Blames the NRA. In this case, the guy didn’t have a permit for a pistol he was carrying, and had drugs on him. But it’s perfectly legal to tote any rifle on SEPTA if you’re going shooting, to or from your place of business, or for any reason at all if you have a License to Carry. In fact, I have a friend that lives in Philly, doesn’t have a car, and has a registered M16. How does the DA think he transports it? Maybe Seth Williams should spend more time prosecuting actual criminals for misusing firearms, and spend less time fretting that certain activities are legal, there might be some crime reduction in that City. This guy had drugs and guns. That’s a no no, so nail him for that. But there are firearms like this on SEPTA all the time, and it’s legal. Get over it.
25 thoughts on “Philly DA Shocked at AK-47 on Subway”
Comments are closed.
And as far as I know it’s perfectly legal to have loaded magazines in the same bag, as long as they’re not inserted into the firearm.
According to PA law, they have to be in separate pouches. Used to be separate bags entirely.
I had the typical padded AR/AK style case with external mag pockets in mind when I made that post. It seems like this guy had everything on a single compartment though.
I don’t know about these days, but many of my contemporaries who lived in Phialdelphia at the time, would regularly ride SEPTA to the end of a line with an uncased shotgun, to go hunting back in the ’60s and early ’70s. No one would bat an eye.
Now, this is going back too far to count, I guess, but somewhere there is a picture of my uncle as a young teenager in the mid-1930s, riding down the street in South Philadelphia on his bicycle with his shotgun across the handlebars and a hounddog under one arm. No one would bat an eye then, either. (I still have that shotgun.)
FWIW, that same uncle at the age of seven had been shot in the thigh by a wild-flying .22 in the fields south of Philadelphia. He and my dad used to laugh about how they had to chase him down and tackle him, to take him to the local clinic to get patched up. No more a big deal than stepping on a nail. Imagine today!
Wow… did that article sensationalize or what? Even in NJ, you’re allowed to carry your rifles and stuff on NJTransit, as long as its cased up and the ammo is in a separate pouch. Also, as long as you are going between residences and to/from a legal shooting activity.
If you have a FID, possession of an unloaded longarm is legal in NJ except on the grounds of an educational institution without written permission. You don’t have to messes with the exemptions. See 2C:39-5 c (1) and (2) and e(1).
Not that I would openly carry a longarm on NJTransit, I don’t like the taste of asphalt pizza.
Also, carry your FID when doing this, the legal presumption is that unless you can establish that you have one, you are presumed not to until you show evidence to the contrary.
Did you look up the guy’s Docket Sheets? He was a criminal.
http://bit.ly/M6vIH1 This incident
http://bit.ly/OE2SeD Arrest 9-7-11
http://bit.ly/NMOLaF Arrest 6-8-12
I did not. Interesting that he could have been prosecuted in 2011, but charges were withdrawn. No wonder Williams is blaming the NRA. If this isn’t his own failure, then we need to be having a serious discussion about who’s failure it was, not deflecting blame. Sometimes it’s amazing to me people in cities like Philly keep letting politicians get away with dodging their own failures.
“Last year, Ponds was arrested for alleged domestic violence, but the charges were dropped after a witness failed to appear, according to courr records.
In that case, Ponds’ ex-girlfriend told police Ponds came to her apartment with a gun, fired three shots at her, chased her and beat her, the records say.
She later posted bail for him, records show.”
http://www.philly.com/philly/news/breaking/20120802_Man_with_AK-47_on_SEPTA_stays_in_jail.html
I am just going to speculate, but, though my family moved out of the city 65 years ago, I know the system of benign [usually] corruption was legendary. Anyone with “friends” could get incredible things “fixed.” The same was true even in staid, rural Bucks County at the time. While my personal knowledge is only of such corruption being used to gain justice for “little guys” caught up in bureaucracy, I’m sure in the city it still survives and extends into the criminal world; I’m sure the Drug Wars have seen to that.
Whenever I hear of “charges withdrawn,” I’m always torn between suspecting a proper outcome resulting from a screw-up by an arrogant police system; or a fix applied in a genuine criminal case.
No, he’s an ACCUSED person. There is, as I see it, a diversion for possession of marijuana (not a criminal conviction) and a withdrawn charge for agg. assault and related charges. No evidence was presented in that case, and no finding made. The charge was withdrawn.
You do remember due process, right?
