I took some wording from you guys (hopefully, you don't mind) and wrote my representative (a former co-worker):

In doing some reading over the weekend, I came across a bill currently in the House which gives me some cause for concern: HF 184, a bill to modify the definition of "burglary" in state law.

While, on the surface, the bill seems to merely raise the penalties for burglars, as in the following excerpt, it also would make some much greater changes that neither the authors nor the Legislature intended, I hope.

The bill reads, in part:

Subd. 2. Burglary in the second degree. Whoever enters a building without
consent and with intent to commit a crime, or enters a building without consent and
commits a crime while in the building, either directly or as an accomplice, commits
burglary in the second degree and may be sentenced to imprisonment for not more than
ten years or to payment of a fine of not more than $20,000, or both, if:
(a) the building is a dwelling, government building, religious establishment, or school building

I noticed tonight that four more legislators had their names removed from the bill. They are Abeler, Berns, Dittrich and Lillie. Someone tell me how common this is for names to be removed from the list of authors. The way I read it is that there was an attempt at pulling something unmentionable under the cover of darkness and the cockroaches started scurrying when the light was shined on this. And, before anyone fires back a nastygram, "cockroaches" is meant as a figure of speach, not a slur on the character of any individual legislator.

The way I read it, an essential element of burglary is entering without consenet.

If you are in a public building such as a school during the hours the school is normally open to the public, you cannot be committing a burglary, unless you have been specifically prohibited from being there.

If you are carrying a firearm without permission, that is the crime. There is still no burglary.

just my 2 cents

Tman065

...add to that "with intent to commit a crime", as far as I know Tresspass is a crime, thus walking past a posted sign "without consent' and obviously "with intent" could easily be interpreted, by a "judge" of a certain persuasion, as guilty..

Update: Met with my rep. (Carolyn Laine) on Friday- she's going to look into possible changes to the bill. Her general response, upon looking the text over, was to the effect of "Why are we doing this? Isn't that already a crime?" I explained our concerns, and she seemed quite sensitive to them.