Category: Anti-Gun Folks

Sen. Bob Casey who ran a campaign to get the support of gun owners changed his tune quite a while ago. He’s on board with the sweeping semi-auto bans, private sale bans, and magazine bans.

Now he wants to make gun owners a felon if they are even suspected of potential crimes – beyond the standard “terror watch list” restriction which could end your right to possess firearms just for having the same name as some person who may not have even visited this country.

Convictions, evidence, and watch list status are no longer required under the plan he announced today. Let someone give your name as a suspect in some crime that happens to include a victim in a protected class, and you lose your Constitutional rights.

“The Hate Crimes Prevention Act would prohibit the purchase, possession or shipment of a firearm by anyone convicted of a misdemeanor hate crime or who received a hate crime sentence enhancement, and prohibit the sale of firearms to anyone reasonably suspected to be guilty of a misdemeanor hate crime. “

(Link via Reason.)

I mentioned a few days ago that Katie Couric and Stephanie Soechtig may not have necessarily violated the law by sending a resident of Colorado to Arizona to purchase firearms in a private sale, since an element of the crime under 18 U.S.C. Section 922(a)(3) is transporting back to your home state. I did not mention 922(a)(5), because I was hoping they’d feel the pressure and open their mouths about what happened to it, possibly admitting to a federal crime in the process.  I’m happy to report I am not disappointed! Soechtig informs us that the firearms in question were turned over to the police in Arizona.

That does not violate 922(a)(3), but it does violate 922(a)(5), which is just as serious as an offense. Section 922(a)(5) makes it unlawful for a non-licensee “to transfer, sell, trade, give, transport, or deliver any firearm to any person … who the transferor knows or has reasonable cause to believe does not reside in … the State in which the transferor resides” Now there’s an exception if you’re transferring it to a licensee, so Couric and Soechtig had the legal option to have it transferred back to an FFL holder outside of Colorado. But there is no exception for police, who under the state in question are non-licensees. So their Coloradan agent here, and Couric and Soechtig by way of conspiracy, did commit a serious federal felony if the circumstances they have described are correct.

Now, will they be prosecuted for it, or will they get the David Gregory treatment? Almost certainly the latter. But there is a technical violation of the law, and otherwise good people have been sent to federal prison for these kinds of violations. There is no “good intentions” exception to these laws, and people with good intentions are routinely prosecuted. But I doubt those involved with “Under the Gun” will be, and that’s because elites take care of their own. One thing it’s not is justice.

According to Ammoland, Stephanie Soechtig admitted in an interview with Lip TV that she sent a resident of Colorado to Arizona to buy firearms from a private seller. We had this issue come up before when Colin Goddard was working for Brady and was accused of the same thing. The crime is actually transporting the firearm back to your home state, not the purchase itself. The seller only commits a crime when the seller knows or has reasonable cause to believe does not reside in his home state. For instance, if the guy pulls up and has Colorado tags, that could amount to such reasonable cause.

Colin Goddard claimed the firearm he purchased out-of-state was disposed of in that state, in which case there was no crime committed. Remember that a lot of the crimes that revolve around deception in a sale only apply if you deceive a licensee. If you tell a non-licensee that you’re from Arizona when you’re really from Colorado, that’s is not a crime. Until the person involved in the sale transports the firearms back to his home state, there is no crime.

That said, if the producers of this show did have the firearm transported back to Colorado, absolutely a federal crime was committed, and they should be forced to answer what happened to the firearms in question. Ammoland is correct that in that instance, the producers can be reached on conspiracy charges if they were involved in the plot, even if they did not bring the firearms back to Colorado themselves. So did they?

Bearing Arms is reporting the EPIX is showing the video is no longer available. Here’s hoping this isn’t just a technical glitch. Couric earlier expressed “regret” for the editing, but didn’t offer an apology or to make things right by re-editing that segment. That tells me she’s looking to let off some of the pressure on her, which is honestly the time to dump even more on her. No quarter. Sadly Couric doesn’t have much of a career left to destroy, but I don’t see any reason to let off the pressure for her fraud.

“Something must be done,” is the first step in the political process. Shouted by ignorant voters, who find some problem they don’t like. Not even considering complexity, nuance, grey areas, or unintended consequences, this low-information sentiment is latched on to by politicians eager to assert their power: “This is something, so therefore it must be done!”

