Your rights, swirling down the drain...
Oct. 18th, 2007 04:41 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
sorrowmonkeyThe "arsenal" in Middletown? Some guy's gun collection:
http://www.wtnh.com/Global/story.asp?S=7232847
A "woman" took 90 of his guns and turned them into the police. Stealing a firearm is a felony. Are the cops going to prosecute her for 90 felonies? Under the proposed 3 strikes law, stealing a firearm counts, and she could get life.
This guy has been arrested for possession of three assault weapons. Based on the proven inability of Connecticut police in identifying assault weapons under Connecticut law (read it sometime, if you want a headache) and their egregious inability to correctly identify licensed persons, I would not be surprised if this guy gets acquitted at trial, if the charges aren't dropped before.
After that, we can watch him fight it out with the Middletown cops over the value of his confiscated collection. My rough estimate of the value of his collection is around $300,000. It could be as little as $100,000, but it could be $1,000,000, too. Possession of bullet proof vests is not illegal, nor is possession of books (even those on explosives), ammunitions or more rifles than you can carry. If you shoot 500 rounds on a typical range trip (not unusual for an IDPA or IPSC shooter), you will use 18,000 rounds in less than six months. If you have one box of ammunition for each of your 375 firearms?
What right will you give up next? Speech? Due Process?
Someone had better come up with something else wrong with this guy, and soon. In the meantime, I believe that we are all just sitting around while the State persecutes this guy for exercising constitutionally protected rights. Did he threaten someone? Does he have a criminal or mental history that legally restricts his right to keep and bear arms? Did this woman get a protective order against him?
EDIT: Slightly more info from the notoriously anti-gun Hartford Courant:
http://www.topix.net/content/trb/2007/10/huge-cache-of-arms-found-at-house
EDIT2: And the Middletown Press:
http://www.middletownpress.com/site/news.cfm?dept_id=571446&newsid=18909672
Apparently, police claim they found an AK-47, a Tec 9, and an "M-16 with a shotgun". At least two of these are almost guaranteed to be factually incorrect. Both an AK-47 and an M-16 are fully-automatic select fire weapons worth over $15,000. It is more like that he had an AK-47S (semi-auto only) and an AR-15.
My guess is that the AK-47[sic], the Tec-9, and the M-16[sic] are the basis for the assault weapon charges. An AK-47 is a pretty easy way to get in trouble in Connecticut. With the AR-15 it depends a little more on the actual configuration. I'm not sure about the Tec-9.
Street sweeper shotguns are banned too.
Oh, can I come into your house, take your stuff, and give it to the police "for safekeeping"? Apparently. Do I need a legal right to be in your house, first? Definitely interesting stuff.
http://www.wtnh.com/Global/story.asp?S=7232847
A "woman" took 90 of his guns and turned them into the police. Stealing a firearm is a felony. Are the cops going to prosecute her for 90 felonies? Under the proposed 3 strikes law, stealing a firearm counts, and she could get life.
This guy has been arrested for possession of three assault weapons. Based on the proven inability of Connecticut police in identifying assault weapons under Connecticut law (read it sometime, if you want a headache) and their egregious inability to correctly identify licensed persons, I would not be surprised if this guy gets acquitted at trial, if the charges aren't dropped before.
After that, we can watch him fight it out with the Middletown cops over the value of his confiscated collection. My rough estimate of the value of his collection is around $300,000. It could be as little as $100,000, but it could be $1,000,000, too. Possession of bullet proof vests is not illegal, nor is possession of books (even those on explosives), ammunitions or more rifles than you can carry. If you shoot 500 rounds on a typical range trip (not unusual for an IDPA or IPSC shooter), you will use 18,000 rounds in less than six months. If you have one box of ammunition for each of your 375 firearms?
What right will you give up next? Speech? Due Process?
Someone had better come up with something else wrong with this guy, and soon. In the meantime, I believe that we are all just sitting around while the State persecutes this guy for exercising constitutionally protected rights. Did he threaten someone? Does he have a criminal or mental history that legally restricts his right to keep and bear arms? Did this woman get a protective order against him?
EDIT: Slightly more info from the notoriously anti-gun Hartford Courant:
http://www.topix.net/content/trb/2007/10/huge-cache-of-arms-found-at-house
EDIT2: And the Middletown Press:
http://www.middletownpress.com/site/news.cfm?dept_id=571446&newsid=18909672
Apparently, police claim they found an AK-47, a Tec 9, and an "M-16 with a shotgun". At least two of these are almost guaranteed to be factually incorrect. Both an AK-47 and an M-16 are fully-automatic select fire weapons worth over $15,000. It is more like that he had an AK-47S (semi-auto only) and an AR-15.
My guess is that the AK-47[sic], the Tec-9, and the M-16[sic] are the basis for the assault weapon charges. An AK-47 is a pretty easy way to get in trouble in Connecticut. With the AR-15 it depends a little more on the actual configuration. I'm not sure about the Tec-9.
Street sweeper shotguns are banned too.
Oh, can I come into your house, take your stuff, and give it to the police "for safekeeping"? Apparently. Do I need a legal right to be in your house, first? Definitely interesting stuff.
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no subject
Date: 2007-10-18 09:24 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2007-10-20 02:53 pm (UTC)Not really the point but...
Date: 2007-10-22 01:51 am (UTC)Re: Not really the point but...
Date: 2007-10-22 01:23 pm (UTC)I'm extremely uncomfortable with law enforcement personnel used as tools in a grudge match. I think it places the officers in a bad position, but I think it has even worse consequences for the relationship of government to the citizenry.
The only part of the whole episode that I don't find completely disgusting is the guy's gun collection. Every other part of it: the woman's behavior, the police willingness to involve themselves, and the reporting makes me want to retch.