If you are anti-guns, or afraid of guns, or just don't like them and don't want them in your house, then this blog is for you.
(It might just change your mind)

Wednesday, July 31, 2013

Star of the Week


Jacqueline Janes is a second-generation native Arizonan currently living in Mesa, Arizona with her fiancé, Robert Messenger. She is a digital marketing strategist and a blogger who writes about Second Amendment issues, recreational and competitive shooting and local and national politics.

Jacqueline has been an outspoken advocate for Second Amendment rights since she learned to shoot in 2009 and has become a very active competitive shooter. She currently competes in the practical pistol sports of IDPA and USPSA and has recently started shooting in 3-Gun competitions. As a certified IDPA range safety officer and NRA basic pistol instructor, Jacqueline provides training and assistance to those interested in learning to shoot in a safe environment. 

Got CHL insurance?

I assume you've heard of Texas Law Shield before.  Insurance for legal defense should you need to defend yourself in court after defending yourself on the street. They do a fair amount of advertising.  But they are kind of expensive, and don't cover you in the event of a CIVIL lawsuit, as well as in several other situations.

USCCA offers less expensive alternative and also covers civil suits.  Plus it comes with a subscription to Concealed Carry magazine.

I cannot vouch for their services, but they are BBB accredited with an A+ rating



Tuesday, July 30, 2013

Guns in school: Ark. district arming more than 20 teachers, staff

Guns in school: Ark. district arming more than 20 teachers, staff
By Andrew DeMillio


 
In this photo taken July 11, a Clarksville schools faculty member, wearing a protective mask, rear center, carries a practice handgun toward a classroom in the city's high school in Clarksville, Ark.


CLARKSVILLE, Ark. - As Cheyne Dougan rounded the corner at Clarksville High School, he saw three students on the floor moaning and crying. In a split-second, two more ran out of a nearby classroom.

"He's got a gun," one of them shouted as Dougan approached with his pistol drawn. Inside, he found one student holding another at gunpoint. Dougan aimed and fired three rounds at the gunman.

Preparing for such scenarios has become common for police after a school shooting in Connecticut last December left 20 children and six teachers dead. But Dougan is no policeman. He's the assistant principal of this school in Arkansas, and when classes resume in August, he will walk the halls with a 9 mm handgun.

Dougan is among more than 20 teachers, administrators and other school employees in this town who will carry concealed weapons throughout the school day, making use of a little-known Arkansas law that allows licensed, armed security guards on campus. After undergoing 53 hours of training, Dougan and other teachers at the school will be considered guards.

"The plan we've been given in the past is 'Well, lock your doors, turn off your lights and hope for the best,'" Superintendent David Hopkins said. But as deadly incidents continued to happen in schools, he explained, the district decided, "That's not a plan."

After the Connecticut attack, the idea of arming schoolhouses against gunmen was hotly debated across the country. The National Rifle Association declared it the best response to serious threats. But even in the most conservative states, most proposals faltered in the face of resistance from educators or warnings from insurance companies that schools would face higher premiums.

In strongly conservative Arkansas, where gun ownership is common and gun laws are permissive, no school district had ever used the law to arm teachers on the job, according to the state Department of Education. The closest was the Lake Hamilton School District in Garland County, which for years has kept several guns locked up in case of emergency. Only a handful of trained administrators - not teachers - have access to the weapons.

Clarksville, a community of 9,200 people about 100 miles northwest of Little Rock, is going further.

Home to an annual peach festival, the town isn't known for having dangerous schools. But Hopkins said he faced a flood of calls from parents worried about safety after the attack last year at Sandy Hook Elementary in Newtown, Conn.

Hopkins said he and other school leaders didn't see why the district couldn't rely on its own staff and teachers to protect students rather than hire someone.

"We're not tying our money up in a guard 24/7 that we won't have to have unless something happens. We've got these people who are already hired and using them in other areas," Hopkins said. "Hopefully we'll never have to use them as a security guard."

Participants in the program are given a one-time $1,100 stipend to purchase a handgun and holster. Hopkins said the district is paying about $50,000 for ammunition and for training by Nighthawk Custom Training Academy, a private training facility in northwest Arkansas.

The Nighthawk training includes drills like the one Dougan participated in, with various role-playing scenarios involving shooters on campus. Dougan and other teachers in the program practiced using "airsoft" pellet guns, with students wearing protective facemasks and jackets.

"There's pressure on you, because you're shooting real bullets if this actually happened," said Dougan, who has three children attending Clarksville schools. "I was nervous to start, but once it started and I was going through what they had taught us, it just took over."

The training is narrowly tailored for teachers to respond to shooters on campus.

Sydney Whitkanack, who will enter seventh grade this fall, said she's grown up around firearms and doesn't mind if teachers or staff are armed at school.

"If they're concealed, then it's no big deal," said Whitkanack, who was an actor in the training scenario. "It's not like someone's going to know 'Oh, they have a firearm.'"

The district will post signs at each school about the armed guards, but the identities of faculty and staff carrying weapons will be kept secret, Hopkins said.

http://usnews.nbcnews.com/_news/2013/07/30/19771320-guns-in-school-ark-district-arming-more-than-20-teachers-staff?lite


Friday, July 26, 2013

Black Neighborhood Watchman Kills White Teen Boy: The Black George Zimmerman You’re Not Allowed To Know About

Black Neighborhood Watchman Kills White Teen Boy: The Black George Zimmerman You’re Not Allowed To Know About


Roderick Scott (black) killed Christopher Cervini (white) under very similar circumstances as George Zimmerman killed Trayvon Martin, yet the administration and the media didn't bat an eye.  And there were no riots.

It all goes to prove that there is an ADGENDA behind the Zimmerman publicity.  it was not about race at all.

Does the mainstream media in America have an agenda in the Trayvon Martin – George Zimmerman case? There was certainly a media influenced uproar surrounding the case; why didn’t they pay as much attention when a black neighborhood watchman shot and killed a white teen boy? 
This is the story that the mainstream media in America doesn’t want you to know about, the story of a black man who, when attacked by a 17 year old white boy, did what he felt like he had to do to survive and shot and killed the unarmed teen.  

Mr. Roderick Scott is the size of an NFL linebacker. Christopher Cervini was a skinny, 17-year old kid. Mr. Roderick Scott was found innocent for reason of self-defense. The must watch videos below tell the story, a sickening story of a mainstream media in America with an agenda, a story that they don’t want you to know about.



Link to the video
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T1NoQgCNNJE




Link to the video


http://beforeitsnews.com/politics/2013/07/black-neighborhood-watchman-kills-white-teen-boy-the-black-george-zimmerman-youre-not-allowed-to-know-about-2537178.html

George Zimmerman Trayvon Martin Justice for Trayvon racist racism riots adgenda
George Zimmerman Trayvon Martin Justice for Trayvon racist racism riots adgenda
George Zimmerman Trayvon Martin Justice for Trayvon racist racism riots adgenda
George Zimmerman Trayvon Martin Justice for Trayvon racist racism riots adgenda
George Zimmerman Trayvon Martin Justice for Trayvon racist racism riots adgenda
George Zimmerman Trayvon Martin Justice for Trayvon racist racism riots adgenda

Monday, July 22, 2013

Warning: Concealed Carry in Post Office Parking lot STILL ILLEGAL !!


