The investigation into the city of Jacksonville’s backdoor registry of gun owners who dared to exercise their Second Amendment rights at City Hall is still underway, but new details reveal the practice took place for almost two years before it was halted when it was brought to light by a city council member.
As the Florida Times-Union reports, the city started keeping tabs on those gun owners who lawfully carried at City Hall soon after the law allowing them to do so took effect, but the planning for list began before then.
One facet of the State Attorney investigation is focusing on a city document titled “Check Points and Perimeter Security” that spells out the city’s expectations for security procedures. Updates to that policy in summer 2023 directed security guards for the first time to use gun logbooks, according to documents and emails obtained by the Florida Times-Union through a public records request.
The addition of the logbooks happened as Florida had started to let people carry concealed weapons even if they did not have a concealed license permit. Florida law previously allowed residents to carry concealed weapons into City Hall and the Yates Building — except for council chambers when City Council is meeting — only if they had a license. That changed on July 1, 2023.
A document dated June 30, 2023 shows an administrator in the Department of Public Works approved adding a section on concealed weapons and firearms to the city’s security procedures. The section on concealed firearms included creating gun logbooks that contain identifying information about gun owners and their concealed firearms.
“At a minimum, record the name, state issued photo ID unique information number, age, weapon type in the WEAPON AND FIREARM LOGBOOK,” the instruction says with the capital letters for the logbook.
That June 30, 2023 document was approved by Mike Soto, who is the city’s facilities manager, on the last day of Mayor Lenny Curry’s term before Deegan was sworn in on July 1, 2023.
Though the plans for the logbook were in place on July 1, 2023, the paper reports that documents show that security guards didn’t start collecting the information on armed citizens until July 24 of that year, when the facilities manager officially signed off on the changes.
The State Attorney investigation is interested in getting information about the addition of that directive, according to subpoenas the city received this week.
The May 5 subpoena, which the city provided in response to a public records request, asks for all communications and drafts related to the document approved on July 24, 2023 and also an earlier version of the document effective Nov. 15, 2022.
The subpoena also seeks communications between First Coast Security and three administrators in the Public Works Department: Soto, Chief of Public Buildings Roy Birbal and Operations Director Steven Long.
A second subpoena dated May 5 seeks emails and text messages by nine current and past city employees related to specific keywords from Feb. 1, 2023 to Sept. 30, 2023.
This would appear to clearly run afoul of a Florida law adopted in 2004 that makes it a third-degree felony for a local government official to “knowingly and willfully keep or cause to be kept” any kind of list or record of gun owners and their firearms, however incomplete it may be. Violations of the law are punishable by up to five years in prison and/or a $5,000 fine, though I’m not aware of any prosecutions taking place over the past twenty years.
With the local prosecutor now investigating, that could soon change, however. Depending on how many people were aware of that the personal information of gun owners was being collected, State’s Attorney Melissa Nelson could soon have her hands full with cases related to the illegal record keeping. With the policy detailed in writing, and with Soto’s approval already documented, I’d say there’s cause for at least one criminal case to be filed, but that may just be the tip of the iceberg when it comes to the blatant disregard for Florida law and the privacy of Jacksonville gun owners.
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