People v. MacFarlane CA1/2

INTRODUCTION

Alan Bruce MacFarlane (“defendant”), a Vietnam veteran with limited mobility in one arm, purchased a rifle at a California gun shop legally and then modified it to accommodate his disability. Unbeknownst to him, he asserted, his modifications rendered the firearm an illegal assault weapon under California law. A few days after he altered the weapon, MacFarlane voluntarily allowed a deputy sheriff into his home to investigate an unrelated matter, who then discovered the weapon in MacFarlane’s kitchen in plain view and seized it. A jury convicted MacFarlane of violating former Penal Code section 12280, subdivision (b),1 which makes it unlawful to possess an assault weapon.

1 Unless otherwise noted, all further statutory references are to the Penal Code. 2 Former section 12280 is part of California’s Assault Weapons Control Act (hereafter AWCA), originally enacted in 1989 and codified as chapter 2.3 of title 2 of part 4 of the Penal Code, commencing at former section 12275. (See Stats. 1989, ch. 19, § 3, p. 67; In re Jorge M. (2000) 23 Cal.4th 866, 875 (Jorge M.); Kasler v. Lockyer (2000) 23 Cal.4th 472, 477.) The AWCA was repealed in 2010, effective January 1, 2012,…