Gov. JB Pritzker signed into law two gun safety bills Monday, including a measure that fines gun owners if they don’t keep their weapons properly stored around minors.
The Safe Gun Storage Act requires owners to keep firearms in a locked box wherever a minor could gain access to it. Passed in the Illinois House at the end of May, the bill also applies to weapons left unsecured around individuals legally prohibited from handling a gun and those considered at risk of attempting suicide or causing physical harm to themselves or others.
Fines of up to $10,000 could be handed down if the gun is used in a crime, or results in injury or death, and it could result in misdemeanor criminal charges.
“I’m tired, frankly, of treating something completely preventable as inevitable,” Pritzker said Monday ahead of signing the bills. “I’m tired of hearing thoughts and prayers and then nothing gets done, so Illinois is standing up and doing something about it.”
Firearms are the leading cause of death of children in the United States, according to a study published in JAMA Pediatrics in June. Lt. Gov. Juliana Stratton said the bills signed into law will help eliminate the risk of gun violence and empower Illinois families to feel safer in their communities.
“The legislation we celebrate today is not about taking things away from people,” Stratton said. “It’s about mandating simple protections that will save lives, because too often guns end up in the hands of those who can’t understand the power of the object they hold.”
Under the Safe Gun Storage Act, owners will also need to report lost or stolen weapons within 48 hours of knowing that their firearms are gone, instead of the currently required 72 hours. Illinois State Police will be allowed to revoke firearm owners identification cards of individuals who fail to report lost or stolen weapons more than once.
The second bill Pritzker signed requires law enforcement agencies in Illinois to use a federal firearm tracing system to track guns and aid in investigations.
Agencies will utilize eTrace, an application used to track the purchase and use history of firearms used in violent crimes, and to boost the tracing of guns used illegally or found at crime scenes.
Illinois Attorney General Kwame Raoul said the bill will help improve gun crime data reporting and help trace not just those who pull the trigger, but also people who traffic firearms, as well as individuals who use those same guns in different crimes.
Pritzker described the two bills as “common sense measures” that will promote gun safety throughout the state. They will both go into effect next year.