police-tape-web

Edward Towers of Palm Coast, FL was discussing “what would you do” scenarios with his neighbor and another man Wednesday evening when he decided to show them his Diamondback Arms 9mm. And by “show them” read “point it at his neighbor and pull the trigger.” Apparently Mr. Towers did not believe he’d actually shot his neighbor, so he asked the third man to “look at the gun” and in the process discharged another round into the ground. Mr. Towers was arrested, the neighbor was transported in stable condition, and yes, there was alcohol involved. [h/t Brad S.]

A 17-year-old Minneapolis man will be charged as an adult with felony reckless discharge of a firearm following the accidental shooting of his two month old nephew. The infant survived, though doctors have deemed it too dangerous to remove the bullet. James Early showed up at his brother’s house carrying a loaded .38 caliber revolver (remember that last part). The brother, Isaac Early Sr., told police he didn’t want the gun around the baby, so he took it away and removed the bullets. A few minutes later, he saw James Early snap the gun shut, and it went off. James Early told police he pulled the trigger back because he thought “that this was the safe mode.”

Davion Titus of San Bernardino, CA was sitting outside his apartment early Saturday morning with a woman when she heard a noise. After retrieving his gun from inside the apartment and investigating the noise, Mr. Titus returned to his seat, placing the cocked single-action Freedom Arms .454 Casull into his waistband. Some time later, the ill-fated Mr. Titus moved in such a way he gained at least one new (very large) hole, and the rest of us gained a cautionary tale. [h/t David B.]

Mark N. writes: California’s proposed ammo permitting scheme failed in the assembly, after which, to preserve it for another go around next session, a motion for “reconsideration” was made and passed, and then the bill “withdrawn” by its author. Meanwhile, SB 374, the assault weapons ban, passed by a single vote and will be making its way to the Governor’s desk next week. Californians who want an “assault weapon” (under whatever definition you want to use) are encouraged to go on a buying spree before the first of the year, the effective date of the new law should Governor Brown sign it into law. Potential buyers should also be aware that this ban will affect ANY semiautomatic rifle with a detachable magazine, including some rather classic hunting rifles. M1 Carbines will be a definite prohibited purchase, as will Springfield M1A1s, Ruger minis, and possibly Garands (people are still arguing about that). Magazine fed shotguns are also on the forbidden list.

Urge California Governor Jerry Brown to VETO gun control bills here:
https://www.firearmspolicy.org/the-issues/california/2013-2014/askbrown/

RELATED ARTICLESMORE FROM AUTHOR

80 COMMENTS

  2. I might be alone in this but I think the new AWB getting passed in California might be a good thing. It definitely violates the 2nd Amendment under the “Common Use” definition established in Heller v DC and is the best chance we have to bring a state’s AWB before the Supreme Court and have it struck down, thereby weakening the concept of a physical features ban in every state.

    • I hope you’re right. You are talking about the old “give ’em enough rope” syndrome, right?

      We shall see. It sure is hard to endure as it happens, though.

    • State Senator Rod Wright (D-Inglewood) gave a very good speech against the AWB, where he urged a no vote. But he also stated that if you don’t listen to him and pass it, he is happy because it would only take a court 20 minutes to reject it as blatantly unconstitutional, and would thus end years of legal unclarity of an AWB.

      And yes you read that right. D, as in Democrat. From Inglewood to boot. He is also black. I am actually quite shocked myself (I assumed any Dem giving even lip service to the 2a would be central valley, or Riverside…not that part of Los Angeles I wouldn’t walk alone at night in…)

      • He was not the only one. In the Senate, a bill needs a “majority of the whole” to pass, not just a majority of those voting, meaning 21 votes out of a possible 40. SB 374 got only 21 votes for passage even though there are 27 democrats.

    • The downside to this approach is the time it takes and the risk of failure. So far, the federal district courts have been rolling over and playing dead, giving but lip service to the “intermediate scrutiny” analysis the case law has established, and concluding that if the (city, county or state) government thinks it is a good idea, then it must be OK. The Ninth Circuit, being exceedingly busy (the busiest circuit, by all reports), it is also agonizingly slow. [For example, Nordyke v. King, a case designed to establish the standard of review, wandered up and down between the trial court and the Court of Appeals for nine years before suddenly petering out.] The net result is that losses in trial courts are all but guaranteed, and relief in the Ninth Circuit is both uncertain and long delayed. Even if swiftly challenged if enacted, it will be years before any case is poised for a petition for cert to the Supreme Court.

