If by some unfortunate twist of fate or bad weather your airplane, with your gun in your checked baggage, is diverted into either New Jersey or New York and you are forced to deplane, you have a big problem.JayStation3 wrote: The skinny? The skinny is my wife, my 2 year old and myself are flying to the northeast to visit family...
If you claim your bag, and then try to check into a flight departing NY or NJ, and notify the airline agent that you will be checking a gun like a normal person, the agent will notify the local police and you will be arrested for illegal possession of a firearm unless you have the proper firearms owner ID card from those states, which is unlikely. Although the federal Firearms Owner Protection Act should protect you, it will not -- neither the state nor the federal judges in that region follow the law. In the long run you might beat the rap, but you will lose your gun(s), spend time in jail, and be out a lot of lawyer fees trying to save your hide.
For example: http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2011/01 ... court.html
Although the gentleman in the above article was able to dodge conviction, he was not allowed by lower courts to sue the police for wrongful arrest, and the SCOTUS declined to take his case: http://warshawskylawfirm.com/lawyer/201 ... bl1727.htm Note that link goes to a law firm that may or may not be able to help.
There's another lawyer that specializes in these cases here: http://www.martinkanelaw.com/criminal-d ... ga-or-jfk/
(I am not recommending either of these lawyers, nor not recommending against them, I just ran across their websites. If I went that direction, I might keep their names and numbers handy tho.)
So what do you do if you get dropped in enemy territory through no fault of your own? I know of no fail-safe "legal" solution. People have recommended that you refuse to claim your luggage, try to make the airline keep it in their control and forward it for you on whatever outbound flight you come up with. The Third Circuit recommended you not take possession of your bag but try to get the local police at the airport to hold it, or at least the gun, until you can get on an outbound flight. Me, I would do everything I could to make sure the local cops never know I have any connection to a firearm. The only other solutions I can think of would cost extra money, time, inconvenience, and entail their own legal jeopardy because of the screwed up way NY and NJ and the feds treat our constitutional rights.