I know I'm late to this story, but here's the synopsis if you are, like me, just tuning in:
Apparently some guy in Massachusetts owns fewer guns in total than I own, say, Mausers. And the po-po and media just absolutely lose their collective bladder control about it.
My favorite part of the charges is this: "Girard faces four counts of possession of an infernal device..." Infernal devices? What, the guy had three bootleg copies of The Necronomicon and a Hand of Glory?
Okay, the guy was a little loopy, and the handcuffs and stun batons are kinda mall-ninja-y, but he wasn't hurting anyone, and bad taste isn't a crime, else half of Hollywood would be in leg irons. Further, all the guns appear to have been purchased legally (although the wife is apparently going to fix that with a restraining order,) which makes all the hysteria look a little overblown. It's high-handed crap like this that makes people get their Wookie suit on.
(H/T to SurvivalBlog.)
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39 comments:
I love how the scoped hunting rifle is now an "assualt rifle".
Yeah, if there's a less threatening looking centerfire rifle than a Mannlicher-stocked Steyr, I don't know what it is.
The news story that never gets written, how these cases usually end up. Somebody realizes no real laws were broken, the charges get dropped, and the 'authorities' steal his property.
Hell of a way to initiate a divorce proceeding if you ask me.
Who does a psychiatrist see about her passive-aggressive tendencies?
This is why I refuse to own certain firearms. How would it look when the local PD has my stash splayed out on a table(s) and everyone gets to judge. I want folks to either be, "meh" or "hey! that's cool right there".
It's very important to me that when they do my junk-on-the-bunk display, folks on internet gun forums will say "Okay, that is an arsenal."
Did the newsie just say "illegal ballistic plate"?
It's a piece of steel, rectangular, with truncated corners and a few scars on it.
Of course, they accuse him of firing at in in his own house...which might be an issue.
If he fired anything stronger than an air rifle.
They tried a similar thing here in Connecticut 10 or 12 years ago, albeit only with people who were first professionally judged "barmy", or who had made open threats, brandished weapons, twisty stuff like that.
It never got around to being used, since real life barmers are already banned from touching firearms here.
If somebody does wig out, he/she (a majority of our pistol permit holders are female), their attorney or next of kin gets the option of transferring the weapons to any other person legally allowed to possess them, or to sell them to a licensed dealer and pocket the peso.
Restraining orders no longer require surrender of arms unless the person under charge has done the open threat/brandishing thing.
Certain soon-to-be ex-wives were using it to get their soon-to-be ex-husbands thrown off several local police forces. Screwing around with Cop Junkies isn't a nice thing for a married man to do, but it doesn't make him a danger to public order.
I suspect the primary difference between Connecticut and the People's Republic of Taxachusetts is the degree of engagement between the sportsmen's associations and local government.
We're pretty aggressive, in a polite sort of way. Lots of good press from lots of venison given to homes for orphans, contributions to good causes, volunteer cleanups after storms, and literally hundreds, if needed thousands, of well dressed, well spoken, well briefed shooters showing up at every hearing.
It's really kind of neat when the first 5 or 6 shooters who go up to comment at a hearing introduce themselves as Attorney So and So, Mayor This-n-That, or First Selectman Blivet. You should see the long pusses on the urbanite snobs from West Hartford or Fairfield County. Jesus, I hold those small minded simpletons in such utter contempt.
With a population of about 3.5 million, we have 200,000 pistol permits, and all of them are permits to carry, openly in rural areas, concealed anywhere.
Every hunting license class in the state is booked to the max, usually months early, and Scouting pours thousand more young shooters into the bag each year.
I don't care if you live in Arizona or Wyoming, if you're not politically active you or your children or grandchildren will eventually lose their right to own and use guns.
A certain rather bright English fellow once wrote "The only thing necessary for the triumph of evil is for good me to do nothing".
Ed,
"Restraining orders no longer require surrender of arms unless the person under charge has done the open threat/brandishing thing."
Regardless of Connecticut's wishes, that's federal.
I love the irony of the cop leaning over the table of confiscated guns, quoting him talking about how martial law is coming, as though that's evidence that he's crazy.
"Oh yeah, clearly, he had NOTHING TO WORRY ABOUT."
Meanwhile, back in the USA, when a nutjob goes ballistic, it seems that there may be hope for our youth and our future:
"Gina Hammond, a UAH student, told WAFF that she lobbied the University of Alabama trustees to allow students with gun permits to carry their weapons on campus. She was turned down.
“... I’m sorry that nobody in that room had a pistol to save at least one person’s life,” Hammond said."
Please note that the nutjob in question is a propah Hahvahd product.
F'in Massachusetts. If my parents didn't live there, I'd never go there again.
When they do your junk-on-the-bunk, Tam, I expect them to be too hot to touch without welding gloves, and I don't want to see a single loaded round.
No way, your arsenal will take the high school gymnasium floor, and a whole company of hefty law enforcement folks to move in time for the evening news. Too much work.
