September 2020 NICS, Gun Sales Continue Record Trend, US Private Stock over 457 Million

 

September of 2020 was a record for both firearm sales and NICS background checks in the United States. There were 2,892,115 background checks done in September, and about 1.614 million firearm sales. The firearm sales is not a precise figure because of uncertainties about multiple firearms sold with one NICS check and firearms sold to people who can legally purchase firearms without an instant NICS check.

The firearms figure is calculated by the number of NICS checks done for handguns +  long guns + other guns + 2.5 X the number of checks where multiple guns were sold on one check. It is a good approximation. 

The 2,892,115 number of checks is directly from the FBI sources for the number of NICS checks done for the month. It is the highest number of checks done in any previous September. The next highest was done last September, in 2019, with 2,207,312 checks done. 

The number of checks has been rising because the checks are used for several other purposes, especially for weapons permits and weapons permit rechecks. In September, 2020, those made up 44% of the total number of checks. In September of 2019, permit and permit rechecks made up 56% of the checks. 

Permit and permit rechecks had been rising as a percentage of the number of total checks. The percentage of permit and permit rechecks has dropped significantly because of the closure of permit systems in several states. In Illinois alone, the number of permit and permit rechecks dropped by 165,000 in September.

In September of 2019, guns sales were .974 million. In September of 2020, they are 1.614 million, or 1.65 x the number last year. For the first nine months of 2020, the number sold is about 15.1 million guns, or 1.7 x the number sold in 2019.

If we extrapolate the trend to the end of the year, there will have been 21.6 million firearms sold in 2020. This requires an average of nearly 2.2 million firearms sold in each of the last three months of 2020.

The question becomes: Is there sufficient firearms production capacity to meet this incredible demand for privately owned firearms?

The highest number of sales on record, for one month, was in December of 2015, when over 2.2 million firearms were sold.

It is likely every manufacturer of firearms and firearms parts on the planet is scrambling to cash in on this insatiable demand for firearms in the United States.

All of the rest of the world combined, does not come close to the demand for firearms in the United States. 

That would not be true if most people in the world were allowed by their government to own the means of effective self defense. 

There are few governments which protect the right to armed defense of self and others. Those governments are pressured by other governments to restrict the ownership of arms more than they currently are.

Switzerland used to have more freedom of arms than the United States. As of 1998, that was no longer true. Yemen may officially allow more, but it is in the middle of proxy war between Iran and Saudi Arabia, with the U.S. backing the Saudi government.  It is unknown if Yemen will survive as an independent state.

Australia and Canada had free access to rifles and shotguns until the late 1990's.  By 2000, both governments had implemented much stricter controls on long guns.

 Australia moved to even greater restrictions on handguns in 2002; Canada reversed their requirement for long gun registration in 2011.

Part of the reason the demand is so high in the United States, is because people in the United States are the wealthiest large population on earth. Guns have always been a measure of wealth. All wealthy elites on the planet have access to guns. 

The trend will continue. The private stock of firearms in the United States will increase by more than 20 million guns in 2020. The private stock of firearms in the United States will have increased by about 4% in one year.  The National Shooting Sports Foundation (NSSF) says 40% of 2020 gun buyers are new gun buyers. The number of gun owners in the United States will have increased by 8% in one year.

The total number of guns in private hands will have increased to over 460 million.

As of the end of September, 2020, the best estimate for that number is about 457 million privately owned guns.  The Small Arms Survey (SAS) estimates there were 1,013 million small arms in the world, with 857 million of those in private hands, as of 2017 .  At that time, the SAS estimated 393 million firearms in private hands in the United States.  It was close to my estimate of 418 million private firearms in the United States as of 2017. The Small Arms Survey does not consider police firearms to be private; in the United States, many police firearms are privately owned.

A reasonable estimate shows United States private persons owning about half of all private small arms in the world, about 40% of all small arms in the world, or three times as many small arms as all the armies of the world combined.

There has been nothing like the arming of the American citizenry in all of history.

Every month, Americans are buying more small arms than exist in most countries armed forces. 

It is a very rough equivalence. Private arms in the United States are heavy on handguns, heavy on long range rifles, heavy on shotguns. There are very few mortars, machine guns, hand grenades, or anti-personnel mines. 

Relatively unregulated, and currently available in the United States, are night vision devices, body armor, and gas masks.

It is unlikely the cell phone system in the United States could compete with a tactical communications system of most any military.  Secure communications may be the weakest point of spontaneously organized American militias.

Much of the purpose of the Second Amendment was to make the United States a prickly porcupine to foreign enemies and local tyrants.  

It is unclear how important such a vast array of small arms will be in a tyranny enforced by armed drones and digital means of soft coercion. 

May the United States never find out.

©2020 by Dean Weingarten: Permission to share is granted when this notice and link are included.

Gun Watch

IL: CCW Carrier Shoots Dog in Self Defense

A concealed-carry holder shot another man’s German shepherd Friday at a dog park in the Loop.

The men were arguing about 3 a.m. in the 400 block of South Franklin Street when one of them released his German shepherd, prompting the other man to shoot the dog, Chicago police said.

The dog was was taken to a veterinary hospital for treatment, police said.

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TX: Home Defender Tells How he Accessed Rifle, Shot Home Invader

"He had blue gloves on and a surgical mask, and he pointed at me and said you’re going to come with me. He was very matter-of-fact and very determined--it was stressful, it was scary.” said Duffy regarding seeing Ramirez for the first time. "You know I yelled to the intruder stay where you are, don’t move, stay where you’re at right now, don’t move, the cops are on their way,” 

Duffy then bolted for the bedroom and grabbed his rifle. He proceeded to shoot Ramirez twice in the chest. He continued firing shots at Ramirez until he could get his girlfriend and roommate to safety. By the time authorities arrived Ramirez was already dead.

