/proprietor can refuse you service and ask you to leave, which if you don't then that's trespassing, which can be enforced by law, but that has little to do with Mass gun laws.
And "gun humper"? That's unnecessary--particularly with such an obvious strawman argument as no one is debating licensure here. I'm trying to help you understand the law, which if you're going to run a crime blog, it would behoove you to understand the gun laws.
Wow, this is incredibly pedantic
Lots to unpack here, but to sum it all up, breaking a law also doesn't prevent you from doing that thing - it's just that there are (maybe) consequences if you get caught. Yes fine the hospital probably won't know if you have a gun in the same way that the highway patrol won't know if you're going 66 MPH on the Pike, but that doesn't mean that it's not allowed.
Yes
Distinctions not relevant to people who don't want to carry around machines for killing other people. Says more about the quibbling gun-humper than about the reporter.