Flint Journal – August 8, 2008:
Some folks looking for protection may be shocked to find they are putting themselves on the wrong side of the law.
The Genesee County Prosecutor’s Office recently issued criminal charges against two women caught with stun guns.
In the first case, an 18-year-old Flint woman found herself in trouble after she flagged down the police to tell them a man walked off with her cellphone. When officers asked why he left so fast, he told them it was because she had a stun gun and he didn’t want to get shocked.
In a separate incident, police stopped a car for a burned out taillight and arrested the 19-year-old Flushing driver when they found a stun gun in her purse.
In both cases, the women ended up with a felony charge of stun gun possession — a crime that carries four years in prison.
One might want to invest in some good old-fashioned pepper spray
(sarcasm)Well, they had to arrest someone, didn’t they? (/sarcasm)
The police can’t protect. They can only try to apprehend criminals. Meanwhile, I could be dead.
I will protect myself by whatever means I can. I’d rather face a judge than my maker.
They search people, there, for having busted tail lights? What do they do if you fail it indicate for a full three seconds before making a turn?
/What do they do if you fail it indicate for a full three seconds before making a turn?/
They send you to rehab, as well as making you face prison sentences.
Classic sniveling laws of Michigan – and NO, pepper spray is not a replacement as THAT IS ILLEGAL IN MICHIGAN TOO! (well, you can have it if its less than .02% but that’s about enough pepper to just piss someone off real good)
TRUE STORY: I had a psycho neighbor once, he was like this 6’3″, 300# guy (i’m 115#, 5’5″ female) who constantly hit on me and I kept ignoring him. Finally, he got all bent about it, started calling me names, staying I was stuck up, a slut, blah blah blah. Things escalated even to where he was pointing a shotgun at me through the window and threw a rock at my car. I complained to my apartment manager and then the police, repeatedly, to no avail (he says / she says, everyone kept parroting).
Finally, I was out working in my yard and he came right up to me, drunk, spouting off crap and getting right up on me, starting to raise his hand in a striking fashion so I pepper sprayed him good in the face – REAL good. Orange dye all over him, he dropped to his knees squealing like a little girl. . .LOL. (UDAP brand is outstanding, by the way. . he he he)
Police show up, haul him away (he had outstanding warrants too – nice they never checked that before). Cops were kinda laughing about the loser except their chief who kept asking about the pepper spray? I go down to the station to file a report with my dad and the chief tells me that I MIGHT BE LOOKING AT CHARGES FOR THE PEPPER SPRAY!!! I told him WTF? that I had repeatedly tried the ‘system’ and how on earth did that make ANY sense for ME to be charged with something? Dude was all robotic “the laws the law” blah blah blah. My dad got soooo red in the face and pissed, I had to get him out of there before HE faced charges.
Fortunately, they ended up declining charges on me after several days. The psycho ended up getting out in a week, (they declined to extradite him to California for meth related charges) and he then was promptly arrested on federal weapons and explosives charges within days, for other things he was up to.
Short of the long of it – Michigan is the midwest state trying to be ALL nanny state. There is even a law on the books for “swearing in the presence of women and children” that is actually occasionally still enforced!
This kind of crap is why I will NEVER live in that shi77y state again.
#3. wow, tough!
These women were clearly not using their guns with the all-essential glee that properly trained police have.
1. take the guns
2. take the pistols
3. take the BATS
4. cant throw ROCKS
5. take the knives
6. cant use pepper spray
7. cant STUN..
A person was in his home “DOING THE THING” with his wife.
Neighbor comes to the window with camera, and TAPES them.
He then takes the tape to the COPS.
COPS see he is using an ILLEGAL POSITION for fun.
HUSBAND and wife are arrested…NOT THE NEIGHBOR..
Person goes to rob a house,
He sacks the house and finds the Door to the garage.
He enters the garage looking for other stuff to take.
DOOR CLOSES, LOCK..
Person cant figure out HOW to open Garage.
