From Maryland State Police:
Marylanders who have submitted handgun purchase applications on or before September 30 will not be required to obtain a handgun qualification license, as required by the new law that is set to take effect on Oct. 1.
The new law that takes effect in Maryland on October 1 states that a handgun may not be sold, rented, or transferred unless the purchaser, lessee, or transferee has a valid handgun qualification license.
The Maryland State Police (MSP) will not enforce the requirements of the new law with respect to applicants whose applications are pending as of October 1. It was widely understood that the new requirements would not be enforced as to applications that were pending before October 1. In light of the number of currently pending applications—resulting from the unprecedented spike in new applications in recent months—it is a fair, reasoned, and appropriate result for those who are waiting for their pending purchase applications to be processed.
Persons who submit purchase applications on or after October 1, 2013, unless otherwise exempted by law, will be required to apply for and obtain a handgun qualification license before attempting to purchase a handgun.
MSP is working diligently to process all pending firearm purchase applications as expeditiously as possible. A record level of firearm sales in Maryland that began last fall—and which has only intensified in recent days—has led to an unparalleled number of pending purchase applications. MSP’s Licensing Division commenced 21-hour-a-day, seven-day-a-week operations last December—more than doubling the staff in the division—in order to process the spike in applications. MSP has also used additional State Police personnel, who worked more than 24,000 hours of overtime in the past year. Despite those efforts, the number of pending purchase applications continued to grow.
The members of MSP’s Licensing Division will continue to work diligently to process pending applications as quickly as possible, without jeopardizing public safety for speed. MSP greatly appreciates the patience of both the licensed firearms dealers holding the weapons, and Marylanders awaiting approval to receive their guns.
Who gave MSP the ability to decide “not to enforce the law?”
Don’t get your panties in a bunch… it’s a fair and reasonable decision on whomever’s part to allow the applications that are in by October 1st to be processed without the new laws being enforced. It’s not the applicant’s fault that they can’t process the applications in a timely fashion, why should they be punished for it? It’s a wise decision. You’ll get your enforcement on any applications submitted after October 1st, don’t worry.
The law is quite clear, MSP cannot ignore that it states no transfer may occur starting 1 Oct without the Handgun Qualification License just like they cannot say they’ll only arrest people for a DUI with a BAC over 0.10 instead of the current 0.08. If they are unwilling or unable to enforce a portion of the law, they should request Governor O’Malley call an emergency session of the legislature so the law can be amended.
Well actually Obama did, when he decided not to enforce parts of his glorious Health care bill.
Please change your name to incredible idiot!
Just so long as the criminals are bound by the same rules, I’m fine with it……oh, wait…..
Thank the politicians who voted for this idiotic bill. They were in such a rush to pass it they didn’t consider any consequences the law might have. Notice how quiet they all are now. It’s sort of like Pelosi’s statement “you have to pass the bill to know what’s in it”. If we keep electing these brain dead morons we can expect more of the same.
I was able to take home my new AK-47 10 days after the purchase.I love gun shows before Oct.1
You can get a Fully-Automatic AK47, Mac-10 or 9mm Uzi in Baltimore City any day of the week with no background check and no i.d. on the same day. All you need is a few greenbacks.
It seems that with the uptick in bank robberies in the county, we need more, not fewer armed citizens. The crims always go where the pickings have been easy before, and they have figured out how naive and unprepared our police are to deal with real crime. We need to arm ourselves.