Is it true that Nunchaku was outlawed in C.A. and N.Y State?

[Zauriel]

I recently found these websites from the internet Yahoo search engine.

http://www.fightingarts.com/reading/article.php?id=456

http://home.earthlink.net/~nunchakulaw/

[shinnekodo]

It has been said in my style (we teach rudimentary nunchaku techniques) that the nunchaku has always been illegal in the NY area except for the practice of martial arts.

The laws that you have links to are newer and stricter variants.

Some of the history that is passed on in my school is that sometime in the early 1970s, that about 5 police officers were attempting the arrest of 2 individuals who were armed with nunchaku. At this time, not much was known about nunchaku. The 5 police officers were killed in a short amount of time by these 2 nunchaku-wielding individuals, so the story goes. This incident shocked the community and the state of NY which led to the passing of certain strict laws concerning the use of nunchaku in the state of NY. Perhaps, this story, if true, might explain some of the notoriety that the weapon has in NY.

Perhaps, others know more about this alleged story. I have no verification other than that this is told in my school when we instruct new students in the nunchaku as a way of illustrating the capabilities of this weapon.

[Anbu Alex]

It has been said in my style (we teach rudimentary nunchaku techniques) that the nunchaku has always been illegal in the NY area except for the practice of martial arts.

The laws that you have links to are newer and stricter variants.

Some of the history that is passed on in my school is that sometime in the early 1970s, that about 5 police officers were attempting the arrest of 2 individuals who were armed with nunchaku. At this time, not much was known about nunchaku. The 5 police officers were killed in a short amount of time by these 2 nunchaku-wielding individuals, so the story goes. This incident shocked the community and the state of NY which led to the passing of certain strict laws concerning the use of nunchaku in the state of NY. Perhaps, this story, if true, might explain some of the notoriety that the weapon has in NY.

Perhaps, others know more about this alleged story. I have no verification other than that this is told in my school when we instruct new students in the nunchaku as a way of illustrating the capabilities of this weapon.

i heard that the black panthers were the reason for this is that tru

[White Warlock]

The story is bogus. The reasons both NY and CA initiated laws on the use of nunchakas was because of the craze during the 70's, yes. But part of the reason for this was there were too many people hurting 'themselves.'

In both NY and CA you may transport nunchakas to and from your training facility, and you may use the nunchakas, for training purposes, in your training facility. In California, they made a foolish maneuver of writing 'dojo' to define training facility. Because dojo means more than merely 'training facility,' you can actually store them and practice with them pretty much wherever you 'train.' Logically, however, it must not be a 'public' area, nor Federal or State property. The 'dojo,' or the 'place that you train,' must be private property and the owner or lessor of the property need have provided permission.

That's essentially it for California. NY does not have this confusion, and thus is not as readily 'exploitable' via the route of foreign language semantics.