MGL c. 269, s. 10H is titled "Carrying loaded firearm while under influence of liquor, marijuana, narcotic drugs, depressants, stimulant or toxic vapor...
Reviewed by Will Luker, Founder of CCW Hub. USCCA Training Counselor, USCCA Certified Instructor, NRA Certified Instructor, Law Enforcement.
MGL c. 269, s. 10H is titled "Carrying loaded firearm while under influence of liquor, marijuana, narcotic drugs, depressants, stimulant or toxic vapor substances; punishment." One sentence carries the whole offense:
Section 10H. Whoever, having in effect a license to carry firearms issued under section 131 or 131F of chapter 140, carries on his person, or has under his control in a vehicle, a loaded firearm, as defined in section 121 of said chapter 140, while with a percentage, by weight, of alcohol in their blood of eight one-hundredths or greater, or while under the influence of intoxicating liquor or marijuana, narcotic drugs, depressants or stimulant substances, all as defined in section 1 of chapter 94C, or from smelling or inhaling the fumes of any substance having the property of releasing toxic vapors as defined in section 18 of chapter 270 shall be punished by a fine of not more than $5,000 or by imprisonment in the house of correction for not more than two and one-half years, or by both such fine and imprisonment.
The grading is the closing clause: a fine of not more than $5,000, or house of correction imprisonment for not more than two and one-half years, or both. It is a ceiling with no floor: no mandatory minimum, no state prison option, no repeat-offense enhancement.
The per se clause is recent. St. 2024, c. 135, "An Act Modernizing Firearm Laws," inserted it at SECTION 133, which amended s. 10H by adding after the figure "140," in line 4 the words "while with a percentage, by weight, of alcohol in their blood of eight one-hundredths or greater, or." Before that the section ran on the "under the influence" language alone, so material describing s. 10H without the eight one-hundredths clause predates the act.
The clause speaks of "a percentage, by weight, of alcohol in their blood." Section 10H sets that number and stops. It states no testing procedure, no consent provision, no consequence for refusing a test, and no presumption attached to a lower reading.
The opening clause is a status element: "having in effect a license to carry firearms issued under section 131 or 131F of chapter 140." Section 131 is the resident license to carry. Section 131F is the temporary license to carry issued by the colonel of state police "to a nonresident or any person not falling within the jurisdiction of a local licensing authority," and to a citizen or national of the United States or a person maintaining legal permanent residency "for purposes of firearms competition." Its catchline still reads "Nonresidents or aliens," but St. 2024, c. 135, SECTION 61 struck "alien that resides outside the commonwealth" from the body and inserted "a citizen or national of the United States or a person who maintains legal permanent residency." Eligibility for both now runs through MGL c. 140, s. 121F, because St. 2024, c. 135 restructured s. 131 down to subsections (a) through (h) and moved the prohibited person and unsuitability standards into the new s. 121F. Section 131(d) says as much: the authority "shall issue as provided under section 121F only if it appears that the applicant is neither a prohibited person nor determined to be unsuitable to be issued a license as set forth in said section 121F."
Section 10H is written against licensed carry. A person with no such license answers instead to MGL c. 269, s. 10(a), below.
The conduct branches. Either the person "carries on his person," or "has under his control in a vehicle." The vehicle branch requires neither driving nor touching the firearm. Control is the test.
"Loaded" is the section's own qualifier and it does real work: the cross-reference to MGL c. 140, s. 121 attaches to the word "firearm," not to "loaded." The s. 121 definition is expressly indifferent to loading: "Firearm" covers "a stun gun, pistol, revolver, rifle, shotgun, sawed-off shotgun, large capacity firearm, assault-style firearm and machine gun, loaded or unloaded," plus the frame or receiver, excluding antique and permanently inoperable firearms. Section 10H narrows that. The definition also settles a misreading in the other direction: "firearm" in Massachusetts includes rifles and shotguns, so a loaded shotgun under the carrier's control in a vehicle is within s. 10H the same way a loaded pistol on the belt is.
The statute gives an intoxication threshold and an impairment standard. Either satisfies the element.
Blood alcohol. "while with a percentage, by weight, of alcohol in their blood of eight one-hundredths or greater." No further proof of impaired faculties appears in that clause.