Court Decision applies to Colorado only

By Jeff White and Texas Law Shield

Folks there is a rumor going around about the federal courts passed a law to carry firearms on postal property.... This is not for Texas.... there was a decision made from supreme court in Colorado that passed to allow the carry on parking lots... NOT Texas... if your caught carrying on postal property in Texas you could get 2 to 10 years in prison...Please do not carry on their property... here is a letter I got...

Recently, either in the media, the Internet, or elsewhere, you may have heard about a court decision regarding possession of a firearm in a post office parking lot. Some news outlets have titled their stories "YOU CAN CARRY IN THE POST OFFICE PARKING LOT - NEW COURT DECISION!"

We at Texas Law Shield wanted to give you a closer look at the decision, and what this means for you. To provide a short answer, this heavily fact based opinion of a U.S. District Court in Colorado does not currently provide any legal protection for those of us in Texas

At best, it provides an argument that can be used should you get arrested and hauled into court. To provide a greater understanding of what happened, we first need to understand the court decision itself, and the legal concept of precedence.

The Colorado Federal District Court Decision

The case in question is Bonidy, et al. v. USPS. In this case, the court was asked to make a very specific ruling. A man named Tab Bonidy wanted a ruling as to whether or not it was legal to keep a gun in his car while he was at the post office. He was challenging the application of 39 CFR Part 232.1(l), which reads as follows:
Weapons and explosives. No person while on postal property may carry firearms, other dangerous or deadly weapons, or explosives, either openly or concealed, or store the same on postal property, except for official purposes.
In light of the law above, one should consider the very peculiar circumstances of Avon, Colorado:

- The post office does not provide delivery to the public
- They provide free post office boxes to Avon residents
- These post office boxes are the only method of retrieving mail

The judge recognized these facts in his decision which only applies to this post office's particular facts, and none others - yet. Further, the judge pointed out additional factors to consider in determine whether or not to allow firearms in car trunks, such as: does the post office parking lot have restrictions (i.e., is it fenced in with a gate, are there signs imposing time limits or stating that vehicles are subject to search), are there outside mail receptacles for patrons, what type of government business is done there (loading of post office vehicles), and do high numbers of people congregate in the post office for other purposes?

The U.S. District Court of Colorado held that concealed carry license holders are allowed to have a firearm in their locked trunk, or have it otherwise secured in their vehicle under these circumstances. 

This does not mean a person can concealed carry on their body in the parking lot, or open carry.

For those not visiting this post office in Avon, the decision made by the court definitely does not set the law of the land. It repeatedly touched on the fact that there should be no general rules (either for or against firearm carrying). Until the 10th Circuit Court of Appeals issues an opinion, there is no general rule or guidelines for the Colorado Post Offices other than the current federal law in 39 CFR 232.1(l).

Precedent: Does the ruling set any legal precedent for other parts of the country? NO.

Precedent is going to be a rule, guideline, or other legal principle established by case law that is binding on other courts when there is a case with similar issues or facts. To put it another way, precedent is best illustrated when a court makes a decision guided by previous rulings. With that said, there are two types of precedent: horizontal and vertical.

Vertical is the traditionally considered concept of precedent; when a higher court dictates their interpretation of the law in a certain fact scenario, a lower court may not overrule their decisions. For example, the Texas Supreme Court is the highest civil state court, and any precedent set at that level must be followed by the Courts of Appeal and the trial courts in Texas. Similarly, decisions by the Courts of Appeal are binding on the Texas trial courts. Federal courts are similarly structured; District Courts should respect the precedence of the Circuit Courts of Appeal, and both must follow the precedence set by the United States Supreme Court.

However, this is where things can get complicated. Federal appellate level courts are divided into different circuits. To illustrate, Texas, Louisiana, and Mississippi are in the 5th Circuit Court of Appeals, while Colorado, Utah, Wyoming, Kansas, Oklahoma, and New Mexico are in the 10th Circuit. A decision in a circuit is binding only on federal courts in that circuit. So, a case that originates in Louisiana is taken to the 5th Circuit; the decision of the 5th Circuit in that case is then binding on Federal district courts in Texas, Louisiana, and Mississippi.

Horizontal precedence is the relation (or lack thereof) between courts on the same level. The decisions made by different circuits, while they can be used as persuasive arguments, are not binding on other circuits. Therefore, a decision made by the 10th Circuit will not bind the 5th Circuit; similarly, federal district courts in Texas will not be bound by the decisions made in the 10th Circuit or U.S. District Courts in the 10th Circuit.

Those are a lot of words, but what do they mean for us in this situation? The decision made by the Colorado federal district court is not binding on a Texas federal district court, nor on any other district courts. If the 10th Circuit makes a decision, however, it will be binding on federal district courts in Colorado, Kansas, Utah, Wyoming, Oklahoma, and New Mexico. This Colorado case can only be used as an argument in other courts, including those in Texas.

Conclusion

Ultimately, this decision is a fantastic first step in possibly expanding a right that seems to shrink more and more every day. The case has already been appealed to the 10th Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals, as Mr. Bonidy was not content with just the parking lot and wants to pursue open carrying in the actual building of the post office. We will keep you informed of how this case turns out, and whether or not you'll see any expansion on where you can legally carry your concealed handgun in Colorado and beyond.

Thursday, July 18, 2013

More Chicago Idiocy - beefing up the assault weapons ban


Chicago lawmakers unanimously vote to beef up assault weapons ban


Chicago's City Council unanimously voted Wednesday to beef up its assault weapons ban with new measures that add strict penalties, prohibit more weapons and define "student safety zones," changes that come in the wake of Illinois' new concealed carry law.

Illinois lawmakers approved a state law last week outlining who can carry concealed weapons in public after a federal appeals court ruled Illinois' last-in-the-nation concealed carry ban unconstitutional. The new state law gave local entities 10 days to come up with new or updated gun laws of their own.

Mayor Rahm Emanuel called a rare special session Wednesday to deal with guns, the same day Cook County commissioners voted to strengthen the county assault weapons ban with tougher penalties.

Chicago already prohibits the sale and possession of the weapons and of high-capacity magazines. City council members approved measures Wednesday that outline more than 150 specific weapons that are prohibited, including any shotgun with a revolving cylinder and any semi-automatic rifle with a fixed magazine that can hold more than 10 rounds.


http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2013/07/17/chicago-unanimously-votes-to-beef-up-assault-weapons-ban/

Now THIS is how you do a "Gun Buy Back"

The Armed Citizen Project has expanded its Redistribution of Firepower Program to Texas and Florida, the group announced this week.
The Redistribution of Firepower Program, put simply, takes donations of unused firearms and gives the guns, as well as training, to background-checked, high-vulnerability Americans such as single women and the urban poor.
“We’ve combined Joe Biden’s love of shotguns with Obama’s love of redistribution,” - Armed Citizen Project Executive Director Kyle Coplen


Read more: http://dailycaller.com/2013/07/17/armed-citizen-project-sponsors-gun-buyback-to-arm-more-people/#ixzz2ZP8kynQH

Attempts to repeal "Stand Your Ground Laws" are Ridiculous.