Duffy was shot in the shin and his roommate was shot in the shoulder. Neither of their injuries were life threatening.

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Pennsylvania Appeals Court Finds Life in Tenth Amendment and Limit to Commerce Clause for PLCAA

Image from Pennsylvania Courts Public Domain, Cropped and scaled by Dean Weingarten

On 20 March, 2016, 32 year old Joshua Hudec of Mount Pleasant, left his three children and house in the hands of an 18-year-old babysitter. The babysitter apparently left 13-year-old James Gustavson and 14-year-old John Bunsworth  into the home. In the home was a Springfield XD pistol.

The babysiter is said to have asked Bunsworth to point the pistol at Gustavson in order to scare Gustavson into leaving. Bunsworth fired the pistol, killing Gustavson. He later claimed the magazine was removed from the pistol, so he thought it was unable to fire, and he did not mean to fire it. He was sentenced to involuntary manslaughter in juvenile court. Joshua Hudec was charged and pled guilty to five counts of child endangerment and reckless endangerment, to serve between 11.5 and 23 months in prison. 

These details were not included in the case before the court. 

In the court findings, only the fact the 14-year-old obtained the handgun in the Hudec household, then subsequently shot and killed Gustavson, is in the court document. It is accepted as fact that Bunsworth, the 14-year-old, told the truth when he claimed the magazine was out of the gun, and he assumed the gun was unloaded because the magazine had been removed. 

The fact the pistol could fire with the magazine removed is the basis for the liability lawsuit.

0n 28 September, 2020, the Superior Court of Pennsylvania (one of two state courts of appeals in the state of Pennsylvania) issued an opinion which held the United States Protection of Lawful Commerce in Arms Act (PLCAA) was unconstitutional under the Tenth Amendment, the Commerce Clause, and the Fifth Amendment. The Court also held the Fourteenth Amendment and the Second Amendment could not render the PLCAA constitutional.

Because the United States government has intervened in the case, to protect the PLCAA, it is almost certain the case will be appealed to the Pennsylvania Supreme Court. From Gustafson v. Springfield, Inc. and United States of America, Intervenor:

 The Gustafsons responded that the PLCAA does not apply here. In the alternative, they argued the Act is unconstitutional, because it (1) overrides Tenth Amendment principles of federalism,(2) cannot be sustained under the Commerce Clause,5 and (3) violates the Fifth Amendment. Upon learning of the Gustafsons’ constitutional attacks against its statute, the United States of America (“Federal Government”) intervened to defend the PLCAA. It claimed Congress properly enacted the PLCAA under the Commerce Clause and Bill of Rights.

With the probable appointment of Judge Amy Coney Barret to the Supreme Court, this case becomes interesting. The Tenth Amendment, federalism, and Commerce Clause claims are strong and well argued. From the Pennsylvania decision:

We hold that merely because, at some point in time, that gun passed through interstate commerce,does not give Congress perpetual authority to regulate any harm it may cause. 

 (snip)

At that point, the activity surrounding the use or misuse of products reverts to a local matter, subject to state, not federal, regulation. This is especially true where, as here, the product kills someone who did not even purchase it.

The idea the gun killed someone is absurd, on its face. It would have been laughed out of any court before tort law escaped most regulation, starting in the 1970's. The gun did not point itself at a human being. The gun did not pull its own trigger.

The principle that the federal government has limited powers over state regulation is sound. The opinion states on page 43-44 that application of state law is in no sense an economic activity. The court cites the Supreme Court of the United States (SCOTUS) in the Lopez decision. But Lopez has been rendered mostly moot since it was written. Lopez was a sound decision, a start in limiting federal power under the Commerce Clause.  

It is not so clear that state law allowing lawsuits against corporations in other states is not intruding into federal power to regulate interstate commerce. That state power would not have been accepted in 1960. In 1960, the ability to sue entities in other states was severely limited, as was the ability to sue corporations on frivilous notions of defective products which performed as intended.

A clarification based on what the states may do or not do in tort law, beyond their boundaries, might be in order. The power of the litigation lobby of trial lawyers is great. It would be difficult to overcome.

The opinion then claims the Second Amendment and the Fourteenth Amendment do not apply, because gun manufacturers are not "people" for the purposes of the Bill of Rights. The opinion does not mention Citizens United, where SCOTUS held exactly the opposite. 

Organized groups of people are still people, at least as far as the First Amendment is concerned. If they were not, the First Amendment would not apply to CNN, Fox News, or AmmoLand. Much the same logic applies to the Second Amendment.

Tenth Amendment challenges are exceedingly rare, as are state challenges to the Commerce Clause. 

The optimum result for this lawsuit would be to make it to the Supreme Court; then have SCOTUS uphold the PLCAA via the Fourteenth Amendment and the Second Amendment, but fail to be upheld by the Tenth Amendment and the Commerce Clause. 

An opinion which did so would reinforce federalism and the Bill of Rights.  Optimistically, the privileges and immunities clause of the Fourteenth Amendment would be invoked.

Lopez was decided in 1995. Justice Thomas and Justice Breyer were on the court. Thomas was enthusiastically in favor of the decision, as were Justices Scalia and Kennedy, O'Conner and Rehnquist. Jusice Breyer dissented, as did Justices Ginsburg, Stevens and Souter.

The court is decidedly more originalist and textualist now than it was in 1995. It is not inconceivable that Justices Thomas, Alito, Gorsuch, Kavanaugh, Barret, and possibly Roberts, would reach such an opinion.

It may be a good time to reinforce placing limits on the Commerce Clause while limiting state power to use torts to regulate firearms out of legal existence. 