Under the influence. "while under the influence of intoxicating liquor or marijuana, narcotic drugs, depressants or stimulant substances, all as defined in section 1 of chapter 94C, or from smelling or inhaling the fumes of any substance having the property of releasing toxic vapors as defined in section 18 of chapter 270." This route has no numeric trigger. It reaches alcohol at any level, and its drug categories take their contours from the MGL c. 94C, s. 1 definitions rather than from s. 10H. Marijuana is named, and nothing in s. 10H carves out marijuana that is lawfully possessed or lawfully consumed.
Section 131C(a) governs the same situation from the licensing side. No person carrying a loaded firearm under a license issued pursuant to s. 129B, s. 131 or s. 131F, or through a s. 129C exemption, "shall carry the loaded firearm in a vehicle unless the loaded firearm while carried in the vehicle is under the direct control of the person." A violation carries "a fine of $500."
The consequence in s. 131C(d) is not discretionary. A conviction "shall be reported immediately by the court or magistrate to the licensing authority," the licensing authority "shall immediately revoke the firearm identification card or license of the person convicted," and no new card or license may issue "until 1 year after the date of revocation."
Read together, the two provisions turn on control in opposite ways. Section 10H punishes having the loaded firearm under your control in the vehicle while impaired; s. 131C(a) punishes carrying it in the vehicle while it is not under your direct control. That much sits on the face of both texts. What the texts do not do is close the gap between them, and the rest of this paragraph is a reading of their words rather than a sourced rule. Neither "control" in s. 10H nor "direct control" in s. 131C(a) is defined in either section or among the s. 121 definitions, and no source in the available materials construes either term or addresses a transfer to a passenger. Section 131C(a) binds a "person carrying a loaded firearm" in a vehicle, so on its words a licensee who has handed the firearm to a licensed passenger who then has direct control may no longer be the person carrying it, and the passenger may satisfy the subsection. Whether the transferring licensee is still carrying for s. 131C(a) purposes is unanswered in the available sources.
MGL c. 140, s. 131L(a) turns on control too. Its storage duty reaches a firearm that is "stored or kept," and "such firearm shall not be deemed stored or kept if carried by or under the control of the owner or other lawfully authorized user." That carve-out is disjunctive. The firearm stays outside the storage duty while it is carried by the owner or other lawfully authorized user, and it stays outside while it is under that person's control. Setting the firearm down defeats the first limb only. The s. 131L requirement that a firearm be "secured in a locked container or equipped with a tamper-resistant mechanical lock or other safety device, properly engaged so as to render such firearm inoperable by any person other than the owner or other lawfully authorized user" attaches only when both limbs fail, and no source in the available materials defines either limb. A violation is graded, for a firearm that is not large capacity or a machine gun, at a fine of not less than $1,000 nor more than $7,500 or imprisonment for not more than 1 1/2 years, or both.
The quoted texts do leave one combination open. Section 10H reaches only "a loaded firearm," and s. 131C(a) reaches only a "person carrying a loaded firearm" in a vehicle, so an unloaded firearm is outside both. Unloaded and "secured in a locked container," which s. 121 defines as "secured in a container that is capable of being unlocked only by means of a key, combination or similar means, including in an unoccupied motor vehicle, a locked trunk not accessible from the passenger compartment, a locked console or locked glovebox," it also answers the s. 131L storage duty on that section's own terms. No source in the available materials construes that combination, so this is a reading of the quoted words rather than sourced guidance.
The 2024 act replaced MGL c. 131, s. 62 at SECTION 13 with a parallel prohibition. A person at or above the same eight one-hundredths blood alcohol level, or under the influence of intoxicating liquor or of the substances defined in MGL c. 94C, s. 1, or who "intentionally smells or inhales" toxic vapor fumes in violation of MGL c. 270, s. 18, "shall not hunt or carry a firearm, bow and arrow or other firearm while engaged in hunting or target shooting." The grading matches s. 10H: a fine of not more than $5,000 or imprisonment in the house of correction for not more than 2 1/2 years, or both. The status element differs: s. 62 opens on "A person," conditions nothing on holding a license, and is not limited to a loaded firearm.
Provenance matters here. The s. 62 text above is the text as enacted by SECTION 13, not a codified scrape; the available sources do not include a published c. 131, s. 62 against which to confirm it as currently in force. And SECTION 14 of the same act struck the figure ", 62" from line 7 of MGL c. 131, s. 90, so the legislature detached s. 62 from an enumeration in s. 90 at the moment it rewrote s. 62 and gave it its own grading. The available sources do not include s. 90, so what that enumeration carries cannot be stated here.