Attempts to repeal the "Stand Your Ground Laws" over Zimmerman are boldfaced in their ridiculousness. 

Firstly, proponents of the repeal claim that it hurts African Americans, and is unreasonable.  The reality is that SYG laws help innocent civilians - especially African Americans, and only hurt criminals.  

Secondly, the SYG law was not even used in the Zimmerman trial - it had nothing to do with Zimmerman.

Thirdly, SYG laws MAKE SENSE.  If you are an innocent civilian minding your own business in a place where you have a legal right to be, you should be able to defend yourself from an attacker without being legally required to run away to someplace else that you have a legal right to be.


Blacks benefit from Florida ‘Stand Your Ground’ law at disproportionate rate

By Patrick Howley 
African Americans benefit from Florida’s “Stand Your Ground” self-defense law at a rate far out of proportion to their presence in the state’s population, despite an assertion by Attorney General Eric Holder that repealing “Stand Your Ground” would help African Americans. 
Black Floridians have made about a third of the state’s total “Stand Your Ground” claims in homicide cases, a rate nearly double the black percentage of Florida’s population. The majority of those claims have been successful, a success rate that exceeds that for Florida whites. 
Nonetheless, prominent African Americans including Holder and “Ebony and Ivory” singer Stevie Wonder, who has vowed not to perform in the Sunshine State until the law is revoked, have made “Stand Your Ground” a central part of the Trayvon Martin controversy. 
The law was not invoked by Zimmerman’s defense team but was included in instructions to the jury.


http://dailycaller.com/2013/07/16/blacks-benefit-from-florida-stand-your-ground-law-at-disproportionate-rate/

Wednesday, July 17, 2013

To all those people wanting "Justice for Trayvon"

Guest post by Nancy Westheimer 

To all those people wanting "Justice for Trayvon"
To all those people who can't believe that they found Zimmerman innocent.


Really?  Did you actually follow the evidence of the trial?  Did you read or watch anything other than the incredibly arrogant shameless and downright criminal bias of NBC reporting?  They criminally altered the video surveillance tapes - tampering with evidence. And the rest of the main stream media wasn't far behind.  So if that's all you heard, then I don't blame you for thinking this way.

There was no case, no evidence, no reason to find guilt.  There was no way that the jury could find him guilty, much less "beyond a reasonable doubt".

YES Zimmerman was an IDIOT.  He made STUPID and regretful mistakes.  And he should REALLY SERIOUSLY rethink his "job" as a neighborhood patrol AND rethink his role and responsibility as a CHL carrying a gun.   But he didn't do anything criminal. If stupidity were a crime, there'd be more people in jail than out.

Trayvon didn't deserve to die, but he actually WAS a criminal.  He committed crimes in Miami-Dade, including graffiti and burglary, and was expelled from school - which is why he was in Sanford FL.   He was a young and naive racist who was full of himself and  hated authority and whites.  

The legal defense team purposely (and criminally) withheld exculpatory evidence on Martin's character.  His parents purposely published pictures of a younger and more innocent boy, and the Main Stream Media purposely (and criminally) distorted facts to make Zimmerman look hateful violent, and racist.  All lies.  But the public bought it - including most of the now violent protesters.

In fact, I suspect that Martin was also a "person of interest  in several home burglaries in that area which Zimmerman was patrolling  burglaries that started about the same time Martin arrived in Sanford. Martin may have been acting suspiciously because it was habit.  

But Zimmerman didn't know any of that.  And he didn't racially profile Martin.  Heck, Zimmerman took up black causes regularly - helping black youth, taking a hard line against police for their treatment of a homeless black man. He was definitely not racist.  Zimmerman didn't even realize Trayvon was black until he doublechecked when 911 asked him.

Zimmerman  profiled Martin by Martin's actions - That's what an LEO or Security person is supposed to do.  Zimmerman should not have overreacted, he should not have followed Martin further, and he should not have gotten out of the car. But he didn't follow or confront Martin after exiting the car

Martin had a chip on his shoulder - as many young men of all races do - and jumped Zimmerman first.  He was beating him to death and Zimmerman fired ONLY ONE shot to get him off of him.  CHLs are typically taught to fire twice, reassess the threat, and repeat if necessary.  Zimmerman used minimum necessary force to save himself.

Yes, Zimmerman was an idiot.  And Martin was just Young and brash with too little mentoring. 

So, no, Martin didn't deserve to die, it is a sad and tragic outcome.  But the Jury got it right - Zimmerman doesn't deserve to go to jail either.

George Zimmerman Trayvon Martin Justice for Trayvon racist racism riots adgenda
George Zimmerman Trayvon Martin Justice for Trayvon racist racism riots adgenda
George Zimmerman Trayvon Martin Justice for Trayvon racist racism riots adgenda
George Zimmerman Trayvon Martin Justice for Trayvon racist racism riots adgenda
George Zimmerman Trayvon Martin Justice for Trayvon racist racism riots adgenda

George Zimmerman Trayvon Martin Justice for Trayvon racist racism riots adgenda

THE BARREL ALWAYS POINTS DOWNRANGE



This is why we have the rule that says 

THE BARREL ALWAYS POINTS DOWNRANGE
NO EXCEPTIONS


The victim was performing some target practice at Wade’s Eastside Guns when a man in the neighboring booth accidentally shot the gun owner. According to official documents, the shooter was using a Smith & Wesson pistol that was “rather new” when the gun accidentally discharged. The bullet pierced the partition separating the two booths, and then went through both of the man’s arms in the neighboring booth.


http://www.opposingviews.com/i/society/guns/man-shot-both-arms-gun-range-sues

Feds want Zimmerman, any way they can get him

Guest Post:  Penny Hunter

Just read an interesting article by Will Jacobsen over on the  legal Insurrection.  I don't agree with the "Insurrection" bit, but he's right about the worsening over-reach by the Federal Government.

This no longer is about George Zimmerman, it’s about a Department of Justice serving political interests.
by  
There’s a reason we stand up for the rights of individuals like George Zimmerman against an overreaching State.
It’s not just about the individual.  It’s about all of us, and the reality that there but for fortune could go you or I. 
The highly politicized Department of Justice desperately wants to bring federal charges to placate the race-agitators, and has joined in the witch hunt. 
http://legalinsurrection.com/2013/07/feds-want-zimmerman-any-way-they-can-get-him/

Follow the money.  That's the rule right?  Law of nature - can't be broken.  Every corporate or government action, every scandal, every donation  every scheme, every new law, every announcement  every motive - it always comes down to money.  

So where's the money in making Zimmerman pay?  There isn't any.  With all the costs of litigation, etc, it's a cash negative proposition.  Same as taking guns away.  Surely there are a lot more money making opportunities selling guns than not selling guns.  But money is power. And taking away guns is a more direct route to power, and not just to power but more power and less limited power.

