If a toy looks too much like a real gun, it can't be sold in New Jersey.

Toy guns must now be a color other than black, blue, silver or aluminum, and they must have a bright orange stripe along the side of the toy so law enforcement officers and others will know that the gun is not a fatal weapon. Federal law requires only that a toy gun have a bright orange tip.

Gov. Phil Murphy signed the ban on realistic-looking toy firearms into law, one of dozens of new measures he approved Tuesday.

The law does not apply to theatrical weapons used in films. People who sell toy weapons that don't have the orange stripe or are the same color as actual guns will be required to pay a $500 fine for the first offense, and $1,000 for any additional violation.

Former Assemblywoman and now-Lt. Gov. Sheila Oliver sponsored the bill, A-4260, in 2015, and said at the time that the bill was in response to the November 2014 police shooting of Tamir Rice, a 12-year-old Cleveland boy who was holding an Airsoft pellet gun when police shot and killed him.

“I am sorry,” Oliver said during a 2016 hearing, holding up a replica of an automatic handgun. “I take umbrage with that when there is something like this that can be purchased in a confectionery store and a 12-year-old can be dead.”

In response, several New Jersey cities passed their own bans in the last few years, including East Orange and Irvington.

U.S. Sen. Bob Menendez, D-N.J. has pushed for similar federal changes, asking the Consumer Product Safety Commission to issue stricter rules for toy guns.

According to the Washington Post's database of police fatal shootings, 172 individuals holding toy guns were killed by law enforcement from 2015 to 2019. That includes the March 2019 fatal shooting of 42-year-old Jason Williams of Trenton, who was holding a BB gun when two officers shot and killed him.

“As a mother and a grandmother, I shudder to think that a child can be playing one moment and dead the next simply because an officer was unable to determine whether a gun was real or a toy,” said Assemblywoman Cleopatra Tucker, D-Essex, who sponsored the bill. The law is "crucial to preventing unnecessary deaths to take steps to make it immediately obvious that a toy gun is a toy.”

Ashley Balcerzak is a reporter in the New Jersey Statehouse. For unlimited access to her work covering New Jersey’s legislature and political power structure, please subscribe or activate your digital account today.

Email: balcerzaka@northjersey.com Twitter: @abalcerzak