Realistically, the case is likely to be decided on only one of the Constitutional issues mentioned.  It could easily be struck down by the Pennsylvania Supreme Court; appealed to SCOTUS, with SCOTUS refusing to grant a writ of certiorari,  killing the appeal.

©2020 by Dean Weingarten: Permission to share is granted when this notice and link are included.

Gun Watch

California Sues to Force Federal Government to Violate Second Amendment

From Wikipedia, Government image Public Domain, cropped and scaled by Dean Weingarten
 

On 29 September, 2020, the State of California, the Giffords Law Center to Prevent Gun Violence, and others, filed a lawsuit in the United States District Court in the Northern District of California. 

The lawsuit is an attempt to force the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives, to change current federal regulations so as to render illegal much of the current manufacture of firearms by individuals for personal use. The Court is in the Ninth Circuit.

It is a fools errand. Practical experience, in numerous countries around the world, has shown this sort of heavy handed exercise of government power does not reduce crime or violence in any significant amount. The introduction of the lawsuit is full of logical and factual errors. 

Here is the first paragraph in the introduction to the lawsuit. It contains the assertions on which the logic for the suit is predicated. From courthousenews.com:

1. Since 1968, federal law, starting with the Gun Control Act (“GCA”), has imposed important, common-sense gun safety restrictions on the purchase and sale of firearms in the United States.1 These include, among other requirements, that any firearm sold or imported in the United States must have a unique serial number, and that licensed gun dealers must maintain identifying records, including the serial numbers of guns they sell and the identity of the buyer. These requirements allow law enforcement to trace guns recovered at crime scenes to their first retail purchaser. The GCA also requires licensed gun dealers to conduct criminal background checks on would-be gun purchasers, ensuring that weapons do not fall into the wrong hands. Federal law prohibits numerous categories of people from purchasing guns, including minors and individuals with disqualifying criminal convictions, people with records of domestic violence, those suffering from serious mental illness, or individuals who are addicted to drugs. These restrictions have been hallmarks of federal firearms regulation for decades. By limiting those who pose the greatest threat of violence from purchasing firearms, these laws have protected an incalculable number of Americans from harm.

The statement contains numerous assertions which are not based on actual experience or statistical data.  They are accepted as revealed knowledge in Progressive dogma. 

Consider: Federal law (relatively recently) has imposed: 

"important, common-sense gun safety restrictions on the purchase and sale of firearms in the United States."

Important? Hardly. There is no agreed on data to indicate the restrictions have reduced violent crime.

However, it fits Progressive ideology, in which it is important to centralize more power in the federal government.

Common-sense?  Not at all. Common-sense, in this case, is a buzz-word to make up for lack of data, to sell the population on Progressive ideology.

Gun Safety Restrictions? The restrictions on ownership and sale have nothing to do with gun safety. The assertion only makes sense if you assume there is more safety when fewer people own guns.  There is no agreed on data to support this assertion. 

Consider the serial number argument:

any firearm sold or imported in the United States must have a unique serial number, and that licensed gun dealers must maintain identifying records, including the serial numbers of guns they sell and the identity of the buyer. These requirements allow law enforcement to trace guns recovered at crime scenes to their first retail purchaser. 

The statement is false on its face. It has never been required that all firearms sold in the United States have a unique serial number. 

Firearms made by individuals for their own use have never been required to have a unique serial number. Only very recently has a small number of states required individuals to obtain a serial number from the state to legally make a firearm for their own use. Such laws are almost certainly unconstitutional.

Firearms which did not have serial numbers when they were legally manufactured, have continued to be legal to sell in the United States up to the present. There are many millions of them in the private stock of firearms in the United States. I have personally owned and sold several. Browse the used section of a gun store. You have a good chance of finding one or more of them.

It is considerably simpler to remove a serial number, or to alter one so that it is useless for tracing, than it is to make a gun for your own use under the current regulatory scheme.  Each system is equally effective in producing an unserialized gun.  

Once a gun has been stolen, the tracing of it goes nowhere. 

Once it has been sold by criminals, it also becomes untraceable. 

The vast majority of firearms in the United States have existed long enough to render their trace to the person who originally purchased the firearm at retail useless for solving violent crimes. 

When GCA 1968 was passed, there were 102 million privately owned firearms in the United States.

There are currently about 450 million privately owned firearms in the United States. Their existence makes the GCA 1968 scheme useless in any reasonable cost/benefit analysis.

Firearm tracing is almost never used to solve violent crimes. It is a particularly ineffective and expensive bureaucratic product of the compromises made in the 1968 law. It continues to exist as a threat to create a national registration system for firearms. The claim that tracing guns is an effective tool for fighting violent crime is false.

National registration of firearms is forbidden by law, and likely unconstitutional under the Second Amendment. 

A system to return guns which were stolen, to owners, is separate from the gun tracing system, and works from a separate database of stolen guns in the National Crime information Center (NCIC).

Background checks: The national requirement for background checks did not exist in GCA 68. It was added as part of the Brady law in 1994, and not fully implemented until 1998. It has been an immense failure, infringing on Second Amendment rights for tens of millions of citizens and denying those rights for millions through false positives. As shown below, it infringes on the rights of people who should never have been denied their rights to begin with.

Prohibiting categories of people from legally purchasing guns:

There is no agreed on evidence this broad infringement on Second Amendment rights has had any statistical effect on crime rates.

This part of GCA 68 is unlikely to stand up to Constitutional scrutiny. It prohibits ownership of firearms to broad categories of people who were not prohibited for the first 179 years of the existence of the Second Amendment.  

Mental illness was not considered a reason to prohibit possession, unless the person performed an actual, dangerous deed or deeds.