In the most recent incident, the violations appear to be technical at most. Moreover, there appears to be no evidence of any intent to shoot up anyplace. It’s supposed to be the case that in America, we don’t arrest people for what they might do. By this standard, I’m subject to arrest every time I go to the range, because I “might” shoot up someplace on the way there . . .
No, he was convicted of stuff in a different court.
http://ujsportal.pacourts.us/DocketSheets/MDJReport.aspx?district=MDJ-38-1-04&docketNumber=MJ-38104-CR-0000457-2007
He has been to jail for his offenses. This one shows 10 days.
The PA system is fragmented and I’m not an expert in it.
It also wasn’t a “technical” violation. The gun violation was bs, but the drug crimes were real enough. Given his record as a drug criminal, we can safely assume that he was not what we think of when we talk about “law abiding citizens.”
It would solve a great number of problems if the PA Liquor Control Board would sell drugs rather than continue this drug war farce.
looks like the DA has some ‘splainin’ to do. Media needs to stay on him as he will let this case fall off the radar otherwise – maybe then Nutter will STFU
Drugs are not crimes. Guns are not crimes. Property is not a crime. Owning, carrying, possessing, making, buying, selling, trading, and using property, be it guns drugs butter lard or fifty gallon sodas are not crimes. Doesn’t matter how many legislatures, courts, and bloggers say so.
Over half of “law abiding citizens” were/are “drug criminals”…
The law disagrees with you. Courts don’t enforce our personal beliefs about drugs, they enforce the laws. I think drug laws are BS too, but I also know that if I violate those BS laws, there are very real consequences. We don’t get to ignore the laws we disagree with.
Instead of saying that making, buying, seling, etc X, Y, and Z “aren’t crimes”, you should say “shouldn’t be crimes” – because they absolutely, positively are crimes.
The courts disagree with me. The law agrees with me. We live in a constitutional republic – all laws must obey the state and federal constitutions and the common law and the natural law. Otherwise they aren’t really a law. Drug “laws” are really a crime, quite literally under Title 18 Section 242 they are a conspiracy under the color of authority of law against our rights of life, liberty, property, due process, republican form of government, etc.
That’s the mindset of a serf.
That is the belief that has empowered every evil tyrant and government in history. Prohibition, not property, is the crime – and your subserviance and compliance makes you an accomplice. Evil triumphs not because good men do nothing – it triumphs because they say “well the law is the law and I will forfeit my ability to think and act for myself in order to destroy everyone’s life, liberty, and property just because some criminals with fancy titles told me I had to”.
Good luck with that. Many tax evaders in prison also believe they’re right. Ignore the law at your peril. And if you think it’s an evil court conspiracy, then ignore the courts at your peril instead.
Many tax evaders are correct. Irwin Schiff is correct and he’s in prison. The vast majority of tax evaders however never get caught. The same is true of people who commit “gun crimes”
and especially “drug crimes”. Using the small data pool of people I personally know the odds of getting arrested for drugs is less than 1/20,000 per “drug crime” and the odds of conviction are much less than that. The government is incredibly incompetent at enforcing it’s tyranny.
By all means, volunteer to be just as correct as Irwin Schiff from your prison bunk too. Good luck with that.
Irwin Schiff went to jail not because he evaded taxes, but because he wrote a long series of books documenting the illegality of the income tax and he spent vast amounts of time speaking in public about the illegality of the income tax. The arrest rate for tax evaders is less than 1%. Your subserviance is illogical in light of the fact that you aren’t likely to get caught.
I am not likely to get imprisoned, I pay my taxes, play by the gun laws, and don’t use drugs (except Scotch and pipe tobacco which of course happen to be two of the deadliest drugs around, hence their non-prohibited status), and most importantly, I don’t engage in public activism under my own name.
Aren’t those the brilliant state capitalists who only carry a limited selection and who introduced the super consumer friendly kiosks that were such a big hit?
The letter to the editor writes itself.
“While this man was committing a crime by transporting drugs, the proper response is to ask is why he was not prosecuted, but instead was set free by DA Williams to roam the city after his domestic violence offense committed in 2011. Little wonder DA Williams is trying to point the finger of blame at the NRA and question why unloaded rifles are allowed to be transported on SEPTA.
Does DA Williams believe that only car owners and others of means should be free to legally and peaceably transport their legally-owned firearms? Would he prefer that the citizens of this city, whether 99% or 1%, increase traffic congestion and pollution rather than use the public transportation their taxes pay for?”
Given that most anti’s are kneejerk liberals, anytime we can show the discongruency between their narratives is one more subtle way to get the undecided middle to think again about positions taken for granted and unexamined.