SITS there for 1 week, eating Kibble and warm POP..
People come home, and find him.
Call cops.
Crook files for UNLAWFUL DETENTION.
WINS…$15,000.
(for you tech people, THINK about electric garage door..THEY are not designed to STAY CLOSED IF YOU ARE INSIDE. Pull 1 clip and the door is MANUALLY OPENED)
Next time you see a cop…
ASK him. Under the LAW how may I defend myself.
the smart ones will tell you. INVITE him into your house, and KILL HIM…NOT harm/not hold..
You don’t understand.
The brain dead authorities want the people to get robbed and raped before they are summoned by third parties.
You can’t claim that you are the defender of the people unless the people are being victimized.
They don’t approve of citizens who can defend themselves from criminals by any means.
You can bet you last dollar they’ll teach these threats to law and order not to try and protect themselves.
The cops can use tasers on people until they die, but citizens can’t use a stun gun or even non-lethal ammunition (lethal ammo is legal, go figure) to protect themselves.
Lets put the blame where it truly lies, its not the nanny state or liberals, but lazy police, corrupt prosecutors and the voter who will put just about anything into law without even reading the question on the ballot.
RE: ECA #7
OH, I almost forgot another gem of Michigan laws – the fact that there is a law prohibiting “Lewd and lascivious cohabitation between unmarried persons” LOL!!!
Unlike the profanity around women & children law, I don’t recall hearing about this one being enforced anytime recently, but it just further reinforces the fact that Michigan laws are a j0ke.
Also, if anyone ever drives near or in some of the devastated by automotive job losses communities (like Flint, Lansing, Dearborn) OBEY traffic laws to the utmost, as tickets are a huge revenue for the Police, now. The local police are notorious for loving to pull over people for your license plate light being out, rolling through stop signs, or for tinted windows (they will actually impound your car, for the latter).
Wait. Stun guns are illegal? But firearms are not?
Hunting deer with a Taser carries the risk of being gored by a 12-point buck.
Hunting is a distance thing:
#4, MaTa,
There is even a law on the books for “swearing in the presence of women and children” that is actually occasionally still enforced!
Just because a law is on the books does not mean it may be enforced. The specific one you refer to was overturned, I believe in 2000 or so. The same as your later “co-habitation” law. That was overturned by a Supreme Court decision back in the ’60s. So while these laws may still “be on the books”, they are unenforcible.
Well, if you find yourself empanelled on a jury hearing a case of “Illegal weapons possession” where the weapons were clearly used defensively, find the defendant not guilty, despite the evidence and the law, and the Jury will have VOIDED THE LAW BY JURY NULLIFICATION !!! It’s the last defense the Founding Fathers put in the Constitution and Bill of Rights to protect us from an over-reaching legislature or executive !!! You can Google “Jury Nullification” to find out more about this real method for ordinary citizens to keep the Government off our backs !!!
ECA@7:
Do you have any further info about the case of the man and woman who were peeped on but got in trouble for using unapproved positions? I would love to read the details of that case, and what happened with it.
It’s almost unbelievable. Almost 🙁
Thanks,
Steve
The only reason to call the police is so they can file a report for insurance purposes. That is all the cops are good for.
Re: #12
Yeah I was wondering the same thing. What the hell?
#16, JimD,
the Jury will have VOIDED THE LAW BY JURY NULLIFICATION !!! It’s the last defense the Founding Fathers put in the Constitution and Bill of Rights to protect us from an over-reaching legislature or executive !!!
Not quite. There is no such thing as “Jury Nullification”. A Jury only hears evidence to decide guilt, they DO NOT hear or decide questions of law. Only a Judge can nullify a law passed by the legislature. There is nothing in the Constitution about Jury Nullification.
Google all you want, I’m quite sure there are quite a few sites offering advice about how this is a “right”. They are wrong. If one lies to a court about having an open mind during jury selection, that is a crime and punishable as a felony.