  3. Sometimes I wonder if these ‘assault weapon’ bans are just a way to make the manufacturers huge piles of money due to the panic spree purchases. Also why should a detachable magazine make it an assault weapon? A good shooter can do more damage with a Winchester or Remington bolt gun with 5 round internal mag, than a novice crazy person can with a 10 round AR-15 like you can get in CA right now. They can also reload that bolt action almost as fast as a nutbag fumbling with the magazine.

    This makes no sense.

    • Think of it as a ‘death by a thousand cuts’. It’s easier to ban guns in small groups than all at once.

    • You assume the people who are making these laws have any clue. They are not educated nor care about the issues and they are simply following a script set by the DNC. Emotions and not clear logic is used.

      • If you believe the DNC is at the top of this pyramid, you are sorely mistaken. The GOP/DNC thing is a charade; they’re asking us to choose between being drawn and quartered or burned at the stake.

        Choose, “none of the above” if you want to survive. If you want America to survive.

    • I agree with that. Work the bolt like a boss and use stripper clips to reload. It can be fairly fast unless you use a Mosin and get rim lock.

      • Sounds good in theory until you actually read the legislation. The law states that “disassembling of the action” is the new standard. As in, if you can reload without disassembling the action, then it is an assault weapon. On the AR platform, that means the bullet button is a goner. Because the law specifically bans magazines that “can easily be removed with a tool” ….

  4. We are not going to be able to count on the high court forever. B.O. gets one more appointment to the bench in the nations highest court and the tables have turned…we’ll be screwed.

    Smitty

      • I don’t know that it will be Obama appointing the next opening on the court. We HAVE to get a President in office in the next election that will appoint judges that support the second amendment though or else we will be SOL.

  5. He retrieved his gun from Inside his apartment and with a c0cked .454 he went Outside his apartment to investigate a noise? In an apartment complex? In California? Here’s hoping the bullet removed his chances of reproduction.

  6. Not to go off subject here but I still cant reply to comments. Why are we fixng stuff that wasnt broke in the first place? Ill take the “make $80/hr at home” bots all day if I can have the old (mobile) site back.

  7. 454 Casull just sounds like it would hurt more than other calibers. (I’m trying the gun-grabber thing and speaking purely out of emotion, while ignoring logic, reason, and also those pesky ‘facts’)

  8. Well, one heartening thing in the news report regarding the now-deceased Mr. Titus:
    “Titus moved to adjust himself and accidently caused the gun to fire”
    For once, the gun didn’t “go off”!

  9. Buying spree? Yeah. You could say that.

    AR-15 lowers: I have a 4-pack of 80% lowers, the finishing jig, and tooling on order. Still tempted by some of the commercial machined-from-solid-billet lowers like the Seekins, though.

    AR-10 lowers: 2 80% DPMS-clone lowers + jig on order. I’m a little worried about not having any commercial lowers just in case the DIY models are problematic, but dammit are those expensive.

    FYI the best place to find this stuff right now is RocketHub:
    http://www.rockethub.com/projects?query=Lower+receiver

    Now the real conundrum: is there any way to acquire a good quality M1A receiver for a tolerably small sum? I really really really want an M1A but my 2013 budget is going to be stretched severely if this ban gets signed into law. All I need is a serial-numbered receiver to register… Help?

    Also, if you live in CA: contact Gov Brown EVERY DAY UNTIL THE BILLS ARE VETOED OR SIGNED. Please. Matt posted the link up above. DO IT.

  10. Why do they always have to mention that alcohol was involved? Speaking as a proud hard core alcoholic who likes to fiddle with firearms while drinking, if you’ve drank enough to render yourself incapable of checking/clearing a weapon you’re a better man than I. Seriously, if you’re capable of backing you’re car into the fire hydrant across the street, you’re capable of clearing your firearm. How hard is that!?!

    • 🙂

      “Alcoholic” is a term to make social workers, counselors and their ilk believe they have someone they need to “help” (as in, “we’re from the State, we’re here…”

      I prefer the humanist term, “common drunkard”.

      These do-gooders will LEAP at the opportunity to get an “alcoholic” on their tenterhooks. But they’ll avoid a “common drunkard” like the plague!

        • YEAH! They act like it’s someone else’s problem besides the drinker…

          Obviously this is the case sometimes, but don’t try and make up effing clinical names for all of human behavior… it’s just people being themselves, trying to cope with this mess of a society.

      • Why get so formal? “Drunk” works for me. I’m a drunk!…

        Sidebar, my favorite Benjamin Franklin quote – “Beer is proof that God loves us and wants us to be happy.”

        • In my experience of life an alcoholic is a person that still has an address. A common drunk’s address is usually something along the lines of the park bench with the shopping cart parked next to it.

