John Willett

Thanks for coming out to them. Glad to hear you've enjoyed them.

Sorry

Save the Date: NJ SAFE Conference returns to Vineland on September 22nd!

FYI Lots of folks are wearing blue to show solidarity, even if it isn't a rally shirt.

Is it because he misuses words like reality? Frankly, there is an objective reality to be explored on matters like firearms and violence, IMO (and I suspect most here would agree). Many seem to want to subscribe to a subjective view of the world, which leads them to spout nonsense like this. (I think exploring the ideas of meaning and symbolism can be useful in determining why people think what they do, but it isn't useful in understanding phenomena in the physical world.)

Any worthwhile representation at that level is going to be frighteningly expensive. That's why cases supported and guided by institutions (like ANJRPC) are so valuable. The fact that an individual decided it was too expensive to finance on their own doesn't mean a whole lot. By the way, I'm not arguing Nappen is a saint or some kind of savior. My point was that I don't think he deserves much of the criticism that I see here based on things I personally have witnessed.

So Nappen said that he wanted too much money to continue his case? That doesn't make any sense.

And I know several people he has helped. Can he be hard to get a hold of sometimes? YES. But then again, so am I. My "ONE phone call" is to my wife, not my lawyer. Should I need to make it, she knows what to do from there. (God forbid).

According to whom or what?

If you were following Pantano, you know that the NJ Supreme Court decided to not hear the case, claiming that their earlier decision to hear it was "improvident", I think. If he couldn't appeal a state court ruling, my understanding is that it would have changed the path to SCOTUS to be through the federal court system, which we had already done with Drake, et al.

Based on what, exactly? The irony here is that now you will have started a rumor and in 3 to 6 months I'll be reading about how some numbskull "knows" this is true cause he "read it somewhere". Here is what I know about Evan Nappen. He has appeared at each NJ SAFE Conference. Do you know what we pay speakers? Nothing. If they come from out of state, we offer them a room to stay in the night before. He has been doing a Continuing Legal Education course with us too. You know how much money we paid him for that course? Nothing. Zero. Zilch. So for the past couple years, he takes his own time to travel to NJ, spend a day with us teaching CLE to help other lawyers know the gun laws better, and then speaks at the conference.

For what its worth, here is a link to DSG Bloom's presentation at NJSAFE.

For those interested in an analysis of the concealed carry litigation environment by the attorney who filed ANJRPC's challenge:

This is patently ridiculous. The prominent lawyers in New Jersey's 2A community do not prefer the "status quo", have never said they support the "status quo", and have done far more than most to change the "status quo".

If you read the email, it specifically mention that NRA is involved in the lawsuit in a supporting role. Emphasis mine

Thanks for the feedback. It's very much appreciated. Glad to hear you were able to hit the range too that day!

I'm very glad it got addressed. Thank you for allowing that to get brought to the open forum. I wish the actual people involved could have responded as well. Of course! Part of our mission is about bringing members of the community together. It certainly would have made for more of an exchange. Those that lobbed those bombs have been invited numerous times over the years. However, they clearly indicated that they would need to have the conference operate "under" their "banner" to "protect their brand". The conference is specifically not owned by any group so that all groups might be encouraged to participate. Their lack of participation has been their choice, no one else's.

Honestly, they did a lot of work on Christie to get him where he ended up vetoing a ton of stuff that would have screwed us. I think we need both the folks that can work the inside track quietly and the guys who can get loud on the outside track. It's even better if they can stay aligned and try not to step on each others toes.

Thanks for the full review! Completely valid criticism. I would like to be clear that no one can pay to be on stage. I did offer that the first year, and did not like the results. I make all decisions about content based on my interest and what I think would be valuable for the folks attending. Some of them were absolutely more "pitchy" than I intended. I agree the community panel should have been longer based on our panelists, we had a late addition after the schedule was largely locked in. I try to ensure that there is content that is stimulating for folks with different levels of interest or expertise.

An article was published attacking two of our speakers and their respective organizations by name, and insinuating collusion with another who is widely assumed to be another of our speakers (basically gossip dressed up as scandal). There were a couple of folks with questions that prompted a response to those attacks, which out of context might have felt like attacks themselves. The decision for me in allowing the question to open the door was in terms of "do we address it and then move on or do we ignore it and allow it to fester without reply?" I chose the former.

Thanks, we're certainly doing our best! If you mean the questions asked and answers given being collected and distributed somehow, you are correct. Frankly, immediately after the conference I was busy trying to wrap up the business end of it and getting video edited and published that I probably wouldn't have even tried to synthesize our NJSP representative's answers in a write up. Maybe that is something we can try to do this year as part of our post conference content on NJSafeCon.net It's a solid idea.

I am interested in gathering any questions folks have. Don't worry too much about how it's written, if its a repeat, or whether someone asks a question you think might be obvious. We are brainstorming here. In a week or two all the submissions will be synthesized into one coherent list before being passed along.

Hi folks! At the New Jersey SAFE Conference this year we will be having the NJ State Police Firearms Unit return. They will have a speaker answer some pre-submitted questions from the stage early in the program and will also have a table where they will engage with attendees individually. As a result, I need some questions to submit to them and the forums here were my best source for questions last time. I'd like to keep the thread focused on the questions for the State Police, if you are interested in more information about the conference, you can reach me at [email protected] or visit the website at njsafecon.net Fire away!

Thanks! Glad to have you on board! I do my best not to be spammy We are a little over thirty days away, so I think you might be hearing more from us as everything firms up with speaker schedule, etc. And we are glad to have you man! I am really excited for this year as we are breaking out to have more non-firearms industry businesses and organizations wanting to participate. We have printing companies, not to mention mechanical and construction contractors, as sponsors and cigar shops exhibiting. Should be a lot of fun.

Fantastic! We are less than 2 months away If you listen to Gun for Hire Radio, you'll hear me on tomorrow talking about it.