Sometimes you need to realize that there are psychos out there buying guns who should at least be separated from them until cured. I do not mean normal people with eccentricities, nor normal people with strong political convictions, I do mean people with mental disorders that may lead to violent behavior. This guy could have been one of them.
Then again, it could all be bs made up by a wife who maybe wants a divorce. I must point out though, I don't know why she would be afraid of him, he had just about 2 of everything in protective gear - his and hers so to speak. Of course, when asked why he stockpiled all of the weapons and survival supplies, he reportedly told police that he was preparing for Armageddon; he probably could have phrased it differently.
While stockpiling for TEOTWAWKI shojuld never be reason to confiscate legally obtained weapons, maybe there were some other reasons here. How many of you have a range in the top floor of your home? I would never shoot in my home without having a professionally built range installed. I wonder who installled this man's 'range'. I wonder if the siding and backing on the walls was sufficient to prevent rounds from going through to hit his neighbors.
I am tending to think his firearms were seized not so much because he was loopy but because law enforcement probably thinks he is psychotic. Based upon some of the statements he reportedly made, plus the build-up of arms over a short period, plus his using his loft as a range might be enough for probable cause for a warrant and a seizure.
I am not saying that the legal actions were justified, just that maybe they were when based upon all the circumstances in this particular case. Sometimes the government is truly there to protect the citizenry.
I certainly would like to hear of the outcome of all of this. Yet, as one person above pointed out, the end result is often not reported in such cases.
All the best,
Glennn B
I once had a range in my basement, and fired rifles up to 45/70 there. (It was a big basement :-)
I sure hope that doesn't make me a kook.
It might help that I had it inspected by the local police instructor at my request, and they gave me some excellent tips on managing air flow over the range.
This guy... my guess is it was an air rifle/pistol range. Anything else and the neighbors would have been unhappy in the extreme. I know I would have been....
Speaking of home ranges, I need to order a new steel target for my back yard (g).
Is it bad when they are reading off the list of items seized from the local 'crazy' and it reads like the shopping list you are kicking around in your head?
Oh, and 1 word: OpSec.
Indoor range in a 4 unit building? Talking openly to other people about "shooting traitors in the head"? Telling the cops, point blank, that your getting read for Armageddon?
Keep your damn trap shut, ya moron. Theres a reason that I want to get out of apartment living...too many people with prying eyes who may be the bedwetter to make a mountain out of nothing at all.
"He was also charged with the illegal possession of four police batons."
The 20 guns were legal, but he had illegal STICKS! Priceless.
wv: bastori -- "Mommy, where did I come from?"
As the resident contrariant totalitarian statist school teacher, I'm going to go ahead and make two observations:
1. His wife is a psychiatrist, and she was scared of him. That's a problem.
2. He was apparently firing rifles indoors in an urban/suburban neighborhood with nothing for a backstop but a "ballistic" plate that looked like it came out of a set of body armor. How large could that thing possibly have been?
Sorry. I realize the media is being sensational about the number of guns and the like, but this guy was dangerous.
Do we know he was firing centerfire rifles up there? Or were they air rifles? Or .22s?
I liked William Grigg's take on this:
"Since it is unacceptable for people to believe that government agents will carry out paramilitary raids to confiscate firearms, a paramilitary force was sent to Girard’s home to confiscate his firearms."
WV=frygoul. A little gamy, but edible with chili sauce.
More information is required.
Jim
"Do we know he was firing centerfire rifles up there? Or were they air rifles?"
My basement range is for air guns, but the press would probably not care to note that fact.
"1. His wife is a psychiatrist, and she was scared of him. That's a problem."
You could have stopped at the comma and been more correct.
Not sure about the legality (spit) of the tear gas and pepper spray grenades, but the rest of it is probably less firepower than most of the readership of this blog.
Bedwetters, indeed.
"Is it bad when they are reading off the list of items seized from the local 'crazy' and it reads like the shopping list you are kicking around in your head?"
See my previous statement, and I personally know a bunch of folks who make me look like a piker when it comes to our respective armories.
Just a common comment that the Americans were trained to not understand, and to thus perpetually endure the grief they cause themselves by their refusal to question contradictions....
"An inferior law contradicted by a superior law holds no weight, effect or enforceability as law."
The use of power of office to enforce an inferior law contradicted by a superior law constitutes fraud, evasion of a known legal duty, perjury to oath of office, malfeasance and other crimes.
Anyone can formally file criminal charges against a government officer, and make them public, and state in the charge that each next superior officer will be formally charged with criminal evasion of a known legal duty if said officers do not, at their duty, initiate due process of law upon presentation of reasonable evidence that a crime has been committed.
Then name each superior officer. Government easily flimflams individuals, but is extremely vulnerable to the law itself, if you understand the law.
Etceteras.
The reason NRA leaders and other gun owner rights organizations refuse to simply manifest the process that would immediately effect the substance of the second amendment is that they are making too much money on donations and leadership ego gratification to stop bilking gullible, unquestioning members.