Felons commonly regained their right to arms following the end of their sentence. The categories of felonies and the number of people classified as felons when the Second Amendment was ratified, were a tiny fraction of those in existence today.

By 1900, some restrictions were placed on handgun sales to minors. It was normally left up to parents to restrict their children as they saw fit. Minors were held responsible for their own actions; or parents were held responsible for the actions of their children. Restrictions on sales to minors existed in a small minority of states.

Drug and alcohol users were not prohibited from owning guns.

Dishonorable discharge from the military was not used to prohibit a person from owning a gun.

Renouncing U.S. citizenship was not used to prohibit a person from owning a gun.

Virtually all these restrictive categories are part of Progressive ideological social engineering. They do not stand up to a strict examination of whether they infringe on the Second Amendment right to keep and bear arms. 

Only if individuals in those categories actually commit deeds to show they are a danger to society, should the various state governments be allowed to infringe on their Second Amendment rights.

The Progressive philosophy, which justifies infringing on the rights of broad categories of people before they have performed any actually dangerous deeds, is essentially "crimethink". It attempts to restrain individuals before they perform violent acts.

Legally, it is called prior restraint.

Prior restraint on individuals because of what they might do, instead of restraint based on what they have done, is offensive to the Constitution. 

The Progressive philosophy of GCA 68 is an affront to the Second Amendment. 

The ostensible purpose of the GCA 68 is to prevent dangerous criminals from obtaining firearms by placing restrictions and regulatory controls on people who have not committed any crimes. Those controls have been a complete failure. Crime rates went up immediately after the passage of GCA 68, and continued to climb for two decades. They did not fall in a sustained manner until there had been significant reform in many states to allow for more legal carrying of firearms. 

The idea that placing restrictions on the sale of firearms to the vast majority of people can significantly reduce crime rates, has not worked in practice.

During the entire period, the number of firearms per capita in the United States has continued to climb.

Many argue the restrictions were designed to fail, so an unconstitutional and comprehensive scheme of universal federal registration and control of all legal guns in the United States would be enacted, completely negating the purpose and scope of the Second Amendment. 

The counterpoint put forward by Progressives is, in their belief system, Progressivisim, it is obvious that more restrictions on individuals, and more government power, are good things. 

This worship of government power leads to the conclusion that restriction of government power is bad. It is the reason Progressives despise the limits placed on government power by the Second Amendment. 

It is an assumption about the nature of reality which is not proven by facts, data, or practical experience. The opposite has been shown. It is exactly those nations which have understood the need for restrictions on government power, which have become the most prosperous, powerful, and free. 

Restrictions on the right to keep and bear arms are not considered important by the ruling elite because they improve public safety or security. 

Restrictions on gun ownership have the advantage, from the position of the ruling elite, of reducing the problems encountered by their enforcers and security apparatus.

They are seen as important by the Progressive ruling elite to demonstrate the power of government over the people they govern.  They demonstrate the Constitution is a paper tiger.

Conversely, limitations on government's power to disarm the people sends a strong, effective message to the people. It says: 

Government power is limited by the Constitution.

It says:

The people have rights the government may not infringe.

©2020 by Dean Weingarten: Permission to share is granted when this notice and link are included.

Gun Watch

 

 

 

SC: Homeowner Catches 3 Suspected Invaders, Shoots 1

"There were three people [the homeowner] had caught and he believed were breaking in," said JT Foster with the Anderson County Sheriff's Office. "One of the suspects made a move towards him and he felt threatened, so he fired at least one time striking one of the suspects."

The other two suspects ran from the scene, deputies said.

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GOA and John Crump File Complaint with Federal Election Commission Against Facebook, AFP, and Harris Campaign

 

GOA symbol from wikimedia/ fair use, FEC symbol in public domain.

 

John Crump and Gun Owners of America have filed a complaint with the Federal Election Commission (FEC) alleging violations of provisions of the Federal Election Campaign Act of 1971.

John Crump is a frequent contributor to AmmoLand.

The complaint alleges Facebook, and/or Agence France-Presse (AFP), and Kamala Harris for Vice President have violated the act in the following ways. From the complaint: 

1. the prohibition on corporations making in-kind contributions (see 52 U.S.C. §§ 30101(8), 30118);

2. the limitations on making coordinated expenditures (52 U.S.C. § 30116(a)(7));

3. the prohibition on making Independent Expenditures without disclaimers and reporting (52 U.S.C. §§ 30104(g) and 30120(a)); and

4. the prohibition on foreign nationals making in-kind contributions for the purpose of influencing a federal election (52 U.S.C. § 30121).

The hostility of Facebook against gun ownership and the right to arms has become a notorious subjective experience for many Second Amendment supporters.

The allegations in the FEC complaint are stark and easily followed. Facebook supports AFP as its official "fact-checker", which gives the French government supported agency significant power in deciding what is acceptable on Facebook. 

The "fact-checker" is supposed to be unbiased in what it labels as false or true. 

The complaint shows how an article written by Cam Edwards about Candidate Harris' position in a 2008 amicus brief was taken down by Facebook. An AFP paper was put in its place. Facebook searches for the Edwards article were directed to the AFP paper.   

The FEC complaint details how Facebook deleted the account of AmmoLand contributor John Crump when he attempted to link to the Cam Edwards article, and how Facebook took down other articles about Candidate Kamala Harris's position on a private right to arms. 

One was by Texas Director for GOA, Rachel Malone.  The article is entitled "Kamala Harris is the Gun Owner's Worst Nightmare".

The AFP paper does not show official statements from the Harris campaign which deny or reject the positions in the 2008 amicus brief. 

Instead, AFP interprets the statements as though banning some guns and some gun ownership is not an attack on the right to own guns, but only "gun safety" measures.

