When they do catch people, and prosecute them, under the laws we have against straw purchasing, they don’t get any real punishment. Yet they scream louder and louder every year at Harrisburg that they need more laws they won’t enforce. How are more laws going to help when they aren’t even using the ones they already have?
Category: Crime
Politically Motivated?
As SayUncle is reporting, an executive at Smith & Wesson is facing a federal indictment, along with 22 others. I wouldn’t toss the suggestion that this could be politically motivated lightly, but what has my suspicious is what they are charged under:
The indictments charged the individuals, including Smith & Wesson vice president for sales Amaro Goncalves, with violating the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act and conspiracy to commit money laundering involving the sale of items including guns and body armor, among other things.
The Foreign Corrupt Practices Act essentially makes it a crime to bribe foreign officials. My understanding from people involved in international business, is that bribery of foreign officials is pretty much par for the course if you want to do business in certain countries, like China, Russia, or most of the third world. That would lead me to believe that Smith & Wesson is hardly alone if some of their business practices involve bribing foreign officials. You can’t really do business in many places of the world without paying bribes.
Maybe I’m off base here, and prosecutions under the FCPA are a lot more common than I thought, which would mean this isn’t a case of selective prosecution at all. But it’s hard for me to believe this isn’t a commonly flouted law, which would cause me to wonder what, in particular, motivated the feds to bring charges in this case.
UPDATE: More info here, courtesy of The Firearms Blog. The arrests were made at SHOT? Not politically motivated at all! No, sir. It would appear to be that revenge may be at least a partial motivator, though:
As part of the FBI sting operation, an unidentified business associate who was a former executive for an arms manufacturer arranged a meeting between the arms sales representatives and undercover FBI agents who posed as representatives of an African country’s minister of defense.
And evidence this type of operation is indeed unusual:
Breuer said the investigation was the largest action ever undertaken by the Justice Department against individuals in an FCPA case. He also said it marked the department’s first large-scale use of undercover techniques in an FCPA investigation.
“We’re steadily pushing this unacceptable practice out of the business playbook by prosecuting companies and individuals who ignore the law, as well as by working with our international counterparts in their efforts to prevent and prosecute foreign bribery,” Breuer said.
He said the Justice Department currently has 140 open FCPA investigations. Kevin Perkins, assistant director of the FBI’s criminal investigative division, said 20 agents were working on FCPA cases full time.
I wonder if this was a way to go after the firearms industry in a way that we couldn’t rightly complain, because they are breaking the law, after all. Unfortunately just about everyone is a federal criminal these days. Perhaps this marks the feds cracking down on this practice in general. I’m sure it will do wonders for the economy and job creation if our corporations are unable to do business in large chunks of the globe because the feds won’t let them pay bribes.
Another Mass Shooting in Europe
Once again in Finland, as GunPundit reports. Finland is has more guns per capita than many European countries, but handguns are pretty heavily restricted, especially after several high profile school shootings, which caused Finnish authorities to deny permits for handguns larger than .22 caliber. Apparently the gunman used a 9mm pistol. Where there’s a will, there’s a way.
UPDATE: Interesting commentary by Claude Cartaginese, who says the gun was illegally obtained:
This time, however, politicians in Finland, instead of focusing on how Shkupolli—who had a criminal record—was able to obtain an illegal handgun in a country that already has strict gun-control laws, are now considering a further tightening of those restrictions.
Finnish politicians will now begin to debate how these “deranged loners,†under the hypnotic spell cast by the “Americanization of Finnish society,†can be prevented from carrying out such attacks in the future.
Ah yes, the American gun-culture rears its ugly head once more, this time shattering the peace in a bucolic Finnish town which would have been spared the carnage caused by Mr. Shkupolli, if only the gun-control laws had been made even stricter.
You can’t make something more illegal.
California Body Armor Statute Tossed for Vagueness
Via RideFast, it looks like the California ban on possession of Body Armor by convicted felons has been tossed out by a California appeals court. Â You can find the ruling here. It’s largely a problem of how California defines the term “body armor.” Â The federal standard is probably better for those purposes, which can be found in 18 USC 921:
(35) The term "body armor" means any product sold or offered for sale, in interstate or foreign commerce, as personal protective body covering intended to protect against gunfire, regardless of whether the product is to be worn alone or is sold as a complement to another product or garment.
Now, in this case, the federal law might not apply, since the jacket in question was a flak jacket, and stated clearly it didn’t protect against small arms fire. But the federal definition only hinges on how the product is marketed, not on its actual capabilities. This would prevent an absurd result, such as possession of boiler plates by felons being unlawful, under the theory that they can stop some bullets, and could possibly be worn underneath clothing.
