JEFFERSON CITY, Mo. — Missouri Republicans have killed a proposal to restrict unsupervised minors from carrying firearms in public.
The plan had been included in wide-ranging crime legislation by state Rep. Lane Roberts, R-Joplin.
But GOP members of the committee he chairs, the House Crime Prevention and Public Safety Committee, removed the provision Thursday.
"I just have a different approach for addressing public safety that doesn't deprive people, who have done nothing to any other person, who will commit no violence, from their freedom," said state Rep. Bill Hardwick, R-Waynesville.
Roberts defended the approach.
"This is about people who don't have the life experience to make a decision about the consequences of having that gun in their possession," Roberts said. "Why is an 8-year-old carrying a sidearm in the street?"
Democrats agreed with Roberts.
"We are telling you, as the representatives and as people who represent some of these dangerous communities and these dangerous areas, this is an important piece," said state Rep. LaKeySha Bosley, D-St. Louis.
Minors in possession of firearms became an issue following the state's passage of "constitutional carry" legislation in 2016.
Sgt. Charles Wall, spokesman for the the St. Louis Metropolitan Police Department, previously told the Post-Dispatch that "under current state law, there is no minimum age to lawfully possess a firearm."
Wall said that Missouri's constitutional carry law that took effect Jan. 1, 2017, "eliminated the requirement for a concealed carry permit and allowed for open carry in the state."
He said the department uses the status offense of "behavior injurious" to "take minors into custody who are possessing firearms, absent any other criminal conduct."
Wall said the "behavior injurious" offense is not a criminal offense.
The legislation designed to keep children from walking down the street with deadly weapons was unanimously recommended by a bipartisan working group of three Democrats and three Republicans appointed by House Speaker Dean Plocher, R-Des Peres.
Democrats on the panel included state Reps. Marlon Anderson and Donna Baringer of St. Louis, and Robert Sauls of Independence. Republicans included Roberts, as well as state Reps. Ron Copeland of Salem and John Black of Marshfield.
