trying to get my Class A but I am stuck

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Garden12

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Hi everyone, this is only my second ever post on this website, so I am newbie. Anyways, I have applied for an Class A in a town in Massachusetts and I have been basically denied. The Chief of police in my town is requiring me to get a physicians letter, stating I am mentally fit to get a pistol. I tried to get one but my physician said, " I am not into the whole gun scene" and would not write the letter. So I am up shits creek now. It's B.S. I meet all the requirements for an LTC. Never been arrested, most importantly never being suicidal or any of that mumble jumbo. I do have an FID card, have had it for three years, have been extremely safe with my guns. Also I am part of the local gun club. Making things worse he will not even look at my application until I get the Doctor's letter. I am willing to go court but it depends on how much the costs will be. Well with that said I would love any helpful suggestions or ideas. Also does anyone know if its legal what he is doing? Thanks.
 
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Get a new doctor. Seriously.

You have asked your MD for MEDICAL DOCUMENTATION, not a personal reference as to your character. All you should need is a letter stating you have no diagnosis of mental disease or defect that would disqualify you from gun ownership. This is no different than getting a letter from an MD to a scuba school stating that you are medically fit for dive lessons.

Present a formal, written request for this as "medical documentation"; ask for a meeting with the head of the practice (if it's a group practice) if you are denied the request for objective documentation as to your medical state.
 
First stop talking edit your post and take out personal information

Second CALL

Attorney Darius Arbabi
600 Worcester Road, Suite 504
Framingham, MA 01702

(508) 879-5879 (office)

(508) 626-0462 (fax)
(508) 395-6500 (cell)
 
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Rob Boudrie said:
Get a new doctor. Seriously.

You have asked your MD for MEDICAL DOCUMENTATION, not a personal reference as to your character. All you should need is a letter stating you have no diagnosis of mental disease or defect that would disqualify you from gun ownership. This is no different than getting a letter from an MD to a scuba school stating that you are medically fit for dive lessons.

Present a formal, written request for this as "medical documentation"; ask for a meeting with the head of the practice (if it's a group practice) if you are denied the request for objective documentation as to your medical state.
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+1. If your doctor won't write the letter, time to find a new doctor.

I would suggest contacting GOAL to let them know about the required letter. Also, I would take a look here and contact one of these attorneys to see if they can assist you in getting your license.
 
Rob Boudrie said:
Get a new doctor. Seriously.

You have asked your MD for MEDICAL DOCUMENTATION, not a personal reference as to your character. All you should need is a letter stating you have no diagnosis of mental disease or defect that would disqualify you from gun ownership. This is no different than getting a letter from an MD to a scuba school stating that you are medically fit for dive lessons.

Present a formal, written request for this as "medical documentation"; ask for a meeting with the head of the practice (if it's a group practice) if you are denied the request for objective documentation as to your medical state.
Click to expand...

Good advice. What if you needed it to work at Pilgrim Nuclear Power plant? Would he tell you he wasn't into the whole Nuke thing?

Try this guy.. dr nick.jpg
 
A few things things. Call GOAL (goal.org) and tell them your town is doing this. Get a lawyer (contact jesse cohen) and go after the town. Second, file a complaint with the AMA on the doctor. Base the complaint on Rob's post. Next, contact your town selectman and your legislative reps. Lastly, keep reading this site for info on 2259 and come down to the statehouse and testify when a hearing comes up for it.
 
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Of course, the time to get legal counsel in such towns is BEFORE one applies.

The decision to accept being abused or to challenge the abuser is the next issue to be addressed.
 
Trust me, I will not let the chief win. This is his whole point of making someone get a doctor's letter, to make it a pain in the ass (besides the fact I am almost sure its illegal). I started this thread to share with others whats going on and to get ideas. I would have loved to get legal advice before I applied but I don't exactly have spare change sitting around.
 