The AFP paper takes the same political position as the Harris position, which is, essentially, the Second Amendment is, or should be, a paper tiger. They cite Harris statement in 2018: 

At a Judiciary Committee hearing in March 2018, Harris called for “common sense gun safety laws” and said “it’s a false choice to suggest that you are either in favor of the Second Amendment or you want to take everyone’s guns away.”

Thus, AFP comes down on Harris' side of a contentious Constitutional issue, which has legal scholars on both sides. AFP only cited experts who hold that Second Amendment rights are extremely limited.  AFP did not cite those who hold Second Amendment rights to be broad, such as Eugene Volokh from UCLA, or David Kopel of the Cato Institute.

This illustrates part of the problem with "fact checkers" on political questions. 

Either side can find "experts" to agree with it. 

When a public forum takes down assertions from one side, and only allows publication from the opposite side of an issue, the publication has taken sides.

The controversy goes deeper than the opinion of experts on the legal issue. It becomes one of world view or philosophy.   

The articles about Harris' statements on more regulation of firearms in the United States cite her positions, and what the writers believe those positions mean for how Kamala Harris will act if she is elected. They are clear and reasonable interpretations.

The AFP paper does not refute the claims of Cam Edwards, Rachel Malone, or John Crump. Instead, they interpret Harris' statements and positions from the same philosophical base as the Harris campaign.  Facebook's claims and actions are not transparent or easily followed.

The AFP paper never claims Harris approves of a right to own guns, which is what is required to refute the claims of Edwards and Malone. 

Instead, it says Harris does not oppose all gun ownership. The two positions are far apart.  AFP never mentions the difference.

Facebook and AFP claim they do not take sides.

GOA, John Crump, and the complaint says they do, and are doing so in violation of federal election law.

It is a David v. Goliath effort. Facebook is one of the wealthiest and most powerful companies on earth.

With only a few weeks before election day, and early voting already in effect in some states,  Facebook and AFP are exerting their influence on the American presidential election. 

©2020 by Dean Weingarten: Permission to share is granted when this notice and link are included.

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OK: Broken Arrow Burglary Suspect Shot by Homeowner

Broken Arrow Police said the homeowner confronted the man and shot him twice. Detectives said the men knew each other and had a dispute.

According to Broken Arrow police, they received a call about a possible burglary a little after 8 p.m. Tuesday night near the area of South Ash Place. Police said when they arrived at the home they found that the homeowner had shot the suspect that came into the house.

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AR: Chase Reel Shot, Killed in Burglary Gunfight

According to the Police report, the first victim entered the home, where the suspect, Trustin, had broken in. Trustin then held that victim at gun point.

According to the report, Reel could not get into the residence because he did not have his keys. He saw his friend inside, but he was not moving or getting up to unlock the door. Reel then kicked down the back door of the house, and saw his friend being held at gunpoint. He retrieved a rifle to confront Trustin, who was armed with a pistol, according to the police report. Trustin then shot Reel and killed him.

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Latest Leftis Claim: Rittenhouse Attacker was "Unarmed Man" Murdered at Distance

 

Image posted on Freerepublic as political meme, scaled by Dean Weingarten Top image, unarmed man beat to near-death by violent mob in Portland, Oregon. Lower image Kyle Rittenhouse after defending himself against multiple attackers in Kenosha Wisconsin.

 

A bizzare claim is blowing around the Internet. It was posted in an article I wrote about Lin Woods suing Candidate former Vice President Biden for smearing Kyle Rittenhouse as a white supremacist.  christianprogrammer wrote:

Wow bro you glossed right over Rittenhouse’s MURDER of an unarmed man — AT DISTANCE —

It may be that Joseph Rosenbaum did not have a visible weapon in his hand when he attacked Kyle Rittenhouse. It is irrelevant.  He was shot at very close range while lunging to grab Kyle's rifle, after showing himself to be out of control, threatening, and pursuing a fleeing Rittenhouse across a parking lot at the head of a number of pursuers.   The entire sequence can be seen here.

Joseph Rosenbaum had already shown himself to be emotionally unstable to the point of violence. He had approached visibly armed men and dared them to shoot him, exhorting them, with loud shouts of rage to  "Shoot me n*gga!" "Shoot me n*gga!" 

It shows Joseph Rosenbaum, immediately before the incident with Rittenhouse, was emotionally unhinged and ready to commit violence. Rosenbaum changed his appearance immediately before attacking Rittenhouse, indicating intent to avoid identification.

Just minutes later, 17 year old Kyle Rittenhouse is fleeing from several people. The lead pursuer is Joseph Rosenbaum. Behind Rosenbaum is reporter Richard McGinnis.  McGinnies testifies there where others moving toward Rittenhouse behind him.

Rosenbaum throws a plastic bag with what appears to be a full drink bottle in it at Kyle as Rittenhouse flees.  As Kyle approaches a dead end blocked by a line of vehicles, a shot rings out, fired by a different rioter. Kyle turns. Rosenbaum is closing fast, and lunging to grab the barrel of Kyle's rifle. Kyle fires four quick shots, killing Rosenbaum at what appears to be arms length distance.  It is classic self defense. 

There are several elements to self defense. First, you must not have been the initiator of the physical violence. There is no evidence that Kyle initiated the violence. There is no evidence he committed or provoked any violence before being pursued by Rittenhouse and the mob, just before the shooting.

Even if he had provoked violence, he regains his legal right to self defense when he attempts to retreat from the situation. Kyle Rittenhouse was fleeing Rosenbaum and the mob. If Rosenbaum did not want violence, he merely had to refrain from pursuing and attempting to disarm Kyle Rittenhouse.