I am being called to dinner by a gourmet chef with a larger arsenal than mine. And she is a better shot. Gotta go.
DougBuchanan.com
previous NRA director
Miss your meds today, Doug?
Oh, and be sure wifey takes hers, too.
I notice many of the aformentioned comments refer to 'an arsenal', as 'the media' usually does. I've taken to stating I own a 'small collection'. Because it is (1) a collection, and (2) small, by my standards, the only ones which should apply. Numbers are irrelvant, if the firearms are legally owned, just like an amount of ammunition.
"Infernal devices? What, the guy had three bootleg copies of The Necronomicon and a Hand of Glory?"
Nah, just a few Macs.
Snerk!
11 rifles?
I think the worst thing was that he owned the tear gas and pepper spray grenades...
Or the illegal ballistic plate. Definitely the lone illegal thing that they know of.
Sure, he had a few problems, but nothing that some therapy can't fix.
Of course he might not be crazy if he wasn't married to a psychiatrist.
Of course if any of the guns were illegal I have egg on my face.
I guess this is an object lesson. If you're going down the path of pre-apocalpytic stockpiling and preparedness, you better make sure the spouse is on board. Or at least not prone to PSH.
Dear ANON,
"Miss your meds today, Doug?
Oh, and be sure wifey takes hers, too."
Your critique of the ex-Director guy's statement would be interesting to read. Could you expand on it a bit?
You have to look at all this from a straight forward, logical approach. Essentially everything stated in the news article and even comments here are conjecture and illogically drawn conclusions / false cause and effect /etc.
He told the police enough to make them think he was out of his tree. Of course, tell most anyone that you think marshal law/Armageddon is approaching and they will not draw the conclusion you are hoping for. That's a given, seems like he said it, it may have been recorded by the po-po.
"Near military style arsenal"... pure sensationalism.
His wife claims, "blah blah blah"... she has skin in the game and therefore her commentary is biased hearsay at best.
Neighbors commentary is also "he said / she said". They could be telling the truth, but they could also be ganging up on the guy telling the po-po what they want to hear.
I have a few holey targets of some of my best days at the range on the walls of my woodshop. It doesn't mean I was using my shop as a range. See the mis-drawn conclusion here? I shoot nails with a self propelled nail gun, sounds like a firearm - someone sees the targets and now we have proof that I was shooting in my shop right? Wrong. What if the guy purchased body armor SAPI plates that had been tested in order to get a good deal on them so he could add them to his vests/holders? Just because someone heard a sound and they found these plates does not compute to him shooting the plates in his attic. C'mon people.
Is it illegal to own body armor and/or SAPI plates there? Most likely not. The po-po state the plate is illegal... that may simply be untrue.
The short period of time he supposedly purchased these items is irrelevant... period.
Hoarding food and medication... irrelevant. I bet any rural farmer on the outskirts of that town has more food and meds stored up... that too is irrelevant, but merely a point of comparison.
Concerns with the number of weapons... irrelevant... period.
Concerns with the proximity of other residents... irrelevant... period. What? If you live "close" to ANYONE you cannot own a firearm? This guy is saying anything possible to scare the unthinking public.
"Potential for the significant danger to our community"... pure conjecture and spin. Was that guy the police spokesperson or just coached by one?
The tear gas and pepper spray grenades may be illegal... that is a true possibility.
The black painted sticks with leather lanyards may be illegal... that is a true possibility.
This kind of weaponry "off the street"... it wasn't... period... irrelevant.
Rarely left the house... irrelevant... period. Looks like he'd had to get out a lot "in the last 9 months" to purchase all that hardware. Last I checked you still had to go to a store or meet someone face to face to purchase firearms.
The po-po will spend countless hours scouring the weapons and ammo only to find... nothing, in my opinion.
Is this guy a loser, poser, and a little wacky? Maybe... but that's not necessarily illegal nor makes him dangerous.
The facts are, he had some guns, and some ammo, and some knives, and some pepper spray incendiary devices, and some tear gas incendiary devices, and some batons, and some food, and some meds, and he may have said a couple things to the po-po. Soem of that may or MAY NOT be illegal to purchase and/or possess in his state. That is all. Everything else you hear in this article is B.S.
"Everything else you hear in this article is B.S."
Yup. That was what I was saying.
(BTW, who is "Marshal Law"? ;) )
I was doing some moving and a portion of my stuff was at work for a time. I suddenly realized what that would look like to a news reporter "a man was arrested at his office today with two fully-semi-automatic assault pistols, a high capacity assault rifle, and 2,000 rounds of ammunition."
I had my 1911, my model 66, and a Glenfield 60. Most of the ammo was 22 lr. All of it was locked in separate cases and nothing loaded.
Joseyh: Randy Weaver had a couple of shotguns, an SKS, some 10-22s and similar stuff in his "arsenal" for overthrowing the government.
There is no gun you can own that won't cause a lefticle to piss his panties, so don't try. Buy the FN2000 (or whatever you like) and don't worry about it.
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