After two attempts, legislation has passed the state Senate that would require a police officer responding to a domestic violence to take temporary custody of firearms readily visible in the home.

S.1985 has not yet passed the state Assembly, but was passed by a 37-20 vote in the state Senate recently. Sponsored by Sen. Pete Harckham, D-Peekskill, the legislation would amend the Criminal Procedure Law to require a police officer who responds to a report of a family offense to take temporary custody of a firearm or other weapons within plain sight or is discovered pursuant to a consensual or other lawful search and any license to carry, possess, repair and dispose of such weapon issued to the person arrested or suspected of such family offense.

Weapons seized would be returned in four days as long as there is no order prohibiting the owner from possessing such a weapon or license or pending criminal charges or convictions that would prevent the owner from possessing such a weapon or license.

“The Safe Homes Act of 2020 provides police officers answering a domestic violence call the option to remove firearms in plain sight or discovered pursuant to a consensual or other lawful search. This legislation seeks to provide further protections to victims by mandating police officers seize firearms in plain sight during a domestic violence call and any license to carry, that is in the possession of any person arrested on the suspicion of such family offense,” Harckham wrote in his legislative justification.

Harckham said in his legislative justification that his legislation is necessary to ensure that firearms do not return to dangerous hands before the courts have had sufficient time to file any necessary charges to protect domestic violence victims.

Republicans in the state Senate voted against the measure en masse, including state Sen. George Borrello, R-Sunset Bay. Borrello said in his comments on the Senate floor that the legislation goes a step too far by taking firearms from those who aren’t accused of a crime while too quickly releasing those accused of domestic violence back into the public.

“Here’s the issue for me, unfortunately thanks to bail reform we release the domestic abusers with an appearance ticket,” Borrello said. “We’re going to seize the weapons. It sounds like a good idea, except this bill has a flaw, and that flaw is that the victim’s firearm can also be seized. So we’re going to release the criminal and also take the weapon away from the abused. That’s a problem. We should just be putting the criminals in jail where they belong, not releasing them.”