Prohibited person status, s. 121F(j). A licensing authority "shall deny any application for a permit, card or license issued under sections 122, 122B, 122D, 129B, 131 or 131F, or renewal thereof, to a person the licensing authority determines to be a prohibited person." No source in the available materials says that a s. 10H conviction makes a person a prohibited person, and the chapeau just quoted puts the determination with the licensing authority. What follows is a reading of the clause text against the s. 10H grading.
Clause (i)(D) reaches "a violation of any law regarding the use, possession, ownership or transfer of firearms or ammunition for which a term of imprisonment may be imposed." That route needs no premise from outside the clause and the section being read against it: s. 10H is a law regarding the possession and use of firearms, and by its own words it authorizes imprisonment in the house of correction. Clause (i)(B) reaches conviction of "a misdemeanor punishable by imprisonment for more than 2 years," and s. 10H authorizes up to two and one-half, but that route carries a premise the available sources cannot supply, that a s. 10H offense is a misdemeanor. No source in those materials defines misdemeanor or felony. The reader does not have to resolve it, because clause (i)(A) reaches "a felony," so a conviction lands in (A) or (B) whichever way the classification runs. A separate MGL c. 94C conviction for the underlying substance would engage clause (i)(E). Clause (iv) reaches a person "currently the subject of an outstanding arrest warrant," which can matter before any conviction issues.
Clause (ii) turns on commitment rather than conviction, and its alcohol and substance limbs sit closest to this subject. Clause (ii)(A) reaches a person who is or has been "committed to a hospital or institution for mental illness or alcohol or substance use disorder, except a commitment pursuant to sections 35 or 36C of chapter 123," and it carries its own way back: the disqualification lifts if, "after 5 years from the date of the confinement," the applicant submits with the application an affidavit of a licensed physician or clinical psychologist attesting familiarity with the disorder and opining that the applicant is not suffering from it "in a manner that shall prevent the applicant from possessing a licensed firearm." Clause (ii)(D) reaches a person "found to be a person with an alcohol use disorder or substance use disorder or both and committed pursuant to said section 35 of said chapter 123," unless the applicant "was granted a petition for relief of the court order" under that same section and submits a copy of the order with the application.
A hold is not by itself disqualifying. An intoxication incident can reach a licensing authority with no arrest and no conviction behind it. SECTION 12 of the 2024 act added subsection (e) to MGL c. 123, s. 36C, which requires a law enforcement agency that "applies for or is involved in the restraint and application for hospitalization of a person pursuant to subsection (a) or (b) of section 12" to transmit the incident log or report number and the person's identifying information to the department of criminal justice information services, which supplies it to licensing authorities. The same subsection then sets the limit: "No person shall be considered prohibited from being issued a license, card or permit under sections 122, 122B, 129B, 131 or 131F of said chapter 140 due solely to the person's restraint and application for hospitalization pursuant to said subsection (a) or (b) of said section 12 unless the licensing authority determines the person is disqualified for said license, card or permit or unsuitable for the same under section 121F of said chapter 140." Where the authority does weigh suitability, the subsection requires it to "make inquiries to the law enforcement agency that submitted the record of the restraint and application for hospitalization and to the court that ordered or denied the commitment." The documents sent to the department may not include information about the person's "medical or psychiatric diagnosis, treatment plans, mental health medications, mental health care providers or other information of a clinical nature." A person denied a license under that subsection without a court order of commitment "may, after 5 years from the date of denial, file a petition for relief" with the court that denied the commitment.
Read the proviso closing clause (i) carefully. Commission of a crime described in clauses (B), (D) or (E) "shall only disqualify an applicant for a firearm identification card under section 129B for 5 years" after conviction, adjudication, or release from supervision, whichever is later. That limit is written for the FID under s. 129B. It is not a five-year limit on the license to carry.
Note also that the standalone codified text of s. 121F(j) stops at clause (vi), the dishonorable discharge clause, ending on a dangling "or." The enacting act supplies the missing clause (vii): "is a fugitive from justice."
Unsuitability, s. 121F(k). Independent of the prohibited person list, a licensing authority shall deny an application or renewal under the same enumerated sections to a person it "determines to be unsuitable." The test: "A determination of unsuitability shall be based on reliable, articulable and credible information that the applicant has exhibited or engaged in behavior that suggests that, if issued a permit, card or license, the applicant may create a risk to public safety or a risk of danger to themselves or others." Such a denial must be in writing and set forth the specific reasons, and it does not wait for a conviction.
