Originally Posted by
chollie
I think it's going to be interesting to see how this plays out. It seems to me that she declared the gun at the appropriate time to declare things when entering/transiting Taipei - so what laws have been broken, exactly? But it's been a week and she's still there, so clearly someone thinks there is a problem - or doesn't want to take a stand either way, perhaps.
That said, I don't know how this would play out in reverse. Suppose someone came from TPE to LAX, landed and immediately declared something prohibited. I thought in that situation it was pretty much 'no harm, no foul' - you were OK as long as you fully and honestly declared in time.
Admitting that you have broken a law does not excuse you from the consequences of breaking it.
I don't know the gun laws in Taiwan, but if it's illegal to bring a gun in, then she broke the law by bringing a gun in, whether she declared the weapon or not. The Taiwanese government may show her some leniency due to the accidental* nature of the transgression, and the fact that she admitted it immediately, but if it's illegal to bring in a gun, and she brought in a gun, then she broke the law, however accidentally.
*Accidental, in this case, means unfathomably careless to the point of unmitigated stupidity when caring for a deadly weapon. In my humble opinion, of course. Both American and Taiwanese law may see things differently, but I've said before, and firmly believe, that anyone who forgets where their loaded firearms are, especially to the point where they 'accidentally' bring a weapon into a place where they know weapons are prohibited, should have their 2nd Amendment rights permanently revoked.