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Regrettably, nothing they do (other than those few groups of people protected by US law wrt discrimination) is "illegal". Under "discretion" they can make you stand on your head and spit nickles if they like, piss in a cup, give a DNA sample, etc. ad nauseum and very few if any judges will call them on it. They simply declare anyone unwilling to bend over as "unsuitable" and deny you.

Good luck however, I would like to see you win this battle and put an end to the abuse.
 
asox2000 said:
Trust me, I will not let the chief win. This is his whole point of making someone get a doctor's letter, to make it a pain in the ass (besides the fact I am almost sure its illegal). I started this thread to share with others whats going on and to get ideas. I would have loved to get legal advice before I applied but I don't exactly have spare change sitting around.
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Isn't this type of abuse what the " NES war chest" funds are for?
 
Jordo said:
How do the HIPAA laws relate to this sort of thing?
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I don't think they do. HIPAA makes it bad for others to talk about your medical history without your consent. It doesn't say a word about thug governments requiring you to give consent for that disclosure in order to exercise a right.
 
I looked into the HIPPA situation a little bit. I'm not a lawyer, and what I did find could be out of date.

First, HIPPA only forbids release of medical info without the patient's permission. Your "friendly" LEO could give you a form to send to the doctor on which you have to sign that you are giving permission. This might be a state/local government legal problem, but not a HIPPA problem.

Second, I found this (note it is from 10 years ago, and the law could have changed):

As an example: many state laws require hospitals to report gun shot wounds to the local police and specify the elements to be reported. The hospital must provide the mandated elements, but may NOT permit access to the medical record unless the statute requires it. If state law merely says that the hospital "may" provide access to the medical record, this is permissive language and not mandated disclosure and HIPAA would not allow access to the record without complying with other terms of the law for consent.
Click to expand...

So your friendly state legislature could mandate some sort of medical clearance that would override HIPPA, but I don't think they have.

Third, there is already mandatory reporting for some things, e.g. gunshot wounds.

Fourth, I did see that there was at some time a movement at the federal level to put lists of everyone ever admitted to a mental institution in to NICS (or some similar database) without any individual evaluation. I hope that was stopped since, inevitably, big lists include a high percentage of errors.

Most of the stuff one the web that comes up on a search of HIPPA and guns is about mental illness. I didn't find much of anything related to CCW. I certainly think that any doctor might cite HIPPA for declining to write a letter, and that an LEO would be way off base in denying a permit/license for that reason.
 
Look, if you can't get a letter or are unwilling, I fully understand and respect this. The chief has stonewalled your application. Consider taking this to court and arguing that it is a constructive denial which has no legal or ethical basis. The relation between a Doctor and Patient is SACRED. There are very few situations where this confidence can be divulged and it involves a judges order. Then bring it to the attention of Matt Carroll at the Globe. Sunlight is an amazing disinfectant.

Can't this gentleman get some help from the war chest for a lawyer?
 
"The Chief of police in my town is requiring me to get a physicians letter, stating I am mentally fit to get a pistol. I tried to get one but my physician said, " I am not into the whole gun scene" and would not write the letter."

If you asked your Dr for the above, I don't blame him for being weary.

If you were to ask your doctor for a letter stating that he is your primary care physician who has seen you on a regular basis for X years and he is not aware of, nor has he treated you for any issues related to mental health. I am willing to bet that he would have no problem doing this because he is only reporting facts and not making any affirmative statements which could come back to haunt him.

Regardless of your Dr's personal beliefs, I don't see how he can deny providing this.
 
The key is if you (the patient) ask the doctor to write a letter, there can be NO VIOLATION of HIPPA.

It would be when the chief queries the doctor for info on you directly (absent a signed HIPPA release) that there could be issues.

Since the chief shrewdly puts the onus on the person to get the doctor's letter, the chief (and doctor) are free and clear of any legal problem wrt privacy of info. And I doubt that there is any legal issues wrt said chief keeping whatever medical info so gleaned confidential either, ergo HIPPA doesn't apply to him.
 