        • My second favorite Benjamin Franklin quote, “In wine there is wisdom, in beer there is freedom, in water there is bacteria.”

        • WELCOME, fellow drunk! Though my style is currently cramped by a stomach ulcer, I am looking forward to the day I can fully partake of the things God gave us.

          And distilled spirits came from the Arabs, like higher mathematics. I have no use for the second, but the first is truly a blessing at times.

        • I doubt the source for that quote is Ben Franklin, since the term “bacteria” didn’t come into use until well after his death.

          But back to the topic at hand: I prefer the term “wino”. It reminds me of a simpler time, when the streets were populated with winos and bums, not alcoholics and homeless people…

        • The Alexandrians were distilling water by the first century AD, and the medieval Arabs learned the technique from them. There is however no evidence that the Arabs distilled alcohol.

          Distilled beverages were likely first made in China in the 8th century.

          The Italians first distilled liquor in the 12th century, followed closely by the Scots who seem to have come up with the idea independently.

          We got much from the Arabs, but with the Islamic prohibition against the imbibing of the fermentation of grain or grape, distilled spirits aren’t on that list.

          I wonder how many Muslims take advantage of the mead loophole…?

        • They were, although the existence of his “minute animals” was by no means generally accepted until much later.

          However, the word bacteria as the plural of the modern Latin singular bacterium, in turn from the Greek bakterion (small things) was coined and entered scientific usage in 1838.

          “In wine there is wisdom, in beer there is freedom, in water there are van Leeuwenhoek’s minute animals” simply hasn’t the same ring to it.

        • I always heard it as, “I’m not an alcoholic, I’m a drunk. Alcoholics to go to meetings.”

          And in that vein: “AA is for quitters.”

        • Antonie van Leeuwenhoek called them “animalcules” so if it was a genuine Ben Franklin quote it might have been translated from “in water there is animalcules”.

  11. My move date is set for two weeks from Monday. Good bye breakfast burritos, palm trees, ocean sunsets, temperate climate, and tyrannical government. Hello lobster rolls, pine trees, tree-lined sunrises, four seasons, and freedom.

    • My family moved to Ohio from California when I was 3. Growing up, I thought California was the coolest place in the world and bragged to everyone who would listen that I was born there. Now that I’ve grown up quite a bit, I realize it’s actually a hellhole. There’s a reason that a lot of people who live there are trying to leave.

      So screw that place. Ohio is my home now. Erratic weather at times, but gorgeous scenery. And a strong gun culture that will furiously oppose any gun control. Although we do have to take a 12-hour class for CCW and there is a 30-round mag limit for some reason, but it does not appear to be enforced (my local gun store had 34-round Sten mags right out in the open)

      • With respect to those magazines, Ohio doesn’t actually have magazine limit. Any magazine size is probably legal to sell or own. However, inserting >30 round magazines into a firearm IS ILLEGAL.
        Per ORC 2923.11, under “Automatic firearm” if you insert a 31+ mag into any gun that isn’t a .22, then you are definitely illegal. There is some debate as to owning the magazines without using them, but you’re right that nobody’s been prosecuted for that (to my limited knowledge).

        Just wanted to clarify that before you get caught with loaded gun with a hi-cap mag and get arrested 🙂

  13. BTW, the M1 Garand is clearly not prohibited under 374. Not under the legal definition of fixed versus detachable magazine used currently. Does the author believe the “bullet button ban” language would somehow cause the en-bloc clip to be counted as a magazine?

    • Not necessarily a magazine, but as a removable feeding device. This is the ambiguity that needs to be hammered out, because 374 doesn’t care how many rounds fit in the magazine or feeding device if it is removable. As others have warned, common semiautomatic hunting rifles appear to fall within the scope of the definitions if they have a box mag. This is why the Ruger minis are going to be banned, as well as some Brownings and and and.

  14. If firearms ed was as commonplace as driver’s ed, I would wager that 90% of negligent/unintentional discharges would cease to happen. Seriously, how hard is it to follow the first couple rules?

      • Yes, this thought occurred to me as well. However, operating a vehicle at speed can be a complicated process. Keeping your finger off the trigger is not. Even drunk people can usually figure out how to put a vehicle in drive and close the door. If young people were brought up shooting, gun safety would be as second nature as locking the door at night.

        • I’m not against firearms education, of course. It would help a lot, especially with children and young adults having accidents out of ignorance.