The video of the incident is reasonably clear. Rosenbaum pursues Kyle, throws an object at him, then a shot is fired by someone else. Then Rittenhouse is slowed by the rows of cars and turns to see Rosenbaum near and rapidly closing the gap. 

Kyle brings the rifle up to fend of Rosenbaum, and shoots Rosenbaum four times at very close range, as Rosenbaum attempts to take the rifle from Kyle.

The best eye witness was Richard McGinnis. McGinnes says Rosebaum was "lunging to grab the barrel of the rifle".

Second, the defender has to believe his life or bodily integrity is in danger. Many people have been severely beaten in previous riots. It would be hard to argue that Rosenbaum merely wanted to peacefully discuss current events with Kyle. 

When someone is attempting to forcibly disarm you, after chasing you,  you may reasonably believe they are not going to play nice after taking your rifle.

Kyle appears to have had a reasonable belief his life or bodily integrity was in danger. 

He could not know Joseph Rosenbaum was a registered sex offender with a long criminal history of violence in prison. A jury should know that to explain why Rosenbaum would attack an innocent person for no apparent reason, other than his personal rage. It is the sort of thing Rosenbaum had a history of doing.

Rosenbaum did not have a visible weapon, other than hands and feet, when he attempted to take the AR15 from Kyle Rittenhouse.  

He would not have been unarmed once he took Kyle's rifle. He could not legally be armed with a firearm because he was a convicted felon.  If he had taken the rifle, Rosenbaum would have been guilty of at least three felonies: Battery, Robbery, and felon in possession of a firearm.

After shooting Rosenbaum, Rittenhouse retreats further, then circles around and carefully approaches Rosenbaum, who is on the ground.  Kyle appears to want to assist. McGinnis is already providing first aid. 

Rittenhouse is threatened by more members of the mob, and runs toward police lines. 

The left has somehow deluded themselves, if you shot someone who is violently attempting to disarm you, you lose your ability to defend yourself from other people violently attempting to disarm you. It is insanity, as if people never commit crimes in concert or in mobs.

image from twitter.com jbouie and Scott T. Parkinson

When I was teaching self defense courses, I reminded people not to intervene in situations where they did not know what had happened.  The people who attacked Kyle Rittenhouse a minute after he shot Rosenbaum, did not know what had happened, whether Kyle was the victim or assailant. 

They did not know if he had shot anyone. Gaige Grosskruetz, who later lunged at Kyle with a semi-automatic pistol in his hand, asked Kyle if he had shot someone. 

Kyle said he was going to get the police. 

Black people have been historically subject to mob attack and false accusations, we are repeatedly told.  To those who would claim Kyle lost his right to self defense, I offer a thought experiment. 

Consider if Kyle were black. 

We would not be having this conversation. He would be roundly accepted by both Conservative gun owners and Leftists as a hero for defending himself.

 Kyle is halfway there. He only shot white people who were attacking him.

If someone is chasing you and attempts to violently take your defensive firearm, you are not obligated to wrestle them for the firearm.  You can shoot them to prevent them from disarming you. You may face a jury.  

There are numerous cases as examples. A person who is attempting to illegally and violently disarm you is routinely considered a deadly threat by the courts.

As a reminder, Wisconsin law did not forbid Kyle from possessing an AR15 type rifle in Kenosha that night, in spite of the false reading of the law by the politically motivated prosecutor. 

Wisconsin law on the subject is a bit convoluted, but clear when read to include the exceptions. 

Kyle Rittenhouse is a political prisoner, because he dared to defend himself against multiple attackers.

To avoid harm, his attackers had merely to allow Kyle Rittenhouse to leave their presence, as he was shown to be doing, on video. 

If they had not chased or attacked Kyle, no one would have been shot.

©2020 by Dean Weingarten: Permission to share is granted when this notice and link are included.

Gun Watch

MT: Man Leaves Neighbors Property, Comes Back with Gun, is Shot, Killed

Sgt. Bret Becker said the two men lived a few houses down from one another, and the dispute started after the victim had left and come back to the shooter’s property twice.

The victim was pronounced dead on scene after being shot in the head with a pistol. Police did find a separate pistol on the victim’s person.

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MO: Teenager Fires Back at Attackers Presumed to have Stolen Guns

“I stood in the kitchen for a minute and took off my shirt, put my hat back on, and when I walked into the living room, I heard two gunshots,” he said. “I stood up and looked around for a second, because I didn’t know what had exactly happened. Two or three more (shots) went off and all of those went through the front side of our house and into the kitchen where I was just a second before. As I was running back to my room to find a gun, one went through our living room wall and hit our TV.”

Caydon ran to his bedroom to get his .22. It was gone, but his shotgun, which he’d had covered with a sheet on his bed, was still there. He took it and returned fire.
“I got my 12-gauge,” he said, “and I shot twice through the front door and once more through the living room window back at them and then ran out the back door.”

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GA: 27-Year-Old Waman Invited to Home, Attempts Robbery, is Shot, Killed

According to police, The homeowner invited Ellis over to the house earlier in the evening. At some point, Ellis attempted to rob the homeowner and shot at him as he attempted to flee the residence. 

Police say Ellis left the residence and returned moments later. She then attempted to forcefully enter the residence again by breaking a window next to the front door.  The homeowner shot Ellis as she was coming through the front door.

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Oral Arguments for En Banc Review of Young v. Hawaii on 24 September, 2020

Link to virtual oral arguments of en banc panel Young v. Hawaii

On 24 September, 2020, the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeal heard the oral arguments in a virtual en banc panel to re-hear the case.

The three judge panel had held the Hawaii law violated the Second Amendment of the Constitution because it did not allow ordinary citizens a way to bear arms outside of the home for self-defense. 

