Loitering with a gun
Or, you know, waiting for a bus. Police ask man to leave bus stop and he doesn’t, since he’s waiting for a bus. They arrest him and take his gun and license. So, the next day, he does it again with the same results. That’s right. Loitering at a bus stop, let it sink in. Same bus stop he uses every day. But this is the part that struck out at me:
Police think that Solomon was being insolent and used poor judgment, including by showing up armed at the same bus stop at which he was arrested the previous day.
“If he’s that defiant, should this guy have a gun?” said Sgt. Ray Evers, a police spokesman. “The most uncommon human trait is common sense. He’s not using good, adult judgment.”
So, he was arrested for contempt of cop?
November 5th, 2010 at 10:47 am
FYI “Poor Judgment” and other wishy-washy reasoning are how the police punish lawful gun owners here in Mass. That on an official letter-head is all that’s needed to deny a permit renewal.
Of course they can just renew a Class A LTC (permit to own anything one can legally own in Mass, plus permission to carry concealed) down to a Class C FID (permit to own only low-capacity rifles and shotguns) and they don’t have to say peep.
That’s why OC is legal in Mass, but you won’t see anybody do it here. OC is legal, but OC is also “Using bad Judgment” and will result in you having an unexpected fire-sale of all your guns you can no longer own…and given that you can only sell 4 guns face-to-face, that’ll be through an FFL, and if they aren’t sympathetic they’ll charge you by the hour.
November 5th, 2010 at 10:52 am
Sounds like mass needs more pro open carry that will go the distance to stop them….
November 5th, 2010 at 10:59 am
Think Philly might have a rude awakening on their Anti-Gun Nazi Attitude come January when the new State gov’t comes in. One can hope.
November 5th, 2010 at 11:01 am
A good idea, John, but I think the easier way is to simply eliminate the permit-to-own system we have as a taxation and infringement or a recognized civil right.
Then we’ll have a lot more leverage on the whole open-carry thing, because cranky Chiefs won’t be able to essentially take away all your guns for being insolent.
November 5th, 2010 at 11:25 am
Stories like this one always make me wonder why the NRA insists that rank and file policemen support gun rights (for non badge carriers).
If there was such a groundswell of support for gun rights in police departments, these incidents wouldn’t happen, or there would be reports of dissension among the officers who were present when the innocent person was being harassed.
November 5th, 2010 at 11:30 am
@Weer’d:
I so want to get my non-resident Mass permit for the next time I visit my wife’s relatives on the cape. Heck. I’d even go so far as to buy a Jennings or Lorcin to OC on the trip. The local sherrifs can’t take a non-res permit, since they are issued by the State Police (or so I’ve been told by a Mass cop). I have no doubt my weapon would be siezed, hence buying a cheap POS sidearm.
Anyone know of any Mass certified instructors in middle tennessee?
Regards,
Pol
November 5th, 2010 at 11:43 am
How do you loiter at a bus stop, get there an hour early? Ok, to not get on a bus when it comes because it’s full of school-kids I can understand. I’ve seen SF Muni buses in San Francisco that are full of after-school kids and they treat it like a school-district yellow-bus, there’s a lot of kid-crap playground stuff going on.
November 5th, 2010 at 11:49 am
1 open guy is easy to arrest in massachusetts. 150 open guys is another thing all together… Would make for one hell of a lawsuit….
November 5th, 2010 at 12:58 pm
Typical cop behavior.
November 5th, 2010 at 2:05 pm
Pol Mordreth, you just need to take the NRA Basic Pistol course for your “Safety Class”, so any NRA instructor can certify you. I will warn you, the Non-Resident permit is $100…and good for ONE YEAR, and I have no idea how long or how many hoops you have to jump through to get it, and how much can be done by mail or online, because I don’t know anybody who is willing to dump that kind of scratch to carry here…
November 5th, 2010 at 2:16 pm
Wade: I suspect that nationwide the rank-and-file cops probably do support private firearms ownership, which is why the NRA says they do.
November 5th, 2010 at 2:29 pm
Thanks Weer’d. I have the packet already, its all by mail, but it specifies that the instructor has to be Mass certified and provide his mass instructor cert # with the app. I’ll have to check into that again. Just being able to carry there to freak out my wife’s friends and family would be worth the $100. Most of them wouldn’t talk to me, so that would be a win. heheh
Regards,
Pol
November 5th, 2010 at 2:30 pm
Man, looks like this is the trend in a subservient populace awed by its own government. Reminds me of the post on giving a police officer the finger. I don’t want to see police officers abused or treated rudely, that that cop is messing up things for all uniformed law enforcement officers.
Newsflash to “the authorities”: some of the populace do not see themselves as serfs.