Don’t Bring a Gun to a Snowball Fight
If you’re going to have a snowball fight in DC, I would recommend doing it near the Capitol, where the Capitol Police, who are generally professional, have jurisdiction. Apparently at least one D.C. Metro Police officer thinks it’s fine to draw their piece in response to his car getting hit with a snowball. See here:
[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uAgQKJuriIo[/youtube]
Glenn has some good coverage of this event, including some comments from Ann Althouse. I wouldn’t blame the cop for calling in on the radio and getting the crowd dispersed, once they were bombing passing cars with snowballs, but drawing the gun is unacceptable. It is brandishing, because he had no cause to present deadly force to the crowd. Glenn is absolutely correct that an ordinary citizen, in this situation, would be prosecuted, and rightly so. I think this officer should be fired, and prosecuted.
Spreading the Blame
Monica Yant Kinney, my favorite Inquirer editorialist, lays out a pretty textbook case of building and eventually prosecuting a case against a guy who was buying a gun from lawful dealers, and then selling them on the streets. Eventually he was prosecuted, convicted, and served 4.5 years in federal prison for the crime. Isn’t this an example of the laws working? From Yant Kinney’s editorial:
Watching the news, Jerome knows he’s partly responsible for the city’s crisis of violence. But he thinks there’s blame to go around.
“I knew it would come to an end for me. I just wish those gun dealers were held accountable.”
No, “Jerome,” you don’t get to assuage your guilt by trying to shift the blame onto the dealers you deceived about the legality of the sale they were making. You’re the one that swore to the dealer and federal authorities you were the actual buyer of the firearm when you signed off on 4473. You’re the piece of shit that took the guns and opened up your trunk and sold them to criminals. It’s all on you my friend. You served your time, not nearly enough in my opinion, but if you’re living the straight life now, congratulations. I hope you learned something. But if you really want to convince us you’re reformed, and not that bleeding heart Inquirer columnist, you need to start by accepting full responsibility for what you did.
Origins of the Sideways Grip
What’s the point of holding a gun sideways?
To look Hollywood, of course. Journalists and gun experts point to the 1993 Hughes brothers film Menace II Society, which depicts the side grip in its opening scene, as the movie that popularized the style. Although the directors claim to have witnessed a side grip robbery in Detroit in 1987, there are few reports of street gangs using the technique until after the movie came out. The Hughes brothers didn’t invent the grip, though. In 1961’s One-Eyed Jacks, Marlon Brando used it, as did Eli Wallach in 1966’s The Good, The Bad, and the Ugly. Directors may prefer the style because it makes it easier to see both the weapon and the actor’s face in a tight camera shot.
I wonder what else Hollywood can do to make criminals continue to choose style over function?
And Yet They Want to Blame Guns
The Philadelphia Inquirer seems to be on to something:
Philadelphia defendants walk free on all charges in nearly two-thirds of violent-crime cases. Among large urban counties, Philadelphia has the nation’s lowest felony-conviction rate.
Only one in 10 people charged with gun assaults is convicted of that charge, the newspaper found.
Only two in 10 accused armed robbers are found guilty of armed robbery.
Only one in four accused rapists is found guilty of rape.
The data also show that people charged with assaults with a gun escape conviction more often than those who use fists or knives. Of people arrested for possession of illegal handguns, almost half go free.
Nationally, prosecutors in big cities win felony convictions in half of violent-crime cases, according to federal studies. In Philadelphia, prosecutors win only 20 percent.
So does the Inquirer want to explain how more gun laws are going to help if we’re not even enforcing the laws adequately against rape and robbery? This is scandalous, yet the Inquirer’s editorial board will continue to blame guns and the NRA, and shame Harrisburg for not passing more laws. Can we try locking up criminals first?
Mass Shooting in China
China is a gun-free society with a totalitarian government that offers no protection against unreasonable search and seizure, which gun control advocates would probably think means this could never happen.
Ridley Township Home Invader Caught
Remember the 84 year old veteran who scared an attacker out of his house after a brief gunfight? Looks like Ridley Township Detectives caught the woman:
“This guy’s a World War II vet, 84, a member of the Field and Stream Gun Club where he shoots every day,†said Detective Lt. Scott Willoughby. “He lives by the NRA motto that he’s not going to be a victim. Thank God, no one was injured in this case.â€
Makes me proud to have grown up there, or at least in the neighboring borough of Ridley Park. What’s even better is they know who she sold the gun to. Unfortunately they did not recover the guns, but this was good work on the part of the Ridley Township Police.