Category: Crime

So he resorted to fox urine to repel the trespassers.

A 50-year-old man told authorities he was fed up with teens toilet-papering his house during homecoming week. This year, he decided to defend his property — with a squirt gun filled with fox urine.

Now, Scott Wagar is in trouble with the law. He pleaded not guilty on Wednesday in Kandiyohi County District Court to misdemeanor assault and other charges. He was released on personal recognizance.

What I don’t get is why he’s being charged.  I don’t know about Minnesota, but in Pennsylvania you can use force to defend property.  Not deadly force, but force:

§ 507. Use of force for the protection of property

(a) Use of force justifiable for protection of property.–The use of force upon or toward the person of another is justifiable when the actor believes that such force is immediately necessary:

(1) to prevent or terminate an unlawful entry or other trespass upon land or a trespass against […]

[…] (1) The use of force is justifiable under this section only if the actor first requests the person against whom such force is used to desist from his interference with the property, unless the actor believes that:

(i) such request would be useless;

(ii) it would be dangerous to himself or another person to make the request; or

(iii) substantial harm will be done to the physical condition of the property which is sought to be protected before the request can effectively be made.

I can’t imagine Minnesota can be all that different.  But it seems to me if kids are TPing your property, you’re justified in squirting piss on them if they won’t leave you alone.

UPDATE: Yep, Minnesota law is similar:

Sec. 609.06. Authorized use of force. Reasonable force may be used upon or toward the person of another without his con-sent when the following circumstances exist or the actor reasonably believes them to exist:

[…]

(4) When used by any person in lawful possession of real or pet-sonal property, or by another assisting him, in resisting a trespass upon or other unlawful interference with such property; or

I guess the charges will hinge on fox urine not being “reasonable” use of force.  Good luck finding a jury who’s going to convict on that.  I sure as hell wouldn’t.

Someone set Sarah Palin’s church on fire. Check out the comments in the article to get some idea just how much seething hatred there is for this woman.  Stay classy progressives, stay classy.

Brillianter talks about how problematic SWAT tactics are at performing the majority of things they are asked to do these days.  It seems more and more departments are forming tactical teams.  When I was growing up, big cities had them, and I think there were SWAT teams provided by the county.  Now the local police have them too.  If you are spending a lot of money obtaining and maintaining and expensive tool, the natural reaction is to look for places to use it.

Never let it be said the FBI doesn’t occasionally do the right thing.  I’m actually rather happy with the extent the FBI under Bush has gone after corruption.

UPDATE: Looks like he was trying to sell Obama’s Senate seat, without much success.  I guess a slow economy hurts the corruption industry too:

A 76-page FBI affidavit said the 51-year-old Democratic governor was intercepted on court-authorized wiretaps over the last month conspiring to sell or trade the vacant Senate seat for personal benefits for himself and his wife, Patti.

Otherwise, Blagojevich considered appointing himself. The affidavit said that as late as Nov. 3, he told his deputy governor that if “they’re not going to offer me anything of value I might as well take it.”

And we elected a President from this cadre of corruption.

The New York Times offers a bit more information about the “certified instructor” than we had before in relation to the death of Christopher Bizilj:

As he fired, Mr. Bennett told The A.P., Christopher was supervised only by a 15-year-old.

So one of the line instructors was a 15 year old?  This just gets better and better with each new revelation.  These folks have put the entire shooting culture in Massachusetts under the microscope with a poorly marketed, poorly thought out, and poorly organized machine gun shoot.  This is what’s being reaped right now:

Terrel Harris, a spokesman for the state public safety secretary, Kevin Burke, said the department had been “working on seeing what statutes and regulations we might be able to tighten and strengthen,” specifically involving “machine guns, juveniles in possession of guns, and gun clubs.”

No good will come of this.

Looks like the machine gun shoot organizer, the instructor, and the firearm owner, were charged with manslaughter in the death of that 8 year old boy at the machine gun shoot.  Seems the club was charged too, but I’m not sure how you charge a club.

Hat tip to Robb

UPDATE: At least one state representative up there understands what the problem is.  I have to admit, I didn’t know what they were doing was illegal either.  With any other firearm, there’s an exception that allows supervised possession.  Just not a machine gun.  When it comes to gun laws, common sense is often uncommon.

Looks like the newfangled sonic weapon, the LRAD, doesn’t work too well against pirates.  I could never figure out how a loud noise was going to deter a determined attacker.  I mean, these guys are presumably firing off a lot of AK-47s, which isn’t exactly quiet.  The pirates seem to have used their AKs to shoot out the device.

Looks like they went after a US flagged cruise ship.  The captain basically outran the pirates.  Cruise ships can move pretty fast when they have to.  One wonders when the international community is going to realize that disarming people on the high seas isn’t helping this situation any.  The proper response to being fired on by pirates, aside from full steam ahead, is return fire.  Won’t take too much of that before piracy doesn’t pay anymore.

This is what the City of Philadelphia does to criminals who shoot at police officers.  No amount of new laws are going to help if the City keeps insisting on catch and release as a policy.

Some of you remember the guy who got caught yesterday with an SKS, looking for a ride to DC.   Well, Pro-Gun Progressive has the scoop on that story.  I would note that this is the reason criminals prefer guns that are concealeable.  I guess you can always count on the media to get it wrong when it comes to gun related stories.