Oh sure now prove to me with an unbroken and auditable chain of custody that between September of 1994 and the day you arrested me with a "re-assembled" assault weapon that I did not have in my possession the required parts to retain pre-ban status.

These parts could be located anywhere on the entire surface of the planet now couldn't they?

Well Mr. District Attorney?

Thank you Judge, move for dismissal and I'll see you Mr. DA in civil court tomorrow morning.

Good-day all!

Mayday is right - you'd then have to present an auditable trail of custody dating back to 1994.

Don't think so.

How could you possibly prove, how could anyone prove that while you slept or were away at work someone didn't disassemble your rifle's pre-ban features and then put them back 3 minutes later?

This is the kind of proof required in a court of law. If evidence is "lost" - a broken train of custody - it's worthless.

I think when the political climate is right, they will be knocking on (or down) doors. If the BATF can make up, issue, interpret, and enforce unconstitutional laws, there is a problem. The groundwork is in place. Not to mention the way some innocent gun owners have been abused in the past. Amazing how far out of control it has gotten already and we still try to comply...so far.

So if you get sited for speeding driving a car with the ability to excede the speed limit your defense would be to prove that the car couldn't possibly do 76 miles an hour.

Prove to me that last Wednesday while you were at work my team of experts didn't break into your home by-passing your alarm systems, drugging your guard dogs, and then carefully cracking open your safe. I then removed the pre-ban features of your rifle for 27 minutes before returning them back, closing the safe, awakening your dogs and re-activating your alarm system.

Under your interpetation of the laws you are guilty if you can not prove that this did not happen. Comrade let me introduce you to Bubba.

This is an impossible task and like arguing how many angels can dance on the head of a pin a waste of time.

Although the likeliness of being tried for such an offense is probably small, I can almost guarantee you that I would have been charged with having a an SAW as defined in 921(a)(30)if I had so much as a Bayo-Lug on my AR15 when they confiscated it. Because many LEOS here are not well informed with respect to firearms law, they would rather take your weapon and then try to make a case against you later. If your weapon is grandfathered and you have good paperwork, it should be no problem. Hopefully where you live it is more pro-gun, but in my town they would rather take your legally owned rifle away from you and have you go to court to get it back. My whole point is that it may be a lot easier than you think to be tried for these type of offenses. Thank GOD that my rifle was a postban, or I would most likely be facing very serious charges today.

I am a little confused about something. If the police stop you and find a possible SAW in your possession, does the BATF have to bring you up on charges or can your local DA/prosecutor charge you himself? Thanks.

The NYS AW law is worded a little diffferent than the fed law from what I recall. It can be a little confusing to a non-lawyer like myself. Thanks.

So then according to this thread if you have a pre-ban serial numbered lower you are required to prove before a court of law that it was fully assembled or that you had the required parts every second of every minute of every hour of every day of every week of every month of every year since the ban? You may have 7 years worth of surveillance tapes to display? Does anyone here understand the where the burden of proof lies and what the rules of evidence are?

I would assume that if the burden of proof is equal to that in other criminal trials. There is no way in hell that [b]anyone[/b] on this planet could possibly prove this much like proving how many angels dancing on pinheads.

The only way the government could prove that a pre-ban serial number receiver sold before Sept of '94 remained unassembled is to have had it under surveillance 7 x 24 from the moment of sale until midnight when the law went into effect. If they lost sight of it for meer moments how could they possibly prove that it wasn't quickly and carefully assembled into a rifle before disassembling it for storage?

If as one poster said that it's the citizens of these United States right to be guilty until proven innocent and as I stated above, no civilian is going to be able to prove that he maintained possession of pre-ban parts for every second that has pasted since 1994 so show me the convictions. There would be millions of us with pre-1994 rifles that couldn't prove that the rifle remained assemblied with all the money in Bill Gates piggy bank to defend us.

Again how could the government PROVE that I don't have my pre-ban parts buried in a box behind my out-house in Udon Thani Thailand? Remember comrade that this is still the Soviet Socialist Republik where the citizen is considered guilty until proven innocent - oh wait that's wrong. I'm in the formerly free states of America.

You paranoid types are cracking me up. Have you ever spent time in court and followed the rules of evidence? I'm not a lawyer (thank's to a head blow when I was young) but I do understand the law and have had to spend more than a couple of weeks in criminal court.

If the law states that you have to maintain the parts of a pre-ban at every instant since whenever we're f'ed and it's time to start voting from the rooftops as the founding concepts of our system of laws has just been changed 180 degrees without anyone but you noticing it.

Ah, so if the BATF bought a pre-ban rifle that had been assembled and sold as an assualt weapon and then stripped it of its parts and then sold it as a stripped legal post-ban lower to you and you didn't already own the required parts (in any location on the planet), [b]and[/b] the government could prove it, then you would be guilty.

Makes sense now.