Its' a Win-Win situation to the government.  Either they get him, and take a step towards killing stand your ground laws and taking guns away, or they DON'T get him, and there are riots where more people defend themselves - which is a step towards killing stand your ground  laws and taking guns away.


So why pursue the expense of the case if it is a win either way?  

Answer:  To indoctrinate the public and further the idea that self defense and gun ownership is evil.  To allow crime to occur because it causes fear and dependency on the government's power base and gives politicians leverage to use in pushing social agendas.  

POWER.


Tuesday, July 16, 2013

Zimmerman Riots Begin: Across the country, people are being terrorized and beaten just because they are not black.

Across the country, people are being terrorized and beaten just because they are not black.  Angry mobs and protests turned violent are targeting innocent bystanders who had nothing to do with the Zimmerman case.

We all support the 1st amendment and peoples right to speak out and to protest.  But when they turn violent and target people through racial profiling, that's a hate crime.  It's worse, much much worse, than what they are protesting.

Lesson:  Be careful where you go.  Don't go alone.  Be aware of your surroundings.  Think ahead for multiple exit strategies.  Be prepared to defend yourself if necessary.


Two Hispanics beaten down (1 in Baltimore, MA & 1 in Senatobia, Miss), and another Two riots in LA


Youths yelled 'this is for Trayvon' while beating a Hispanic man

She saw several young black males and two black females chasing a 37-year-old Hispanic man.  "One of the boys had a handgun out and it was pointed at the back of him,"  They were hitting him and they started yelling, "This is for Trayvon, [expletive],"



Youths yelled 'this is for Trayvon' while beating a Hispanic jogger
One of them asked, ‘Do you know who Trayvon Martin was?’” Holts quoted the man as saying.  At that point, the men in the vehicle attacked him.  He was badly beaten and later dropped off on a road


Protesters marched along Crenshaw Boulevard on Monday night,  stomping on cars, chasing bystanders and storming a Wal-Mart.

Police estimated that 80 to 150 people were engaged in lawless activity along Crenshaw as they jumped on top of vehicles and assaulted bystanders.  Some protesters ignited fireworks in the middle of Crenshaw Blvd. 

The LAPD declared a tactical alert about 9 p.m



Oakland: Police Stood Down As ‘Protesters’ Terrorized Drivers

Crowds protesting the George Zimmerman verdict turned violent and seized control of a major street for three hours.  Oakland police officers that had been near the corner retreated, leaving the helpless drivers without police protection.  Occupy Oakland is now calling on demonstrators to repeat the stunt tonight, while subtly encouraging violence by mentioning smashing courthouse windows and telling people to wear all black.

-


Friday, July 12, 2013

HOW many rounds of ammo?? More Proof that 10 Round Magazines are Bullsh*t.

33.    It took this guy 33 rounds to take down one assailant.  And it would have been more, except he was a crack shot and had AMAZING hit ratio and shot placement and also got very lucky.  I wonder how this cop feels about 10 round magazine limits for self defense?


Before the call that changed Sergeant Timothy Gramins’ life forever, he typically carried 47 rounds of handgun ammunition on his person while on duty.

Today, he carries 145, “every day, without fail.”

He detailed the gunfight that caused the difference in a gripping presentation at the annual conference of the Assn. of SWAT Personnel-Wisconsin.

At the core of his desperate firefight was a murderous attacker who simply would not go down, even though he was shot 14 times with .45-cal. ammunition — six of those hits in supposedly fatal locations.

The most threatening encounter in Gramins’ nearly two-decade career with the Skokie (Ill.) PD north of Chicago came on a lazy August afternoon prior to his promotion to sergeant, on his first day back from a family vacation. He was about to take a quick break from his patrol circuit to buy a Star Wars game at a shopping center for his son’s eighth birthday.

An alert flashed out that a male black driving a two-door white car had robbed a bank at gunpoint in another suburb 11 miles north and had fled in an unknown direction. Gramins was only six blocks from a major expressway that was the most logical escape route into the city.

Unknown at the time, the suspect, a 37-year-old alleged Gangster Disciple, had vowed that he would kill a police officer if he got stopped.

He was scarcely up to highway speed when he spotted a lone male black driver in a white Pontiac Bonneville and pulled alongside him. “He gave me ‘the Look,’ that oh-crap-there’s-the-police look, and I knew he was the guy,” Gramins said.

Gramins dropped behind him. Then in a sudden, last-minute move the suspect accelerated sharply and swerved across three lanes of traffic to roar up an exit ramp. “I’ve got one running!” Gramins radioed.

The next thing he knew, bullets were flying. “That was four years ago,” Gramins said. “Yet it could be ten seconds ago.”

“He bailed out and ran headlong at me with a 9 mm Smith in his hand while I was still in my car,” Gramins said.

The gunman sank four rounds into the Crown Vic’s hood while Gramins was drawing his .45-cal. Glock 21.

“I didn’t have time to think of backing up or even ramming him,” Gramins said. “I see the gun and I engage.”

Gramins fired back through his windshield, sending a total of 13 rounds tearing through just three holes.

A master firearms instructor and a sniper on his department’s Tactical Intervention Unit, “I was confident at least some of them were hitting him, but he wasn’t even close to slowing down,” Gramins said.

The gunman shot his pistol dry trying to hit Gramins with rounds through his driver-side window, but except for spraying the officer’s face with glass, he narrowly missed and headed back to his car.

Gramins, also empty, escaped his squad — “a coffin,” he calls it — and reloaded on his run to cover behind the passenger-side rear of the Bonneville.

Now the robber, a lanky six-footer, was back in the fight with a .380 Bersa pistol he’d grabbed off his front seat. Rounds flew between the two as the gunman dashed toward the squad car.

Again, Gamins shot dry and reloaded.

“I thought I was hitting him, but with shots going through his clothing it was hard to tell for sure. This much was certain: he kept moving and kept shooting, trying his damnedest to kill me.”

In this free-for-all, the assailant had, in fact, been struck 14 times. Any one of six of these wounds — in the heart, right lung, left lung, liver, diaphragm, and right kidney — could have produced fatal consequences…“in time,” Gramins emphasizes.

But time for Gramins, like the stack of bullets in his third magazine, was fast running out.

When the suspect bent down to peer under the car, Gramins carefully established a sight picture, and squeezed off three controlled bursts in rapid succession.

Each round slammed into the suspect’s head — one through each side of his mouth and one through the top of his skull into his brain. At long last the would-be cop killer crumpled to the pavement.

The whole shootout had lasted 56 seconds, Gramins said. The assailant had fired 21 rounds from his two handguns. Inexplicably — but fortunately — he had not attempted to employ an SKS semi-automatic rifle that was lying on his front seat ready to go.

Gramins had discharged 33 rounds. Four remained in his magazine.

Before the shooting, Gramins routinely carried 47 rounds of handgun ammo on his person, including two extra magazines for his Glock 21 and 10 rounds loaded in a backup gun attached to his vest, a 9 mm Glock 26.

Now unfailingly he goes to work carrying 145 handgun rounds, all 9 mm. These include three extra 17-round magazines for his primary sidearm (currently a Glock 17), plus two 33-round mags tucked in his vest, as well as the backup gun. Besides all that, he’s got 90 rounds for the AR-15 that now rides in a rack up front.

