Sunday, January 17, 2010



WA: Jury clears man who pulled gun at bar: "A Longview man who pulled a gun on bouncers at a local bar has been found not guilty of second-degree assault. A jury determined that 29-year-old Brian Adam Barnd-Spjut acted in self-defense on the night of March 28. A security video showed bouncers from Kesler's Bar and Grill hauling the man down the bar's hallway toward a back alley. When thrust into an alley, he spun around and pointed the gun at three bouncers and the bar manager. Barnd-Spjut, who has a concealed weapons permit, says he displayed the gun because he feared the bouncers would beat him up".


Ohio: 1 Person Shot, 4 Arrested in Columbus: "Police were called to the area of Republic Avenue and Bremen Street on Friday night on a reported shooting involving a robbery. Reports say Thomas Clark, Larry Smith and Christopher Frasure arranged to meet at Clark’s house so Smith could purchase two television sets and a Play Station. Once Frasure and Smith arrived at the agreed-upon location, the suspects jumped Smith and Frasure and attempted to steal their money. Smith is a concealed carry permit holder and had his personal weapon with him. Smith was able to obtain his weapon and fire a single shot striking two of his attackers. The suspects fled the scene and the victims called police. One suspect, 23-year old Thomas Clark was transported to the hospital in critical condition with a gunshot wound to his abdomen. Austin Young, 21, was transported in stable condition with a gunshot wound to the hip. Police also arrested 22-year old Tyrone Clark and 23-year old Erick Brown in connection with the robbery."


TN: Token verdict against man defending his family: "A jury convicted a Memphis man of negligent homicide on Friday for killing a woman and critically injuring a man during a 2008 melee involving feuding families. Jarvis Robinson, 25, was convicted in the killing of Charlotte Branch, 37, and the wounding of her common-law husband, Edwin Boswell, 40, in a fight that occurred at Fourth and Keel on July 30, 2008. The conviction was more lenient than the original voluntary manslaughter and aggravated assault charges, pleasing defense attorney Gerald Skahan, who had argued that Robinson acted in self-defense when he brought a gun to a fight involving family members. According to police reports, Robinson had returned home from his janitorial job to find his sisters involved in a knife and stick fight with members of the Branch family. Robinson ended the argument when he pulled out the gun and fired, killing Branch with a shot to the chest and critically injuring Boswell. But the decision left members of the Branch family in tears after state prosecutors explained that this conviction means Robinson probably will not spend much, if any more, time behind bars. "I think it's stupid," said Michael Branch, Charlotte's brother. "But that's how the system works when it's black-on-black crime."


Sunstein Attacks Second Amendment: "In a lecture at the University School of Law on October 27, 2007, Obama’s administrator of the White House Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs emphatically stated that you do not have a right to own firearms. “It is striking and noteworthy,” said Cass Sunstein, “that well over two centuries since the founding, the Supreme Court has never suggested that the Second Amendment protects an individual right to have guns.” It is said Sunstein is a constitutional scholar. And yet he fails to mention that opinions dealing with the Second Amendment come from almost every period in the Court’s history and almost all of them are consistent with the proposition that the Second Amendment is an individual right. See David B. Kopel, The Supreme Court’s Thirty-five Other Gun Cases: What the Supreme Court Has Said about the Second Amendment. “My coming view is that the individual right to bear arms reflects the success of an extremely aggressive and resourceful social movement and has much less to do with good standard legal arguments than [it] appears,” Sunstein said"

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