Revocation and suspension, s. 121F(u). Under s. 121F(u)(1) a licensing authority "shall revoke or suspend any license, card or permit pursuant to sections 122, 122B, 122D, 129B, 131 or 131F upon the occurrence of any event which makes the licensee, card or permit holder a prohibited person as defined subsection (j)." That is mandatory. The same paragraph adds discretionary grounds: the authority "may also revoke or suspend" on a subsequent determination of unsuitability under subsection (k), "or upon satisfactory proof that the license, card or permit holder has violated or permitted any violation of this chapter." That last hook is limited by its own words to chapter 140, so it reaches a s. 131C violation directly. Section 10H sits in chapter 269 and reaches the license through the prohibited person and unsuitability routes instead.
Under s. 121F(u)(2), revocation or suspension "shall be in writing and shall state the reasons," and "No pendency of proceedings before the court shall operate to stay such revocation or suspension." A revoked or suspended license "may be reinstated only upon the termination of all disqualifying conditions."
Once the license is revoked, suspended or denied, s. 129D(a) attaches at once. The person "shall, without delay, deliver or surrender to the licensing authority where the person resides all firearms or ammunition which are registered to the person or that the person then possesses," and report the surrender to the electronic firearms registration system under s. 121B. The obligation covers everything the person holds, not the firearm involved in the incident.
The person or the person's legal representative then has a right, "at any time up to 1 year after the delivery or surrender," to transfer the property to a licensed dealer or to a person legally permitted to receive it, and the licensing authority must give written notice of that right at surrender. The right carries a carve-out that bites here: "such transfer shall not be permitted if the firearm may be evidence in any pending criminal investigation." Under s. 129D(c), firearms and ammunition "not disposed of within 1 year of delivery or surrender pursuant to this section shall be sold at public auction by the colonel of the state police," with proceeds "remitted to the General Fund."
A person carrying with no license in effect under s. 131 or s. 131F answers to s. 10(a), which reaches whoever, except as provided or exempted by statute, "knowingly has in his possession; or knowingly has under his control in a vehicle; a firearm, loaded or unloaded, as defined in section one hundred and twenty-one of chapter one hundred and forty" without a listed alternative.
Section 10(a) sets out parallel enumerations, and they are not identical. For a firearm, the alternatives are being present in or on his residence or place of business; an LTC in effect under s. 131; an LTC in effect under s. 131F; "having complied with the provisions of sections one hundred and twenty-nine C and one hundred and thirty-one G of chapter one hundred and forty"; or, as to an air rifle or BB gun, compliance with s. 12B. Read that compliance route with care: St. 2024, c. 135, SECTION 64 provides that "Section 131G of said chapter 140 is hereby repealed," while the text of s. 10(a) still names it. Section 129C is the surviving half of that route, and a charge under s. 10(a) is graded as set out below. The enumeration for "a rifle or shotgun, loaded or unloaded" repeats the residence or place of business alternative and the license alternatives, then diverges: its clause (4) is the s. 129B firearms identification card, followed by s. 129C compliance as to rifles and shotguns that are not semiautomatic and the s. 12B air rifle route. Being present in or on his residence or place of business defeats liability under s. 10(a) standing on its own, in either enumeration.
The grading is front-loaded: "imprisonment in the state prison for not less than two and one-half years nor more than five years, or for not less than 18 months nor more than two and one-half years in a jail or house of correction," with the sentence not reducible below 18 months, not suspendable, and no eligibility for probation, parole, work release, furlough or good conduct deductions until 18 months are served. Prosecutions "shall neither be continued without a finding nor placed on file." The license defense sits in the same subsection: no person having in effect a license to carry firearms for any purpose under s. 131 or s. 131F "shall be deemed to be in violation of this section."
If the firearm was loaded, MGL c. 269, s. 10(n) adds a consecutive term: violating paragraph (a) or paragraph (c) "by means of a loaded firearm shall be further punished by imprisonment in the house of correction for not more than 21/2 years," to "begin from and after the expiration of the sentence" for the underlying paragraph.
This page covers one part of our Massachusetts concealed carry guide.
Read the complete Massachusetts guideBrowse local instructors offering state-approved training in your area. Book online, complete your training, and get one step closer to your concealed carry permit.