Concealed Pistol Licenses called into question

On Friday, we reported that seven Dickinson County Concealed Pistol Licenses we’re being temporarily surrendered due to the validity of an NRA training certificate.

Those licenses are in the process of being reinstated free of charge, but as ABC 10’s Rick Tarsitano reports, it appears it may be just the tip of the iceberg.

When you enroll in an NRA certified concealed carry class, the trainer is required to give you an NRA-issued course packet complete with all of the training materials. The packets cost $20 and include a completion certificate bearing the NRA seal. That certificate is then submitted to the county clerk along with a completed application packet.

On October 14th, the Dickinson County Clerk received a completed course certificate from a Delta County trainer that caused some officials to notice a glaring difference. The following morning the County Clerk received a notice from the NRA stating that the same trainer had been suspended. The Clerk’s Office then proceeded to call all seven Concealed Pistol License holders who had submitted the same type of certification, notifying them of the disparity.

After researching the issue, a number of participants submitted emails to the NRA, detailing their experience, which included a lack of required materials and shooting only 30 rounds in a training session instead of the required 100.

At the next gun board meeting, headed by the Dickinson County Prosecutor, a Michigan State Police Post Representative, and the County Sheriff, the decision was made to ask for the surrender of all seven licenses instead of a full on suspension.

“Whenever you talk about suspending or revoking someone’s license, there’s a negative connotation attached to that,” noted Dickinson County Sheriff Scott Celello. “We wanted to be perfectly clear that ‘We do not feel that the individuals who hold the license, plus the one that had the application, did anything improper.’ As far as they knew, they took a course that was recognized by the NRA, which would fulfill one of the requirements for obtaining a CPL. We didn’t want to go the route of voting to revoke or suspend their license. We just wanted to contact them to see if they’d be willing to come in and voluntarily surrender their license until they could talk another course.”

Which they did, without hesitation, on November 19th following their monthly gun board meeting.

All seven Dickinson County CPL holders that were affected by the decision will receive their 8 hours of training at the Sagola Township Sportsmen’s Club, free of charge. But, Delta County is a different story. With estimates of over 1,200 permits being affected and each class costing at least $100, it remains to be seen what will be done to rectify the situation.

The Delta County Clerk received the same suspension notification on October 16th, and has not accepted any CPL applications containing a certificate of completion after October 15th, since then. As of now, the Delta County Clerk says any certificate that was obtained before the October 15th suspension notice, will remain in force.

The issue will be discussed, in detail, tomorrow at a special gun board meeting in Delta County District Court.

It’s interesting to note that Michigan Firearms Act 372 of 1927 states that “A license to carry a concealed pistol that is issued based upon an application that contains a material false statement is void from the date the license is issued.”