title
A resolution requesting the Metropolitan Nashville Police Department or the Davidson County District Attorney's Office employ a domestic violence dispossession investigator.
body
WHEREAS, the United States is the most dangerous country in the developed world for women. More than three in 10 women murdered with guns in the United States are killed by an intimate partner; and
WHEREAS, according to Everytown, 39 women are fatally shot by an intimate partner in Tennessee each year. 74% of female intimate partner homicide victims are killed with a gun each year on average; and
WHEREAS, in 2024, the Metropolitan Nashville-Davidson County Office of Family Safety reviewed 13,818 criminal defendants and persons subject to orders of protection and found that 6,090 (44%) had access to guns; and
WHEREAS, in 2024, the Metropolitan Nashville-Davidson County Office of Family Safety identified 212 cases with incomplete Firearms Dispossession forms; in 90 cases in which forms had been returned, there were concerns about continued gun possession; and
WHEREAS, federal law prohibits felons, those convicted of misdemeanor domestic violence, and individuals subject to domestic violence restraining orders from possessing guns; and
WHEREAS, Tennessee law prohibits persons convicted of misdemeanor crimes of domestic violence from possessing guns; and
WHEREAS, Tennessee law requires persons subject to orders of protection to dispossess themselves of any guns they own within 48 hours of the order going into effect and submit an affidavit of dispossession form to the court stating they have dispossessed themselves of firearms, including by transferring their guns to a third party, for the duration of the order of protection; and
WHEREAS, however, the Firearms Declaration form does not require the respondent to identify the third party holding their guns, or their contact information. The Scott County, Tennessee, domestic violence court updated the Firearms Declaration form i...
Click here for full text