It is in this vein that the Sun Heard says, “Enough is enough, we must get guns under control!” The article starts off with examples of a criminal element out of control, and inevitably arrives here:

We don’t want to take firearms from responsible gun owners, but it’s hard to imagine any of these people fit that description.

Ah yes, it’s just that easy. The central premise of gun control is that criminals obey gun control laws. If only we had this law or that, none of these bad things would happen. If this were so, California would be a crime free paradise, rather than having a violent crime rate higher than the national average, and higher than it’s neighboring states that lack California’s strict gun control laws:

“What is alarming to the police is that they have no power to ascertain the potential criminal background of an armed individual until a crime is committed, and by then it is too late,” said Ladd Everitt, spokesman for the Coalition to Stop Gun Violence, an advocacy group.

I’ve been meaning to write about this for two weeks, but just haven’t found the time. You might remember a story that popped up a year or so ago that busy body whack jobs in Arlington County, Virginia were trying to prevent a gun shop from opening up there. The shop, Nova Armory, managed to open, but not until after the crazies managed to get a few state reps to use their offices to attempt to intimidate the landlord into cancelling the lease. A few weeks ago, Nova Armory filed a suit, arguing that there was a Conspiracy to Injure Another in His Trade or Business. This is now relevant again, because as Miguel reports, the busy bodies are busy getting the county to revoke Nova Armory’s Certificate of Occupancy at a hearing tonight. If you live in Arlington County, now is a good chance to go stand up to these whack jobs.

I don’t know much about how steep of a hill it is to climb with this kind of lawsuit in Virginia courts,  but I wouldn’t be afraid of looking into suing in federal court, especially if they revoke occupancy. I would file in federal court under 42 U.S.C. Section 1985(3), “Conspiracy to Interfere with Civil Rights.”

A lot of folks on our side incorrectly speak of using civil rights laws to shut down what is mere advocacy, but in this case, by using State Legislators and County Government to attempt to shut down Nova Armory’s business, they have actually taken measures to deprive Nova Armory of their Second and 14th Amendment rights. Absolutely if this were happening because residents of Arlington County didn’t want a Black-owned business opening, and engaged in a conspiracy to take actual measures to shut it down, that business owner would have a case. This is no different. The Second Amendment right to keep and bear arms is necessarily the right to buy, sell, and trade in arms as well. Granted, Heller lit the way for government to regulate arms sales with that infamous clause we’re all too familiar with, “The Court’s opinion should not be taken to cast doubt on … laws imposing conditions and qualifications on the commercial sale of arms.” But this is going much farther than regulation.

In this case, they are not imposing conditions or qualifications, but arguing that no gun store may operate in Arlington County, and they’ll act extra-legally if need be to ensure it doesn’t happen. The Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals, in which Virginia resides, has been more friendly to a lot of Second Amendment claims than others. I’d say dragging these fiends into federal court is worth a shot. You can’t negotiate with people who do things like this. You just have to hit back and hit back hard.

Remember when President Obama ordered the military and federal agencies to come up with a plan on how to promote smart-gun technology through the procurement process? Well, that report might be due out this week:

Sources in and out of government say the administration is about to put forward a report from the agencies on the way forward on smart guns. The document could be released as early as this week, these sources say.

Its exact recommendations are being closely guarded by the White House, but it’s likely to reopen a years-long debate on whether smart guns ultimately can cut down the number of accidental shooting deaths — 500 in 2013 alone, 30 of those under age 5.

Bicycles kill more people in accidents every year. Accidental poisoning kills 38,851 people every year, and 76 of those were children under the age of 5 (via Poison Control Center). Unlike accidental shootings, which thanks to community education efforts have been on the decline, accidental poisonings among both adults and those under 5 have been increasing substantially. So why all the attention on this issue? To me, the answer is clear. This isn’t about saving the lives of children, it’s about gaining political advantage over those rubes in flyover country.

We have to be ready for this. Any manufacturer who cooperates with this shit gets the Smith & Wesson treatment. For those readers who are young, gun owners nearly drove the iconic gunmaker out of business because they cooperated with the Clinton Administration to enact back door bans for civilians. Military and police contracts represent a small percentage of the industries overall business. If a company wishes to lose all their civilian business entirely, by all means, bow to pressure from this administration or the next.