Plato wrote:I think you've kinda jumbled a few issues together there. I was not questioning whether a property owner (or person acting for the owner/like a manager) could legally tell you leave and have police brought to the scene to force it. But the police typically just arrive on the scene and repeat the command to leave and then your response determines if you get arrested.
That is what they do for simple 30.05 criminal trespass, like someone loitering in a parking lot.
No one knows what they would do for 30.06, because no one is ever prosecuted for it.
As for the second part it would depend on the scenario. If an employer decided one day to search all employees cars and upon doing so found a deer rifle behind the seat of some good ole boy's pickup and promptly fired him and told him to leave -I expect he could then just leave. If the PO'ed employer called the police and wanted that good ole boy arrested I'm sure the police could do it -but I'm not sure why your certain they would ?
in the first place, this would not be a violation of 30.06, which involves a person with a CHL having a handgun on or about his person.
An employer cannot simply search vehicles in the company parking lot. They can ask employees to consent to a search, and fire those who refuse.
They can also bring in the police with the infamous "drug and gun-sniffing" dogs. That is what happened in the Weyerhaeuser incident in Oklahoma in 2002.
That kind of search brings up some interesting questions. It is not a violation of law to have a firearm in your vehicle in Texas, so no probable cause exists for a search. A smart lawyer could make something of that, but the people who are victims of these activities can't afford to fight them.
For a 30.06 violation to exist, someone with a CHL must be found to be carrying a handgun on or about his person. Some kind of concealment failure or imprudent mouth-running must occur for the employer to find out. In that case, you have an armed person in a place where the property owner or manager does not want him to be. The police would arrest. It's what they do with armed people who are apparently violating the law.
Does a CHL holder commit an offense if he carries at work after watching a computer video "no firearms" policy. Whether you can get fired is not my question, you can be fired at any time without any reason. You can pretty much be arrested at any time as well -an arrest is not a conviction.
It would be up to a judge or jury as the finder of fact. Until that happens, the question can't really be answered. It's like Schrödinger's cat.
Many people have been arrested and convicted, and had their conviction overturned years later by an appeals court. I doubt any of them were thrilled about the process.
- Jim