Paranoia?

Gramins shook his head and said “Preparation.”

http://www.policeone.com/patrol-issues/articles/6199620-Why-one-cop-carries-145-rounds-of-ammo-on-the-job/



PS - for you observant math wizzes out there, 33+4=37 not 47.  The other 10 must have been in his 9mm backup gun.

Thursday, July 11, 2013

You Can Now Bear Arms in a Post Office Parking Lot!

THIS IS FOR COLORADO ONLY, NOT HERE IN TEXAS OR ANY OTHER STATE.



A federal judge rules it is OK to bring a gun to a USPS parking lot, but not inside the facility.



Tab Bonidy was polite enough to ask before he brought a gun into a Colorado post office. In 2010 his lawyer sent a letter to USPS asking whether Bonidy would be prosecuted if he brought a firearm inside the facility or left one in his car while, let's say, purchasing stamps. And he got a response.
According to Thursday's ruling by District Judge Richard Matsch, the USPS legal counsel responded to Bonidy, saying, "Regulations governing conduct on postal property prevent (Bonidy) from carrying firearms, openly or concealed, onto any real property under the charge and control of the Postal Service."
She was referring to Title 39 of the Federal Regulations, which dates back to 1972:
Weapons and explosives. Notwithstanding the provisions of any other law, rule or regulation, no person while on postal property may carry firearms, other dangerous or deadly weapons, or explosives, either openly or concealed, or store the same on postal property, except for official purposes.
Feeling his rights were being violated, Bonidy teamed up with the National Association for Gun Rights to file suit against this provision. 
And they won. Well, at least partially. Judge Matsch maintained that USPS did violate Bonidy's rights by not permitting him to leave a gun in the trunk of his car. But guns inside the post office itself are still forbidden.
Citing the Supreme Court's decision in District of Columbia v. Heller (the case that ended the handgun ban in the District of Columbia), it is still in the federal government's right to deny carrying firearms within the actual buildings. "The Avon Post Office building is used for a governmental purpose by significant numbers of people, with no means of securing their safety;" the judge wrote. "Therefore, it is a sensitive place, and the USPS Regulation is presumed to be valid as applied to the building.... There is no such easy answer as to the public parking lot."

In a press release, the National Association for Gun Rights said it will appeal the decision, with the hope of allowing firearms within the post offices themselves.


http://www.nationaljournal.com/domesticpolicy/you-can-now-bear-arms-in-a-post-office-parking-lot-20130711

Wednesday, July 10, 2013

Connecticut sued over "illegally bypassing" legislative procedures when passing new gun laws

A Newtown, Conn.-based gun industry group on Monday filed a lawsuit challenging Connecticut's tough new gun control law passed in the wake of the shootings at Sandy Hook Elementary School.

The National Shooting Sports Foundation Inc., which is based a few miles from Sandy Hook, claims the emergency legislation was illegally passed in April without proper public input, time for adequate review by members of the General Assembly, or a statement of facts explaining why lawmakers needed to bypass the usual legislative process.

The lawsuit argues that the law violates group members' rights to bear arms under the Second Amendment and a provision of the Connecticut Constitution that provides citizens with the right to defend themselves, The Hartford Courant reported.

"This is an action to vindicate the rights of the citizens of Connecticut whose federal and state constitutional rights have been adversely affected and significantly restricted by the passage of [the bill] through an abuse of the 'emergency certification' procedure, circumvention of the normal legislative process, and violation of Connecticut statutory law," the lawsuit states, according to The Courant.

"There was no emergency and so there's no statement of facts as to why this is an emergency," Lawrence G. Keane, the foundation's senior vice president and general counsel, told The Associated Press, arguing the public's federal and state constitutional due process rights were therefore violated. "There was truly no emergency other than a political one."

Keane said the foundation wants a U.S. District Court judge to strike down the law as invalid, prohibiting it from being enforced. Many parts of the legislation have already taken effect, such as an expanded ban on guns considered to be assault weapons and a ban on large-capacity ammunition magazines.
"The correct, legally required process was not followed," Keane said.

http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2013/07/09/gun-industry-group-sues-connecticut-over-gun-law/

Plenty of Cheap and Bulk Ammo for Sale! (in Canada)

by Jon Stokes

I was surprised to learn that Canadian Reddit users aren’t have any problems buying bulk ammo of any type, at only slightly elevated prices. User linuxbman reports that for 22LR, he’s “paying $20-$25 for a box of 500.” Another user urges fellow Canadians, “don’t mention the 1600 round crates of 5.56 for $449 that we have available everywhere.”

So what gives? Why does Canada not have a raging ammo shortage? I’ve done a little research, looking at various Canadian ammo sites, and it turns out that it’s hard to get ammo across the border. So Canada is its own, isolated market, which mean that the US panic buying doesn't really affect the Canucks.

There are apparently logistical and regulatory reasons for Canada’s isolation. Many Canadian ammo sites have notices to the effect that shipping ammo from Canada to the US is prohibitively expensive, and it doesn't make sense to do it unless you’re really buying bulk — like 1 million rounds or more. And if you’re importing that much ammo, then you have to go through a lot of ATF scrutiny.

But even if you just drive up to Canada and buy some for your personal use, it still looks like there’s an ATF form to fill out in order to get it into the US legally. So getting ammo into the US from Canada is a lot harder than just camping out at the local Wal-Mart and waiting for a new shipment of 22LR to come in, which is why Americans are doing the latter and not the former.

My personal theory is that, barring another panic-sparking event, ammo will eventually get very cheap again, at least online. Hoarders who are sitting on monstrously large ammo stashes are going to decide at some point to unload some of it in one of the various online venues for buying/selling/trading guns and ammo, and at that point the floodgates will open and supply will rush into the market. Wal-Mart shoppers are still going to pay list for ammo when this happens, but those of us buying in peer-to-peer venues are going to see prices go through the floor. I base this speculation on what has happened with AR-15s in recent months: if you’re dying to pay list, you can buy an AR at a gun store, but if you buy via classified or auction you can get a big discount.

A final note: one thing that the Canadian ammo non-shortage makes clear, as if it needed any further clarification after Pat Cascio’s excellent piece, is that the current US ammo shortage is driven solely by US supply/demand dynamics, and not by a nefarious government plot to buy up all the ammo.


http://www.alloutdoor.com/2013/07/09/bulk-ammo-sale-pre-panic-prices-eh/

Illinois FINALLY enacts concealed gun license law

Illinois became the last state in the nation to allow public possession of concealed guns as lawmakers rushed Tuesday to finalize a proposal ahead of a federal court's deadline.

Both houses of the General Assembly voted to override changes Gov. Pat Quinn made to the bill they approved more than a month ago. Some lawmakers expressed fear that failure to pass something would mean virtually unregulated weapons in Chicago, which has endured severe gun violence in recent months.

