Santa Clara County is launching a program to enforce court-ordered removal of guns from people with domestic violence restraining orders.
The plan includes the formation of a five-member team, which will search for people possessing arms who've been ordered to give them up.
“This is going to be a collaboration of investigators, prosecutors and analysts, who are going to identify priority gun offenders for enforcement, and with collaboration of county police agencies, actually go after those who are armed and dangerous,” said Supervising Santa Clara County District Attorney Marisa McKeown.
Supervisor Cindy Chavez said there are about 10,000 felons who currently own guns illegally.
“We’re going to follow up on every single person,” Chavez said. “It’s a big group of people, but once we get on top of it, we’re going to be able to manage this. And I think it’s going to make our community much safer.”
Chavez said she's alarmed by an increase in gun violence.
“In the county of Santa Clara, we’ve continued to have an increase in crimes that occur with someone using a gun,” Chavez said. “That’s against the national trend, so we know there’s a problem here that needs to be addressed.”