The Ninth Circuit has established a tradition of re-hearing cases favorable to the Second Amendment, and not re-hearing cases which are not favorable to the Second Amendment.  This gives the Ninth a second chance to derail an effective Second Amendment.

President Trump has appointed 10 judges to the Ninth Circuit. There are 29 active judges on the Ninth Circuit. Judges to en banc panels are chosen, to some extent, randomly. There are eleven judges on an Ninth circuit en banc panel. 

In the panel for the review of Young v. Hawaii the judges and the presidents who appointed them are listed below: 

Bybee           G. W. Bush

Callahan       G. W. Bush

Clifton           G. W. Bush

W. Fletcher    Clinton

Friedland       Obama

Ikuta              G. W.  Bush

McKeown      Clinton

Nelson           Trump

O'Scannlain   Reagan

Thomas         Clinton

Wardlaw        Clinton

The panel has six appointees from Republicans, and five from Democrats. This shows the changing nature of Ninth Circuit, which now has 16 active judges appointed by Democrats and 13 active judges appointed by Republicans. 

This panel may either uphold the three judge panel or overturn the panel's decision, but the en banc panel will hear the case fresh, or de novo. 

It is not worth much time to attempt to predict a panel decision from the oral arguments.

The oral arguments are less than an hour long. Oral arguments seldom have much effect on a case. 

Here are a some impressions from the video.

The attorney for Young, Beck, does a workmanlike job. He lacks polish, but he is generally prepared. He hesitates at times, searching for the right word, but eventually finds it.  After 17 attorneys refused to take the case, he took the case pro-bono (without charge).

Beck says his client would be perfectly happy with either open or concealed carry. He gets his points across.  He has great material, but his presentation is hesitant.

His adversary, Attorney Neal Kumar Katyal, representing the State of Hawaii, is known as a rock-star for his presentations before federal courts on Constitutional issues.  He is one of he best hired guns which can be had, for presenting oral arguments to an appeals court or to the Supreme Court. 

He has significant experience at this level. It shows. His presentation is flawless.

He has terrible material to work with. His logic, such as it is, goes thus: 

Heller held some restrictions on the Second Amendment were allowed. Other states, allowed and have allowed restrictions on open carry. 

He groups those restrictions into a class he calls "good cause" restrictions, which is to say, a person has to show good cause before a gun can be carried.

He claims "good cause" restrictions are Constitutional, because there were a lot of them over the years. He claims the history is categorically on his side ( it isn't). 

Then, he claims Hawaii's law is a "good cause" law, because, occasionally, someone in Hawaii, very rarely, is allowed to carry a gun openly, for very restrictive reasons. 

The presentation is slick. The logic is bizarre. 

In effect, this is a clash of two judicial philosophys. 

One, the originalists and textualists, say the Constitution means things, the meaning is what was meant originally, and the Constitution may only be changed by the amendment process.

The second is the Progressive philosophy. In the Progressive philosophy of the courts, the courts serve as an activist branch of government, changing the law at will, as they see the need to change it. In this thinking, clever wording can always be found to change the meaning of the Constitution to what the Progressives want with any particular case.

For example, Attorney Katyal admits that carry outside the home may be part of the core of Second Amendment rights. But, he says, as long as a law has the potential to allow someone at sometime to carry outside the home, the right to carry outside the home is satisfied, even if those people are limited to 1 or 2 for an entire state over years. The key is that the law allows some potential for carry outside the home.

In effect, his logic has flipped an individual right into a government power. 

The results of the en banc review will only delay what happens with this case. 

It is likely either side will appeal the result to the Supreme Court.

The appointment of a new Justice to the Supreme Court of the United States will have far more effect on this case than the oral arguments in Young v. Hawaii.

©2020 by Dean Weingarten: Permission to share is granted when this notice and link are included.

Gun Watch

 

 

 

CA: Disarm, Gang Attempts Robbery, Asian man Takes Gun, Shoots Suspect

Sources from The Marina Times San Francisco stated an Asian man wearing a Rolex watch exited Neiman Marcus in the 100 block of Geary Boulevard at Grant Avenue around 5 pm. A group of African-American suspects then tried to rob the Asian man at gunpoint.

A struggle soon ensued between multiple suspects and the Asian man who eventually managed to wrestle a gun away from Jones and shot him point-blank multiple times in the chest. The other individuals in the group jumped into a getaway car and drove off.

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PA: Deer Owner Shoots two Escaped Dogs

The dogs began to harass and intimidate the white-tailed deer, who was fenced in on the owner’s property, according to state police. The dogs barked and ran along the fence, causing the deer to become scared and erratic.

The deer began to injure herself and damage the fence in her attempts to escape, police said.

Because of the immediate danger to the deer and the fencing, the owner shot the two dogs and immediately contacted state police afterward to report the incident.

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Grizzly Bears, FOIA, Bird Hunting, Shotguns, and Close Range Defense

 

Image from FOIA request, public domain. Cropped, scaled and text added by Dean Weingarten.

Most conflicts between bears and humans are not reported to the authorities. Of those which are reported, only a small number are reported in the local or national media. Of those reported in the media, many do not include information about the firearms used.

A few months ago, Fredy Rehl of AmmoLand talked to me about Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) requests which might result in information of interest to AmmoLand readers.  I suggested FOIA requests be submitted to agencies dealing with bear attacks. 

Fredy's persistence and hard work has borne fruit.  A FOIA request to the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service has resulted in a pdf file of over 1500 pages of forms and pictures. It represents a fraction of human and bear conflicts which have been reported to the authorities.

Study of the 1500+ pages shows they represent 59 cases where humans were involved in acts of defense of self and others against grizzly bears. The vast majority of the cases were not found in searches of local and national media. 