The Senate voted 41-17 in favor of the override Tuesday afternoon after the House voted 77-31, margins that met the three-fifths threshold needed to set aside the amendatory veto. Quinn had used his veto authority to suggest changes such as prohibiting guns in restaurants that serve alcohol and limiting gun-toting citizens to one firearm at a time.

Quinn had predicted a "showdown in Springfield" after a week of Chicago appearances to drum up support for the changes he made in the amendatory veto.

But lawmakers had little appetite for fiddling any further with the legislation on the deadline day the 7th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals had set for ending what it said was an unconstitutional ban on carrying concealed weapons. Without action, the previous gun law would be invalidated and none would take its place.

"If we do not vote to override today, at 12:01 a.m. tomorrow, July 10, there are no restrictions upon people who want to carry handguns in the public way," said Sen. Kwame Raoul, a Chicago Democrat who negotiated the legislation with House sponsors.

As a nod to Quinn, who faces a tough re-election campaign in 2014 and has already drawn a stiff primary challenge from former White House chief of staff Bill Daley, Senate President John Cullerton floated legislation that addressed the governor's worries. But the Senate ultimately approved a follow-up bill that only mentioned two of his suggestions.

The House rejected the plan later Tuesday, including Cullerton's proposal to remove a requirement that gun-free zones specifically mentioned in the law — schools, for instance — post signs that they're off-limits to gun.

Quinn scheduled a news conference for Tuesday afternoon.

The law as approved by the Legislature permits anyone with a Firearm Owner's Identification card who has passed a background check and undergone gun-safety training of 16 hours — longest of any state — to obtain a concealed-carry permit for $150.

The Illinois State Police would have six months to set up a system to start accepting applications. Spokeswoman Monique Bond said police expect 300,000 applications in the first year.

For years, powerful Chicago Democrats had tamped down agitation by gun owners to adopt concealed carry. So gun activists took the issue to court and the 7th Circuit ruled the Second Amendment permits citizens to take guns out of their homes. The court's original June 9 deadline was extended by a month when lawmakers didn't sent Quinn the plan until early that month.

Quinn had urged Democratic Attorney General Lisa Madigan to appeal the ruling to the U.S. Supreme Court. A spokeswoman for Madigan, another potential gubernatorial rival, said Tuesday there's no reason to appeal now, since Illinois has a concealed-carry law.

Opinions varied about what would have happened had a law not taken effect. Gun supporters said it would have meant with no law governing gun possession, any type of firearm could be carried anywhere, at any time. Those supporting stricter gun control said local communities would have been able to set up tough restrictions.

With the negotiated law, gun-rights advocates got the permissive law they wanted, instead of a New York-style plan that gives law enforcement authorities wide discretion over who gets permits. In exchange, Chicago Democrats repulsed by gun violence got a long list of places deemed off limits to guns, including schools, libraries, parks and mass transit buses and trains.

But one part of the compromise had to do with establishments that serve alcohol. The law will allow diners to carry weapons into restaurants and other establishments where liquor comprises no more than 50 percent of gross sales. One of the main provisions of Quinn's amendatory veto was to nix guns in businesses that serve any alcohol.

He also wanted to limit citizens to carrying one gun at a time, a gun that is completely concealed, not "mostly concealed" as the initiative decrees. He prefers banning guns from private property unless an owner puts up a sign allowing guns — the reverse of what's in the proposal — and would give employers more power to prohibit guns at work.

Sen. Jacqueline Collins, D-Chicago, said Quinn's changed made sense, particularly in her urban district where shootings are common. She voted to sustain the veto.

"It's a difficult decision," Collins said. "It's a position that I'm making out of respect for the mothers and the fathers who's lost children to senseless gun violence."

___

The concealed carry bill is HB183. The Cullerton bill is HB1453.

Online: http://www.ilga.gov


http://bigstory.ap.org/article/lawmakers-poised-override-quinns-gun-bill

Tuesday, July 9, 2013

Is a firearm the best way for women to protect themselves from violent acts?

The Great Equalizer Between the Sexes: Michelle Fields Learns How To Fire a Gun


Michelle Fields meets with firearm enthusiat Cynthia Bigelow at the LAX firing range to learn how to shoot a handgun. See Michelle handle a gun for the first time as she and Cynthia discuss the advantages of female gun ownership. 

Female gun ownership has risen by over 77%.

Is a firearm the best way for women protect themselves from violent acts perpetrated by men? Find out.

WATCH VIDEO HERE:


Monday, July 8, 2013

More and more Americans are becoming concealed-carry permit holders

BY ERIKA JOHNSEN

Firearms sales have been on the up and up since President Obama was elected in 2008, and the federal government’s attempt to pass more national gun-control measures did nothing to quell the firearms industry’s personal economic boom. It isn’t merely gun sales, however, that have lately been experiencing a major surge; the WSJ has the numbers indicating an encouraging trend of more and more Americans taking the responsibility of carrying a concealed weapon upon their person. We’re only halfway through 2013, and it already looks like plenty of states are on track for their biggest permitting years on record:
Since July 1 of last year, Florida has granted more than 173,000 new concealed-carry permits, up 17% from the year before and twice as many as five years ago, for a total of about 1.09 million permits in the state.
Ohio, meanwhile, is on pace to nearly double last year’s total of 65,000 new permits, which would be nearly three times as many as in 2007. And Oklahoma, Tennessee, Wyoming and Nebraska all have nearly matched or surpassed last year’s totals with half of 2013 still to go.
A dozen states surveyed for this article, including Texas, Utah and Wisconsin, issued 537,000 permits last year, an 18% increase compared with a year prior and more than double the number issued in 2007. Early figures for 2013 show many states are on pace for their biggest year ever. …
“I suppose it’s the same reason people are reporting gun sales are up and ammunition sales are up,” said Ohio Attorney General Mike DeWine, referring to concern among gun owners about the recent push for gun control. “It’s nothing unique in Ohio.…It seems to be a consistent trend across the board.”
The mass murders in Newton, Connecticut and Aurora, Colorado spurred a gun debate at not only the national but the state level, and much of the media focus was on states that undertook efforts to tighten their gun laws (Connecticut, New York, Maryland, California, and Colorado figuring prominently).
Plenty of states, however, actually went about easing up on gun laws; the WSJ mentions that at least 20 states have loosened laws on concealed-carry, according to the Law Center to Prevent Gun Violence. Individual states’ measures have included making permits cheaper and easier to gets, doing away with permits altogether, allowing concealed carry in more places, and/or generally streamlining the process through which their law-abiding residents can exercise their Second-Amendment freedoms and protect themselves and their families, neighbors, and communities.


http://hotair.com/archives/2013/07/05/more-and-more-americans-are-becoming-concealed-carry-permit-holders/

Saturday, July 6, 2013

Are you prepared? Zimmerman-Martin riots begin in 5...4...3...2..

Reposted from BonnieGadsden

In light of the Trevon Martin racial hysteria, I'm doing a little research into the LA Riots of 1992 to see what we are to expect if fuel keeps being thrown on the fire and it rages out of control.  I found a series of posts on www.aussurvivalist.com from a man  about his first hand experience in the riots

http://bonniegadsden.blogspot.com/2012/03/1992-la-riots-first-hand-account-part-i.html#.UdSmJ_numvE

The  L.A. Riots:  A First hand experience

The truth is that the L.A. Riots were the most extreme physical terror I have ever experienced. Watching the recent remake of DAWN OF THE DEAD last month brought it all back very sharply - the whole movie was just one giant flashback for me.