Thanks for posting this. I missed it.
November 5th, 2010 at 3:09 pm
The cops insist that they’re not all thuggish power-trippers, yet this kind of crap keeps happening. They need to err on the side of, you know, THE LAW, and liberty. Yet they never do. At some point we need to collectively beat the hell out of them until they Get It.
November 5th, 2010 at 4:56 pm
Basically, yes he was arrested for contempt of cop. As a cop myself, I can’t see from the news reports where he committed any crime; unless bowing down down to the cops there is a crime.
November 5th, 2010 at 6:23 pm
The cop should be arrested for contempt of humen rights, and for Oath violation, and should be banned from public service.
November 5th, 2010 at 7:36 pm
I’ve seen the cops take a lot of abuse and just keep a straight face. That doesn’t make the news. Not a cop. Not related to cops. Just observing. But, the police are the enforcement arm of government and when “Disrespect to a public official” becomes a crime, we are all just serfs.
November 6th, 2010 at 12:18 am
Arrested for birdwatching
http://groups.google.com/group/massbird/browse_thread/thread/b86af7f22502b53c/20b5a8e38c4c01aa?hide_quotes=no#msg_20b5a8e38c4c01aa
” The officer said I
looked suspicious. Upon asking me what I was doing, I told him I had been
birdwatching. He replied “Oh yeah, there are no birds in winter.””
…
“He then
pushed me and stated ” I hate to do this”, followed by throwing me onto the
ground. My brand new binoculars were still around my neck at the time. He called
backup, and when they arrived, I yelled “Help, Help” because I thought I was
being attacked by the arresting officer. In the police report, he states that
Sgt. Ricardelli observed us wrestling on the ground, and that Sgt. Ricardelli
assisted him in putting me in handcuffs. (both lies)”
…
“My $2,000 lawyer said I should accept a plea agreement, whereby if I didn’t
get arrested in the next six months, the charges against me would be dropped. I
assumed he knew what he was doing, so I went along. Now, I am not sure I should
have accepted, because now I cannot sue the Saugus, Ma. Police Dept. for the
psycholgical damage afflicted upon me during my ordeal. I still suffer
psychological damage today. I finally got back my brand new binoculars after
four months.(they were being kept as evidence, of what I don’t know!) I actually
had to go the the dreaded police station in person to pick them up. I also had
to make a third trip to the courthouse to pay a court fee of $150. What I am
amazed by, is the fact that here in America there are policemen who themselves
have no regard for the law that they are supposed to uphold!”
November 6th, 2010 at 12:40 am
Hmm…defiant people with guns. I seem to recall a David McCullough book about them.
November 6th, 2010 at 1:46 am
The day is coming, when citizens will no longer consider the police to be protectors, but government enforcers.
When that happens some will take things into their own hands, and the rest will look the other way when police and government entities are attacked.
And the police will insist on (and get) enhanced powers because of the uppity peasants.
And insist that absolutely none of it is their fault.
November 6th, 2010 at 2:13 am
Yes, if the government refuses to prosecute police brutality, juries will refuse to convict cop killers.
November 6th, 2010 at 2:36 am
Yea,I got popped like that once by a cop here in Houston…he had been particularly obnoxious on several occasions and finally I had had enough and I said “I sure do admire that two bit little badge you have to hide behind to make yourself feel like a man…what pawn shop did you buy it at?”…so I was busted for “reckless conduct”..released the same day on my own recognizance…and the cop never showed up for the my court appearance and the charges were dropped…but after that he wasn’t quite so obnoxious any more..at least when I was around.
November 6th, 2010 at 2:45 am
I can’t emphasize this enough — FILE A CITIZEN COMPLAINT if things like this happen to you. Most stations take these fairly seriously and a cop who gets too many gets in trouble.
Most cops are good cops. But we aren’t serfs and if we don’t want to BE serfs we need to stand up and SPEAK OUT.
November 6th, 2010 at 4:06 pm
Sue them until they squel!
November 7th, 2010 at 1:24 am
This is what I have a problem with. If most cops really were good cops, these jackwagons wouldn’t be so quick to start acting like this in the first place.
November 7th, 2010 at 1:38 am
if another american revolution occurs, we shouldn’t be surprised.
November 7th, 2010 at 9:47 pm
Who do these people think they are?
November 9th, 2010 at 12:48 am
Don’t ever tell a cop to slow down, or you will commit contempt of cop, even when the cop is breaking the laws he swore to uphold. I guess when you are a lawyer and the president of GA CCW you do get a break in the end. The following video is not recommended for others.
http://libertypulse.com/article/fayetteville-ga-officer-confronts-citizen-for-telling-the-officer-to-stop-speeding/