Sebastian – Page 417 – Shall Not Be Questioned

In a Defensive Shooting

Your first call should be to your lawyer. Reading over this post over at Tam’s, one thing strike me: if there’s one lesson to learn from the Zimmerman case, your next call should probably be to a PR firm. We’ve seen two cases recently, Gerald Ung and now George Zimmerman, where the parents of the shootee have hired PR firms and made life a living hell for the the shooter.

They used to say the first person to call 911 is generally the victim. Now it’s probably accurate to say the first person to hire a PR firm to start setting the narrative in the media is probably the victim.

More Poor Reporting from the Media

Via SayUncle, who notes that NYC firearms instructors seem to be out of touch with the gun culture as much as the media is, “$2 PATH fare-beater had pistol loaded with cop-killer bullets, cops say.” New York City is so far gone that even the cops don’t understand ballistics or guns.

David Frum and the Martin Shooting

Lead and Gold is not impressed with his analysis. I don’t understand why anyone pays attention to Frum anymore.

BTW, root canal was mercifully short. Less than an hour. That was my fourth root canal, over all, but the third on a second molar. The other ones seemed to take a lot longer. This one was about 50 minutes.

More Wins for SAF & Alan Gura

A federal court in Massachusetts has struck down Massachusetts’ practice of denying pistol licenses to permanent resident aliens. I wonder whether our opponents have noticed while they’ve been busy exploiting another shooting, we’ve still been quietly winning victories. Is it just me, or does it seem like we’re having more success in District Court these days?

Could It Happen Here?

That Patriot-News, the world renowned experts on self-defense, hysterically say yes, someone could indeed shoot another in Pennsylvania under questionable circumstances. Shocking! Clearly these folks were Presidents of the debate society in school.Â No, says the York Daily Record, since Pennsylvania law is different from Florida.

The York Daily Record is closer to correct, but the fact of the matter is even Florida’s law isn’t factoring into the Martin shooting, based on both narratives. Maybe the traditional media ought to take a look at their shallow and inaccurate coverage of complex issues, often deliberate in my opinion, to understand why people are turning away from them in ever increasing numbers.

Tab Clearing: Root Canal Edition

Off to the dentist this morning for a root canal, so I’ll have to leave you with some tab clearing this morning.

Michael Bane talks about the self-defense implications of the Trayvon Martin case.

What’s happening to Zimmerman can happy to any of us.

Some thoughts on the Trayvon Martin case from The Balloon Goes Up.

How common are deaths like Trayvon Martin’s?

CoBIS, New York’s failed ballistic database, has been repealed.

Joe Biden says the Florida killing could spur gun law debate.

NBC Doing Internal Investigation Regarding Alteration of Zimmerman 911 Call.

More on Audio Forensics

The former defense attorney over at Crayfisher isn’t impressed either, and a commenter at another blog noticed this:

Golly, the Easy Voice Biometrics software has only been available since March 7. And the webpage that it is sold on is registered to:
Registrant:
Owen Forensic Services, LLC
Administrative Contact:
Owen, Thomas
Owen Forensic Services, LLC

He has managed to get a lot of free publicity for his new software product with this story!!

Sure has. Plus some other audio analysis folks over at another blog suggest that the conditions aren’t correct for a good analysis. Once again, the real world is not CSI.

2 out of 3 of Brian Aitken Convictions Squashed

Eugene Volokh mentions the case. Aitken’s convictions for unlicensed transport, and high capacity magazines were reversed. His conviction for having hollow point ammunition was allowed to stand. There’s one crime Brian Aitken is guilty of, and that’s believing when he moved to New Jersey he was still living in America.

On the charge of transportation without a permit, the court found that the judge’s failure to properly instruct the jury as to exceptions was sufficient to squash the conviction.
On the charge of the high capacity magazine, the court ruled that the state failed to introduce proper evidence that the device was a large capacity magazine. At trial they showed that the magazine could hold 16 rounds of ammunition, but they failed to show that it was operable with that many rounds of ammunition, and the court ruled that was required.
On the issue of hollow nosed ammunition, Aitken argued that the statute was unconstitutionally vague. He also argued that the rule of lenity should apply, given that the statute didn’t exempt moving between residences, that it should based on a reading of the statute, which allows possession in the home.
Aitken also made a Second Amendment claim, which the court summarily dismissed without any discussion. This is wrong.

So Aitken is still a convicted felon and prohibited person, because of the hollow nose bullet charge. I think he should appeal, and appeal all the way to the US Supreme Court if necessary.

Brief Update on the Zimmerman Case

Dave Kopel has an excellent summary of Florida’s stand your ground law, and how it’s not relevant in the Trayvon Martin case, no matter which narrative you believe.

A forensics firm has taken the 911 audio that’s been released and analyzed them, and determined the screaming voice was not George Zimmerman’s. The guy who did the analysis is credentialed. That said, I’m skeptical of a lot of this CSI stuff, after so much of it that was accepted as scientific was later proven to be based on junk science. Phones and walls acts as filters for audio signals. If I’m on the jury, they need to show me, using the same methods, how much the scream correlated to Martin’s voice before I’ll accept it. Keep in mind there was an eyewitness, and in my view as a juror, an eyewitness is going to trump audio forensics, if they can’t ID the scream to either voice. Also, one person in this field thinks you’d need an exemplar of Zimmerman screaming to do an accurate analysis.

St. Louis, NRA Annual Meeting, and Guns

This comes up every year at the NRA meeting, whether or not the facility allows carry. It was fine in Pittsburgh last year, illegal in Charlotte, legal in Phoenix (except for events with alcohol), legal in Louisville, and before that was St. Louis, where it’s just not allowed by the venue. John Richardson has a handy guide to St. Louis, and where you can and can’t carry.

I will note again, that there are only a handful of cities that can host NRA Annual Meeting. It is a huge event that moves around the country so members, at some point, have an opportunity to attend. It is very difficult to find venues in every corner of the country that allow carry, and can also host an event of this size. But every year, there’s a handful of people the complain. The alternative is to limit NRAAM only to certain areas of the country where the venues allow it, denying opportunity for people around the St. Louis area to ever attend. NRA’s formula is a high-density of NRA members within a 500 mile radius, when choosing a host city, in order to maximize the number of members who get to attend. St. Louis set a record last time we were there (which was beaten by Charlotte).

I get that a lot of folks get angry when the venues don’t allow carry, and sure, there are venues in some other city where it could be allowed, but that could translate into a dramatic drop in attendance, during an election year. How do you think the media would spin that?