The cases range from 2005 to 2016, all involve grizzly bears, and except for one case, barely across the border in Idaho, all were in Montana and Wyoming. 

While this is only a fraction of all cases, it is a significant sample of self defense cases. All of the cases involved firearms. A few involved firearms and bear spray, a couple involved pistols and bows. Of the firearm cases about 13 were pure pistol defenses. There were five combination pistol and long gun defenses, as I recall. 

Many of the stories are worth telling. About 10-15% were were covered in the media to one extent or another. Even in those, the official reports reveal details not reported in public media. 

Here are three which involved birdhunting, shotguns and grizzly bears. A bird shot load acts like a pre-fragmented slug when fired at 15 feet or less, out of most shotguns. Two of the incidents were covered in the media. 

On 12 October, 2009, near Choteau, Montana, a pheasant hunter had to shoot a grizzly in self defense. He used his 20 gauge semi-auto loaded with #6 shot and dropped the bear a few feet from him. From choteaucantha.com:

In an interview after the shooting, West said, “I was just in the wrong place at the wrong time.”

West said he and his dog were following a lane or game trail through the brush and came to a dead end in shrubs and berry bushes that were well over his head. He surprised a radio-collared female grizzly who was bedded down for the day with her three cubs.

“It stepped on a limb or something and got my attention,” West said, adding that the sound of the breaking limb — a crash not a snap — alerted him to the bear’s presence about 22 feet from where he stood.

In a matter of seconds, he said, the sow took two big lunges toward him and he began firing his gun, a 20-gauge, semiautomatic shotgun with five rounds in the chamber. He fired three times.

“It fell right at my feet,” he said, adding that he didn’t even have time to shoulder his gun, but simply yanked it up and fired.

“There were no decisions to make,” he said. “It was just reflex.” His 12-year-old English setter, Josie, didn’t even have time to bark or growl as she stood beside him, he said, adding, “She didn’t have time to react.”

“I’m damn lucky to be alive,” he said. “That bear would have gotten me in one more bound.”

In this incident on 7 November, 2015, , the hunter had a full choked Remington 870 12 gauge pump shotgun, loaded, as required when hunting migrant fowl, with only three shots. The event happened 5 miles South of Clark, Wyoming at about 1340 hours. The information is from the  FOIA p. 351.

 Full choke 870 with #4 steel shot on lake Creek Drainage.  Fired three shots from the 12 gauge, starting at 20 feet away, full charge.  Measured distance, 23 fee first shot.  Bear not located. First shot rolled the bear, fired two more as the bear rolled and tumbled toward him.  Pulled the trigger a fourth time, but the shotgun was empty. His young Chocoalte lab  then bit bear in the face.  Then reloaded one shot from his pocket, and shot one more time as the bear was running away, with the dog chasing it.  Had to use shock collar to get the dog to return. 

The last incident was given fairly wide publicity. It happened near an irrigation ditch on a farm 20 miles north of Choteau, Montana on 7 November, 2017. The hunter shot at the charging bear with a 12 gauge shotgun, wasting one shot as a warning shot. This is not advisable when you only have three shots in the gun. From Spokesmanreview.com:

"The female grizzly was in a patch of willows along the canal with her three young-of-the-year cubs," reports Bruce Auchly, FWP spokesman in Great Falls.

"She emerged from the willows and charged the hunter’s dog. The hunter yelled at the bear, which turned and charged him. The hunter shot in the air once with his 12-gauge shotgun

"As the bear continued to charge, the 69-year-old hunter finally shot at the bear twice, hitting it in the chest and face. The final shot came when the animal was within 10 feet.

"The bear returned to the willows, where the cubs had remained. By the next morning Fish, Wildlife and Parks officials went into the willow patch and found the sow dead and the cubs were gone."

Biologists determined the sow was 9 years old and weighed about 500 pounds.

When a bear charges you at close range, and you have a shotgun in your hand, ready to go, it is not advisable to drop the shotgun and grab at a can of bear spray.

All ordinary shotguns shooting common loads, can kill grizzlys at very close ranges of 15 feet or less. Many shotgun hunters are used to shooting at fast moving targets, often with snap shots. 

More factual bear stories will be published from the FOIA treasure trove as time allows. 

©2020 by Dean Weingarten: Permission to share is granted when this notice and link are included.

Gun Watch

 

TN: Disarm, Resident Disarms Home Invasion Suspect, Shoots Same

NASHVILLE, TN (WSMV) – A man is in the hospital after police said he tried to break into an apartment in Hermitage, but once inside the tenant took his gun and shot him.

Officers were called to a reporting shooting in the 100 block of Bonnabrook Drive after shots were fired and a man was spotted running down the street.

Police said an unidentified man walked into Summit Medical Center with a gunshot wound to his shoulder and hip.

Upon arrival, officers learned that the man, who was armed with a gun, forced entry to an apartment. The man inside the apartment told police that he was able to take the suspect's firearm away.”

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FL: Gunfight, Victim Drives off Home Invaders with Gunfire

At approximately 1:21 a.m., officers responded to the 4900 block of NW 20th Street for calls of shots fired, according to police. They learned that two armed assailants attempted to break into an apartment.

One of the shots that were fired struck one of the victim's windows; however, no one inside was injured, police say. One victim returned fire at the subjects.

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FL: Domestice Defense, Man Shoots Woman who Attacked him with Knife

TAMPA, Fla — Deputies are investigating after a woman was shot and killed Wednesday night in Plant City. The Hillsborough County Sheriff's Office said it was called to a home around 6:30 p.m. on Wednesday because there were reports of a disturbance. When investigators got there they found a man who told them a woman he knew came after him with a knife during an argument.

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