Solsys, I was working as a security guard at the very high class Rodeo Drive boulevard when the riots started. I knew the verdict was coming down that day on the Rodney King police trial and I had been trying to get ready the best way I knew how, by stocking up on food and buying ammunition. At that time, I was not a true survivalist, just a nascent embryonic paranoid. I knew enough of my American history to be able to predict what the blacks would do based on their previous behavior the decades beforehand if they did not approve of the verdict. I will say that 99.999% of the people I told to watch themselves before the riots were exactly as lame and feeble as we have often accused them of being here on AusSurvivalist.

The average person just has no idea of what a thin veneer civilization is until it cracks underfoot. I have to say honestly - neither did I before the riots.

The thing rocked my world so violently that I have never really been the same person. I think my personality was altered as a result of the riots and I have kind of been on another plane of awareness ever since. I never really came down off the adrenalin and returned to my sleepy eyed sheeple state afterwards.

Anyway, I had been talking to the celebrity slut that day known as Pia Zadora, a second rate softporn star who was rumored to have had sex with nearly every male and most females in Hollywood. She was asking for assistance with the lift down to the parking garage, which wasn't working. I radioed my supervisor to ask why the lifts were keyed off and he came back over the radio sounding really weird and frightened. He said "We're shutting everything down. I need you to make your security check right now and lock everything up. When you've done that, you are released to go home for the day, we are being relieved by some heavily armed private police who are being shuttled over from Beverly Hills." I asked what the problem was. Pia Zadora was staring at me like she thought this was some elaborate prank. "Listen, Cleve, some really strange stuff is happening. There are apparently spontaneous riots breaking out all over because of the Simi Valley verdict. Lock everything up and get yourself home immediately." I showed Pia Zadora the stairwell access, walked her down to the car and then did my security checks as asked.

I was supposed to meet my wife at Soup Plantation, a well known restaurant down the road. I couldn't get her on the mobile. When I got there and parked, there was a queasy air amidst all the shopping mall splendour and people had a frightened look in their eyes that I had never, ever seen before. The easy listening music in the restaurant was so mundane it was hard to reconcile with the outside windows, which had fire engines, police cars and people running on foot outside. I had planned to just eat quickly with my wife and go home, because I was having trouble absorbing the idea that this thing was possibly even worse than I might have imagined. I thought South Central was so far off, truth is it was about five minutes down the road.

People in the restaurant were watching the television reports, which were growing increasingly more feverish and seemed to just show one new burning building every thirty seconds. I was trying to keep a calm demeanour and went to explain to my wife what was happening.

All of a sudden, a woman in the restaurant screamed. A guy dropped his tray and soup went everywhere. A man was standing in the doorway of Soup Plantation and wobbling on his feet. Blood was gushing out of his forehead which had a nasty gash running right down to his ear. He yelled "They're coming! They are next door in the mall!! They're tearing everything to pieces!"

You could have heard a pin drop. Then the restaurant exploded with activity and EVERYBODY was crawling over the women and children trying to get to their cars in the parking lot outside. I'm talking blind panic here, people smacking into each other like they could not give a fugg less about any human in the world outside of themselves. A guy floored his Subaru and tore the toll gate right off the booth. Everybody else was following him out, the attendant was gone. There was cars hitting each other like bumper buggies at the carnival, nobody seemed to care, everybody wanted to get out to the street.

When we made it out onto the highway, I got my first look at the skyline since I left Rodeo Drive. It looked like the fires of hell were consuming half of the city. My wife was crying, she thought it was the end of the world.

When we were driving home, we saw all kinds of bizarre things that were totally out of place. Like right in the median strip, some businessman sitting on his briefcase with blood all over his pants and a tourniquet. A bunch of black guys surrounding some young couple who looked like tourists literally ripping the woman's clothes off one piece at a time. A homeless guy by the edge of Sunset Boulevard holding a cardboard sign reading "REPENT NOW OR BE DAMNED TO HELL." People running everywhere with shopping carts piled high with groceries or possessions. The smoke forced us to close the car ventilation intakes and circulate the air inside.

We stopped at all the red lights until I realized that very few people were and if we sat in place like this we might get rear ended. I was trying to keep my wife from losing it by staying in control myself, but I was having a really hard time convincing myself I was not dreaming. I kept thinking, this is one of those vivid dreams where something so incongruous will happen I will realize it is a dream and suddenly things will be inconsistent and irrational and then I will awaken. I thought there would be riots down in South Central like Watts and they might be bad but there is no way this could have happened to the entire city like this so quickly. That's what I was thinking.

When we pulled into our driveway off Martin Way it is like I was suddenly seeing with new eyes. Our home was right on Sunset Boulevard, close to an alley that accessed a main road on both sides. That was not a good place to be during the apocalypse. It's like my eyes had X-ray vision when we unlocked our front door. We were completely exposed in our one level flat, our door was made of a composite of cardboard fibers and lots of glue. Any man over 200 lbs could probably just tear the door off the frame. It suddenly occurred to me I lived in a fishbowl with full length windows in the front yard. Like most people this just had not struck me as something important until right at that moment. I had been sleepwalking through my entire life.

The first thing my wife did was to rush over to the television and turn it on. I got my Desert Eagle out of the cupboard and I immediately made a tour of the entire house checking to see if all the windows and doors were locked. Then I came back to the living room and sat briefly with my wife watching the news, just as the last rays of the sun were dying behind the drapes. Night was coming. It looked like on television that nobody was going to be in darkness, though, because half the buildings in the city were catching fire.

I was shaking. I could hear loud voices out in the street, some in fear, some in anger. I peered through the curtains and could only see dark shadows moving out on the sidewalk. I turned the porch light off. There was no way I wanted to go out there, I kept thinking we'll keep the drapes closed and nobody will know we are here. I had this really powerful overwhelming urge to want to rush to a strong door down to a cellar, which I would close behind us and have a rush of relief at finding a place with food, water, light and safety. Unfortunately, there was no cellar.

When I went out and sat in the living room and watched some more television, I got one consistent fact from the news ... apparently the police were nowhere to be found, 911 was not answering and the government had completely abdicated it's responsibility to keep order. The people on the news kept saying something about the police waiting for the national guard to arrive. It took a really long time to sink in before I understood what they were saying. The police had camped out in their stations and were not coming out. You were completely on your own.

My wife finally fell asleep on the couch around midnight. I did not sleep a wink and stayed in front of the television all night, making one cup of coffee after another and monitoring the creep of the riots towards us one block at a time from down in South Central. Every few minutes, a helicopter shot appeared of a new building burning at a ferocious rate almost by magic where just an hour beforehand it had been pristine. They never showed anyone running away from the building, no arsonists ... it was just buildings exploding into bright flames glowing like miniature suns one after the other in a slow procession towards Sunset Boulevard. You would have thought the planet had been invaded by aliens made of fire.

