Sophie Hall was out with a group of friends at a night club in London in early April. It was 1 a.m. and they were still having fun before she noticed a fight breaking out next to her. Then she became overwhelmed by the smell of petrol and her face felt like it was on fire. The next thing she could remember was being stripped of her clothes and transported to the hospital for treatment for an acid attack.

Sophie was one of twenty people who were victims of the acid attack at the Mangle nightclub. The attack was not an isolated incident, but part of the larger epidemic of gang- and drug-related acid attacks that have increased in London in recent years.

According to data from the London police released in March, acid attacks from 2015-2016 increased by 74 percent. There has been a 30 percent rise in England overall. The problem has gotten so serious that London police officers have been issued acid treatment kits to allow officers to give immediate on-scene treatment to victims.

Acid attack epidemics are nothing new for the city. During the Victorian era it was common for women to throw corrosive acid on men who had “crossed them in love” as revenge. However, in the UK today most corrosive acid attacks involve men. Gang wars are believed to be the primary cause.

There are a variety of reasons why acid attacks may be popular for gang members. For example, there’s the relative cheapness of purchasing and concealing the substance. A liter of 95 percent sulfuric acid only costs £6.50 (about $8.50) and can be easily concealed from police. Furthermore the rise in acid attacks also coincides with efforts by lawmakers to deter possession of knives and guns.

Simon Harding, a Criminologist at Middlesex University, believes that the frequency of acid attacks has risen because they’re more difficult to prosecute and see more lenient repercussions, pointing out: “If you throw [acid] in someone’s face, it’s going to affect their eyes and eyesight so you have a high chance of getting away with it.” He went on to say: “Acid is likely to attract a ‘[Grievous Bodily Harm] with intent’ charge while using a knife is more likely to lead to the attacker being charged with attempted murder.”

In recent weeks, acid was used to target food delivery workers for popular services such as UberEats and Deliveroo. Jabed Hussain, 32, was one of five delivery bikers who were attacked during a 90-minute acid attack spree on July 16 in East London. In response, Hussain and other busy drivers blocked a central street in London during rush hour to protest the lack of safety. Hussain told reporters: “I’m just shocked, using acid to steal a bike? What’s a bike worth? My life is worth more than that.”

Representatives from the British government are currently meeting with police officers and the office of Home Secretary to discuss banning some kinds of acid, but have encountered difficulties because variations of the chemical are found in household goods. One MP, Stephen Timms, has recommended making it illegal to carry such noxious chemicals without justification. Violating that law would lead to penalties more on par with people caught with guns or knives. But while it may deter the number of acid attacks, it could inspire criminals to search for new, more dangerous weapons to use.

James Levinson

James Levinson is an Editorial intern at Law Street Media and a native of the greater New York City Region. He is currently a rising junior at George Washington University where he is pursuing a B.A in Political Communications and Economics. Contact James at staff@LawStreetMedia.com

The post What You Need to Know About the Rise of Acid Attacks in London appeared first on Law Street.

A Miami judge ruled on Monday that new revisions to Florida’s “Stand Your Ground” law are unconstitutional. Florida Governor Rick Scott signed the amended “Stand Your Ground” law on June 9,  requiring prosecutors to prove a defendant wasn’t acting in self-defense at pretrial hearings.

Miami-Dade Circuit Court Judge Milton Hirsch held that the legislative changes altered the burden of proof in “Stand Your Ground” cases, raising the threshold “from mere preponderance of the evidence to clear and convincing evidence.” Per Florida’s Constitution, such changes could only be made by the Florida Supreme Court, not the state legislature, and were therefore unconstitutional, Hirsch said. In outlining the necessity for a separation of powers among the three branches of government, Hirsch even referenced a paper about the Ministry of Magic’s judicial overreach in “Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix.”

Hirsch’s ruling comes as the result of two “Stand Your Ground” cases in his court. Liletha Rutherford was charged with aggravated assault with a firearm and grand theft for pulling a gun on a couple during an argument. Omar Rodriguez was charged with first-degree murder for shooting and killing Jose Rey over an argument about Rey’s dog. Rodriguez claimed Rey charged at him with a knife. Police recovered a knife at the crime scene, but discovered Rodriguez’s DNA on the knife, not Rey’s.