          But, you can’t fix stupid, either. A *lot* of the negligent discharges we read about here every day are caused by morons being morons, and no amount of education is going to keep stupid people from doing stupid things. Like putting a cocked .454 Casull revolver in your pants, pointed at your nutsack. That Freedom Arms gun is an expensive piece, not some Hi-Point brick he picked up “just in case”. Guy owns a gun like that, he’s probably an experienced shooter. And also clearly an idiot for jamming it down his pants.

  15. Dang, I give up. Three comments have disappeared on me, and not one of them should have run afoul of the robocensor.

  16. Wow… There are some idiots out there. It gives “Fawlty Towers” an entirely new meaning, and don’t get me started on San Bernardino. Hopefully the “man” from Minnesota won’t get out ’til he’s too old to breed…

    Pardon my ignorance, but what’s the issue with the M1 and Калифорния?

    An 8 round “en bloc” clip thingie ain’t exactly a detachable magazine.

    What am I not getting…?

    • The bill they passed says this:

      (d) For purposes of this section, the following definitions shall apply:
      (1) “Detachable magazine” means an ammunition feeding device that can be removed readily from the firearm without disassembly of the firearm action.

      The way they’ve defined it, many are worried that an en bloc could be perceived by a jury as “an ammunition feeding device.”

      • Wow. Stretched to near the limit, the stripper clip used with a Mosin might also be so considered, but at least with a Mosin the clip is optional.

        Stupidity on parade.

  17. “The infant survived, though doctors have deemed it too dangerous to remove the bullet.”

    How does a .38 Special bullet NOT pass through an infant? Was the negligent gun owner shooting defective .38 Special ammunition?

    I sure hope the infant recovers fully … how sad and needless.

      • The bullet hit the child in the neck, and my guess is it passed through something else (window, door, wall) first. Hell, it may have even been a ricochet off the ground or something. It was clearly an accident, so no telling where exactly the gun was pointed when it was fired.

        The story says “any potential permanent injuries remain unknown.”

  18. “California’s proposed ammo permitting scheme failed in the assembly …”

    Seriously, how is that possible? I figured the Communist super majority would pass anything and everything. I wonder if an attorney told them it would definitely lose in the courts when challenged because I cannot see the assembly failing to pass it for any other reason.

    “Meanwhile, SB 374, the assault weapons ban, passed by a single vote …”

    Again, I am stunned. See explanation above.

    • Colorado has suffered from Californication for quite some time.

      Perhaps this weirdness in the Assembly is due to some sort of “reverse Heisenberg Effect,” in which the influence travels the other way?

      • Well they have certainly reinforced the “uncertainty” aspect of Heisenberg’s Uncertainty Principle.

    • Maybe the loonies are migrating out of California faster than the sane people? Maybe in another generation California will seem like the normal place and the midwest will be corrupted by the California drift?

      • Bad jwm! Bad, bad, bad!!!

        That thought is not to leave this [chat] room!

        Ugh! Yuck! Bleah!

        Might I suggest the following instead?

        May sense come to those with power, and power to those with sense.

        There. Isn’t that a better wish?

    • You are only stunned because you never knew anything about CA politics in the first place other than tired rhetoric. There has always been a libertarian streak on both left and right here. And though it is not pronounced as much anymore, you still see its effects. CA after all was home to many Blue Dogs (moderate-conservative Dems). Liberal and Conservative here is different than in the East. Something often missed by those outside looking in.

      The Assembly has always been more conservative and hesistant than the Senate. Well since 1968 (when we complied with that evil SCOTUS decision, Reynold v. Sim). The simple reason is that every Senator represent approximately a million people (ok, more like 975,000) whereas Assemblymen are twice as numerous. This means smaller districts, and hence more influence by conservative regions which might be combined in a Senate district with a liberal one and made irrelevant.

      The Assembly killed several of the bills proposed this year in previous years. The real shock to me was that the Assembly Appropriations Committe went party line and approved all the gun control this year without any hesistancy…in the past they have been more restrained than the Senate.

      Frankly, the NRA should focus on targetting Reynold v Sim. California used have the Assembly based on population, but the Senate was one vote=one county. The Court ruled this unconstitutional because, screw the actual constitution (by their logic the Constitution’s provisions on the US Senate are unconstitutioal). They ruled that bicameral legislatures must have both houses based on population, thus defeating the whole purpose of such legislatures (largely emulated of the actual Constitution).

      There was a Senator at the time that wanted a Constitutional amendment to reject this nonsense. He warned that if it stands Chicago would dominate Illinois, and Los Angeles and San Francisco would rule California, without regard to the millions of fellow citizens with different interests. He was right.

  20. It is gospel: The first step towards a totalitarian state is the complete removal of all privately owned firearms.

Comments are closed.