#13
Nice, shooting down a public road. No comment on the marksmanship.
In Colorado the Game Wardens have remote controlled deer they set up by the road at night. When Bubba stops and shoots at it, out come the game wardens and arrest him for shooting from a public road, hunting after sunset, etc..
20. “There is no such thing as “Jury Nullification”.”
Actually, there is. I’ve researched this matter (using real court cases not biased websites and literature). Unfortunately, my research is at work. I’ll post it as a comment tonight sometime when I get to work.
I’ll tell you this, the bizarre thing about jury nullification is that a judge is under no legal obligation to tell the jury about it. That’s to keep it from being overused. Judges are afraid if all juries knew about it, anarchy would result. My guess is that in most cases, justice would result.
Wiki on Jury Nullification:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jury_nullification
23. Thanks JimD. That’s a pretty good overview of the law. US. v Dougherty does a pretty good job explaining the history and purpose of jury nullification. You can read the entire opinion here. Here’s an excerpt.
It’s in wiki, it’s gotta be true!
Case Study: The O.J. Jurors overturned the legality of murder.
“Just because a law is on the books does not mean it may be enforced.”
Not good. Just means everyone is in a state of breaking the law and the thug cops can pick and choose who they harass.
25. “The O.J. Jurors overturned the legality of murder.”
No, O.J. was innocent. It was the white jurors on the civil case that were biased.
Stun Guns are a first step into a dangerous world. I’m afraid that most of these ladies think its the last step. 🙁
Would these qualify as concealed weapons?
The Cursing in Front of Women and Children was a law that one man had to go through court and was convicted, but was overturned in Appeals Court
http://www.firstamendmentcenter.org/news.aspx?id=4064
SN,
OK, I read over DOUGHERTY . While you included the Court’s history, you didn’t include their reasons for denying the appeal (on this point).
86
Rules of law or justice involve choice of values and ordering of objectives for which unanimity is unlikely in any society, or group representing the society, especially a society as diverse in cultures and interests as ours. To seek unity out of diversity, under the national motto, there must be a procedure for decision by vote of a majority or prescribed plurality-in accordance with democratic philosophy. To assign the role of mini-legislature to the various petit juries, who must hang if not unanimous, exposes criminal law and administration to paralysis, and to a deadlock that betrays rather than furthers the assumptions of viable democracy.
87
Moreover, to compel a juror involuntarily assigned to jury duty to assume the burdens of mini-legislator or judge, as is implicit in the doctrine of nullification, is to put untoward strains on the jury system. It is one thing for a juror to know that the law condemns, but he has a factual power of lenity. To tell him expressly of a nullification prerogative, however, is to inform him, in effect, that it is he who fashions the rule that condemns. That is an overwhelming responsibility, an extreme burden for the jurors’ psyche. And it is not inappropriate to add that a juror called upon for an involuntary public service is entitled to the protection, when he takes action that he knows is right, but also knows is unpopular, either in the community at large or in his own particular grouping, that he can fairly put it to friends and neighbors that he was merely following the instructions of the court.
In short, the argument of Jury Nullification as a right was dismissed.
31 “In short, the argument of Jury Nullification as a right was dismissed.”
I hate arguing the law with non-lawyers, you guys simply do not get it.
The defendant appealed and argued that his right to a fair trial was violated because the jury was not informed of its right to Jury Nullification.
The court discussed the history of Jury Nullification and determined that the right does exist. However, the court had to determine whether an error existed which denied the defendant a fair trial.
The Court went farther and determined that while the right of Jury Nullification does exist, the trial judge is under no duty to explain it to the jury. That’s the part you quoted, the problems associated with explaining the right to the jury.
And because the court held the lower court had no duty to explain Jury Nullification in the defendant’s trial, there was no error.
That’s exactly what I said back in comment 22: The right exists, the judge does not have any legal duty to explain it to the jury. Thanks for making me repeat myself for no good reason.
Lesson of the day:
Dont go to michigan.