I don't think my doctor has an legal obligation to write me a letter. If he does not want to write one, I don't think he has to. I did tell him that all the letter had to say was, "as far as I know, asox2000 is mentally capable of having a firearm." I did speak to a former doctor about it, thinking he might have been scared about liability. But as far as the former doctor knew, their is no way my doc would be held liable. So I truly feel the reason he did not write the letter was for his personal beliefs about guns. I have spoken to GOAL about my issue and I am getting ideas. My idea was to shoot at a beautiful gun range near my school, but it looks like that will never happen since I am almost done with school. At least I have a gun range back home. Hopefully, I will get the license sometime in my lifetime.
 
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Biggest mistake was mentioning the word firearm to your doctor. Think about it...depending on his experience, if he has ever worked at a hospital (ER, etc...) he probably has seen horrific sights of various patients coming in with bullet wounds. For this very reason I'm sure most doctors are not going to be pro-2A...hell my former doctor gave me a lecture every time I showed up in my motorcycle gear because they hated motorcycles "cuz they're soooooooooooo dangerous." You would have been better off just telling him/her that you needed a letter stating you are a mentally stable individual (the reason for the note is none of their business). My vote now is to find a new doctor
 
bhmax16 said:
Biggest mistake was mentioning the word firearm to your doctor. Think about it...
Click to expand...

The letter is REQUIRED to attest to the patient's ability to handle a firearm competently. READ about it:

The Chief of police in my town is requiring me to get a physicians letter, stating I am mentally fit to get a pistol
Click to expand...
 
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Scrivener said:
The letter is REQUIRED to attest to the patient's ability to handle a firearm competently. READ about it:
Click to expand...

Damn, I'd have to take my doctor shooting to prove that . . . after I taught him basic firearms safety, so he'd be competent to evaluate my actions. [rofl]
 
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Scrivener said:
The letter is REQUIRED to attest to the patient's ability to handle a firearm competently. READ about it:
Click to expand...

The OP's original post stated, that yes, the letter needs to attest to his mental fitness to own a pistol, however, that DOES NOT mean that the word firearm needs to be included anywhere IN the letter...correct? Therefore, as long as the doctor attests to the OP's mental stability, then by default that should attest to his fitness to own a firearm and mentioning the word firearm to the doctor or the doctor mentioning firearm in the letter becomes a non-issue, IMO. Unless I missed something else in this thread (which is possible as I tend to post a lot at night when I'm tired) the Chief did not mention firearm needed to appear within the contents of the letter
 
bhmax16 said:
The OP's original post stated, that yes, the letter needs to attest to his mental fitness to own a pistol, however, that DOES NOT mean that the word firearm needs to be included anywhere IN the letter...correct?
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NO.

As in, not even in the same zip code.
 
Scrivener said:
NO.

As in, not even in the same zip code.
Click to expand...

I will take your word for it, since we all know you're the professional on the law. However, I still don't see why the letter would specifically need to state the word pistol or firearm unless the Chief specifically told the OP it had to. Either which way, I feel bad since the OP has been blackballed by the Chief and his own doctor, and this is all the more reason we need a ruling such as the recent one in CT where issuing departments can no longer make any of their own requests in addition to what the state requires for a permit application. However, we all know H. 2259 would be the true hallelujah moment
 
bhmax16 said:
I will take your word for it, since we all know you're the professional on the law. However, I still don't see why the letter would specifically need to state the word pistol or firearm unless the Chief specifically told the OP it had to.
Click to expand...

Which the chief did.

As was so posted.

More than once.

RTFD
 
Given the OP's circumstances, I have to believe that some local doctors in the area must issue such letters. A few phone calls might find a resolution to this problem.

Running something like this thru the legal system is likely to take years, cost $xK and result in a very uncertain outcome. Chiefs know that it is cheaper (in $$ and time) to bend over than fight the system.
 

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