Illinois assault-style weapons registration is open, but questions remain about enforcement, other issues
CHICAGO (CBS) -- It has been one month since Illinois State Police opened up registration for assault-style weapons - as is now required by Illinois law.
As CBS 2 Investigator Megan Hickey reported Thursday night, there is still plenty of confusion about who needs to register - and just how the new law will be enforced. There are also real concerns about whether those questions will be answered in time for the Jan. 1 registration deadline.
The law says that people who already owned assault-style weapons before the ban took effect are allowed to keep them, as long as they register them before Jan. 1, 2024. But gun owners Thursday said they only have had some of their questions answered - and pending legal challenges could change everything.
A public hearing was held Thursday on the Protect Illinois Communities Act assault weapons registration requirement.
A familiar response from Illinois State Police legal counsel Suzanne Bond was, "We are committed to hearing your concerns and doing what we can."
The meeting Thursday was the first of three across the state to try to resolve confusion over the law and what it means.
Illinois state Rep. Brad Halbrook (R-Shelbyville) said at the meeting that many questions remain – including what the penalty is for not registering.
"Nearly every day, we get email or some level of communication from constituents about it," said Halbrook, whose downstate district is located east and southeast of Springfield and also includes Taylorville and Effingham.
Halbrook said he was surprised to hear Illinois State Police defer many of the questions about specific penalties - and how state police will go about enforcing the registration requirement to prosecutors at the county level.
Bond said at the meeting, "It will be up to each individual state's attorney in the 102 counties to decide how they will enforce that."
"So if that's the case, there's going to be somewhere between 90 and 100 counties that I don't think there'll be any prosecutions - unless there's a much bigger case to be had there," Halbrook told CBS 2.
State Police couldn't answer questions about what happens if legal challenges to the law are successful.
ISP was also peppered at the meeting with plenty of technical questions about which weapons fall into the assault weapons category.
Josh Witkowski of the Illinois Federation for Outdoor Resources wondered if the standard would be that a weapon would qualify as an assault weapon "unless the firearm magically appears in a field, and they use it only in the field for hunting."
We've learned that since Oct. 1, 2,430 gun owners have disclosed their assault style guns, accessories, and ammunition.
We don't know how many assault style weapons are out there and left be accounted for — but we do know a total of 2,415,481 million Illinois residents have Firearm Owners Identification Cards.
"I think a message at the end of the day is, I believe, hundreds of thousands of law-abiding citizens are just not going to comply with this law," said Halbrook. "I think it's going to be a problem for the governor and the ISP, and ultimately the legislature, to sort out.
Illinois State Police said they hope to have answers to some of the unanswered questions by the December meeting of the Joint Committee on Administrative Rules, which is just about a month from that Jan. 1 registration deadline.
State lawmakers approved assault-style weapons the ban in early January, and Gov. JB Pritzker quickly signed it into law. Before signing the bill, Pritzker invoked the memory of the July 4th parade mass shooting in Highland Park last year – which left seven people dead and 36 injured, and left a 2-year-old boy parentless and wandering around.
The shooter used a legally-purchased semiautomatic weapon.
In August, the Illinois Supreme Court ruled to allow the state's assault weapons ban to stay in place following a 4-3 decision.