Lots of pundits and talking heads were telling us the previous night was the worst part and it was over. I climbed to the roof of my house and looked towards the south - I had this sick feeling that this was the beginning, not the end. That feeling was absolutely accurate. That was just the tip of the iceberg of what was coming.

I gave my wife a gun, locked the front doors and drove to the supermarket as soon as it was open and found myself fighting dozens and dozens of people at the doors to get inside and raid the place for as much as we could cart away. I got it right this time and bought what I thought would be serious provisions ... powdered milk, dry staples like beans and corn, canned meats, 30 liter springwater jugs. There was a serious dearth of cashiers and I heard the manager say that lots of people would not be coming in at all. There was a kind of electricity in the air like before a storm. Everyone wanted to get home with stocks and cocoon themselves. Some guy was trying to argue with me over a big pack of "D" cell batteries that I found behind the empty display case, I kept staring at him until he shut up and went away. One really old codger had a radio with an earpiece and he was muttering something about the "looting" starting in earnest while he was waiting in line with me. I didn't know what he was talking about at the time.

I waited at the gun shop for thirty minutes trying to buy a few boxes of ammo but the atmosphere there was very violent and utterly strange. There were lots of guys trying to buy guns off people waiting in line because the gunshop owner had reminded them of the thirty day waiting periods they had voted for in referendum and told them they could apply for a permit but would not be taking a gun out of the shop. These guys were begging for guns to protect their families in these pathetic reedy voices it broke your heart to listen to. Just about then a station wagon filled with black youths drove by playing some bass ugly rap music, everyone in the line was ultra tense thinking they were going to do a drive-by on all the white gun owners waiting in line. The wagon pulled off down the street and finally vanished. I gave up waiting and headed back to the house, luckily I had bought a little ammo the week before the riots.

When I got home, I immediately drilled holes for security crossbars on the front and back door and mounted a two-by-four on each to hold the door if somebody was trying to force it.

That afternoon, I began hosing down the roof with water to make it difficult for passing rioters to throw a molotov up there and set the house afire if they came by the alleyway. Some of my neighbours were doing same.

The rabid leftist across the street, a guy with a little goatee like Trotsky and an earring, came over and offered me a blank check if I would loan him my .22 pistol for the duration of the riots. He said his girlfriend was so scared she had been unable to sleep and he wanted it to give her a feeling of security. About two weeks beforehand, this guy had given me a long smug lecture about the evils of guns in private hands. I gave him the cold shoulder and told him to go up the street to the gunshop if he needed a gun. He said, "They've got a ninety day waiting period! I already tried!" I told him "You're s**t out of luck, then, I guess. Can you even appreciate the irony? That is called being hoisted by your own petard." It was true. The guy didn't appreciate the irony. He was a creature of emotion and now felt fear, maybe for the first time in his pathetic life. Ah, the utter blindness to self-knowledge of the liberal mind.

I had a roll of rusty barbed wire I ran completely around the property over the little chainlink fence. It was the only thing I could think of to give some measure of safety to our little dollhouse. I actually wired broken glass bottles to the tops of the gates and locked the latches shut from the inside with big thick padlocks. My wife came out with sandwiches while I was working and as usual had a good laugh at me. Not in a mean way, just amused a bit at how grimly I was going about the task. The previous tenant had left the barbed wire, a half dozen animal traps and some buckets of nails. Only the week beforehand I was complaining to the landlord about the big fat coil of rusty barbwire in the outdoor garage. I set the animal traps in the weeds on the other sides of the gates, because they were the most likely spots for a rioter to try to get a handhold to leap over the fence and land on the other side. Then I set my wife to making caltrops out of the nails using some ten penny wire. In about two hours we had made a couple dozen and I spread these all over the front lawn hidden by blades of grass. Since I had never made a caltrop before in my life I had a weird sense of accomplishment at this.

That night, it was like deja vu of the previous night except ten times worse. They now had burned most of South Central to the ground and were working their way steadily north towards Sunset Boulevard. I had this sense of some epic confrontation approaching when they left the ghetto and started to hit the white neighborhoods the following day.

I went up on the roof to try resting my .203 in various gutter brackets and aiming at different parts of the street to see if I had a clear field of fire if it came to that. A police helicopter passed directly overhead and must have seen me with the rifle, but when he made a second pass after turning around I had dropped it into the gutter with my ammo and thrown some leaves over it, then pretended to be sweeping up on the roof so he might think he had seen a broomstick instead of a rifle. The thing about all this is that it was so out of character for me and yet it all seemed to be so instinctual. I was starting to feel like I had another person inside of me for 27 years and it took the riots to bring my true nature out. I was discovering that I was a survivalist. That was the real person inside of me, it was my real nature coming to the fore under stress.

The news was best summarized as saying the gates of hell had opened in Los Angeles. The Koreans were engaged in firefights with looters from the roofs of their stores, in lieu of a police response. The National Guard was on the way, or so the reporters told us. Darryl Gates was getting asked complicated questions like why the police had been holed up inside the station for three days during the worst riots in United States history. He just gave'em dumb looks and shrugged. The looters were getting more sophisticated and organized, confident in the realization they could operate in an unhindered environment by any law and order. The coming day had a quality about it of climax - everybody had a buzz this was the threshold we were going to step over and see what was on the other side of the world we had known previously.

This is what the news told us, aside from martial law and curfew, when I rose from the couch that morning with the smell of woodsmoke in my lungs filling the air and my wife told me she needed fresh milk for breakfast and real bread. She brushed off my suggestion we use the powdered milk and cook the bread flour I had purchased. She didn't like the way it tasted. She pointed out how quiet it was outside this morning and said the rioters were probably sleeping it off indoors ... she said this was the perfect time to make a run to the Quick Mart for some staples. For some reason this made sense at that time. I soon discovered it wasn't so.

When I started to leave with the Desert Eagle in my hand, she screamed and said the police would shoot me if they saw me with it or arrest me on the spot. She said it was only two blocks and that I should just jog over, grab the groceries and jog back. So I left the Desert Eagle at home, thinking she was right and it wasn't worth getting shot by the cops over some milk and bread.

I didn't jog, I walked quietly and calmly down the alleyway with the sun still rising. I could hear birds chirping and some fire engines far away but otherwise the streets seemed empty.

When I turned the corner and could physically see the Quick Mart, a drunken looking black man, about in his fifties, came shuffling along. "You stretched us too far, white motherf**ker!!! See what you got! This is what you got when you stretch a man! How you like it, pink ass porky pecker!"

We kept backing away from each other with ugly looks, he finally snorted and kept shuffling off.

I did not see another living soul until I made the front of the Quick Mart, which I could have sworn was closed and locked up like everything else with the lights out inside and one lone car parked out front. I tried the door just as a formality and it swung open. I stepped inside and said "Hello? Anybody in here? The door was open."

This was how the great battle of the Quick Mart began.

READ THREE MORE CHAPTERS HERE:
http://bonniegadsden.blogspot.com/2012/03/1992-la-riots-first-hand-account-part-i.html#.UdSmJ_numvE