Gun control Bills passed in California

  • 02/06/2016
Gun enthusiasts look over Winchester guns at the National Rifle Association's annual meetings & exhibits show (Reuters)
Gun enthusiasts look over Winchester guns at the National Rifle Association's annual meetings & exhibits show (Reuters)

The California Assembly has passed a package of gun control Bills, including a measure to ban so-called bullet buttons which allow quick changes in the magazine of a military-style weapon.

The Bills, which legislators are pushing the state senate to consider this month, are among several gun control measures that leaders of both houses want to pass in advance of a gun control referendum headed for the November ballot.

The measures include a ban on so-called bullet buttons which supporters say allow gun manufacturers to bypass the state's prohibition on removable ammunition magazines. Weapons owned by the shooters in December's San Bernardino massacre were equipped with bullet buttons.

The Bill passed on the same day that the University of California, Los Angeles campus was shut down after a murder-suicide shooting.

Also passed was a Bill to allow employers, co-workers, mental health workers and school employees to ask a judge to ban someone from possessing a gun for up to a year.

The state already allows family members to seek such a ban, known as a gun violence restraining order, against relatives whom a judge rules are at high risk of committing violence against themselves or others with a firearm.

Last month, the California state senate passed its own package of Bills, which would prohibit possession of large-capacity ammunition magazines, require greater scrutiny of ammunition purchasers and seek to better keep guns out of the hands of violent felons.

Reuters