Florida lawmakers reacted to the ruling on social media. State Senator Rob Bradley, who sponsored one of the amendments to the “Stand Your Ground” law, said in a tweet that the court’s ruling “attacks the Legislature’s role in defining and protecting our individual rights.”

Today’s Miami trial court ruling attacks the Legislature’s role in defining and protecting our individual rights. /1

— Rob Bradley (@Rob_Bradley) July 3, 2017

Following Hirsch’s ruling, Rutherford and Rodriguez will now each have to prove they acted in self-defense. Currently, the ruling only applies to those two cases. However, appeals are likely to make their way to appellate courts and the Florida Supreme Court.

The effectiveness of “Stand Your Ground” laws hasn’t exactly been clear. In March, Florida State Senator Dennis Baxley claimed that since Florida’s 2005 “Stand Your Ground” law, “we’ve seen violent crime continuously go down.”

PolitiFact pointed out some flaws in that statement. While violent crime in Florida has dropped a cumulative 34.9 percent from 2005 to 2015, that decrease is not “continuous” as Baxley contends. Data show occasional increases in Florida’s violent crime rate during that 10-year period, however not enough to really counteract that overall decline in violent crime.

That said, PolitiFact also highlighted the fact that national violent crime rates have also been decreasing since the 1990s. It has yet to be proven whether Florida’s decrease in violent crime has been due to its “Stand Your Ground” laws, considering several states with similar drops do not have “Stand Your Ground” laws.

Critics of “Stand Your Ground” say the laws disproportionately benefit defendants who kill black victims compared to those who kill white victims, and often allow defendants to avoid murder charges.

The Tampa Bay Times identified nearly 200 “Stand You Ground” cases. Of those cases, 70 percent of defendants who invoked a “Stand Your Ground” defense were acquitted. Seventy-three percent of defendants who killed a black person faced no penalty, while 59 percent of defendants who killed a white person faced no penalty.

One of the most high-profile “Stand Your Ground” cases involved George Zimmerman, the “neighborhood watchman” who shot and killed 17-year-old black Florida teenager Trayvon Martin in 2012. Zimmerman did not invoke the “Stand Your Ground” law in his trial, but the judge issued instructions to the jury along the same lines as the law’s language, saying Zimmerman “had the right to stand his ground and meet force with force, including deadly force if he reasonably believed that it was necessary to do so to prevent death or great bodily harm to himself or another.” Zimmerman was acquitted of all charges in Martin’s death.

“Stand Your Ground” may stay in place in Florida for now, but Hirsch’s ruling could limit the extent to which the law is allowed to reach. The question has the potential to make it to higher courts and get decided once and for all.

Marcus Dieterle

Marcus is an editorial intern at Law Street. He is a rising senior at Towson University where he is double majoring in mass communication (with a concentration in journalism and new media) and political science. When he isn’t in the newsroom, you can probably find him reading on the train, practicing his Portuguese, or eating too much pasta. Contact Marcus at Staff@LawStreetMedia.com.

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Cedric Anderson’s fatal shooting of his estranged wife, Karen Smith, and one of her students in a San Bernardino elementary school on Monday sparked discussions about domestic violence. While assumptions were made about the shooting when it first broke–namely that it could have been a terror attack–it was quickly revealed to be an act of domestic violence. This raises the question: why isn’t domestic violence as heavily covered by the media as terrorism?

Why, exactly, doesn’t violence against women cause the same type of public outrage? There are plenty of theories–including traditional male dominance over women, and the historical viewpoint that a woman is a man’s possession–that could lead to the downplaying of domestic violence. But it’s incredibly dangerous–according to mental health experts, most murder-suicides are committed by men killing their female partner and then themselves. And in 90 percent of murder-suicides, guns are the preferred method.

Domestic violence has in some cases proven to be a warning sign and precursor for a mass shooting. That was the case with Omar Mateen and the nightclub shooting in Orlando last year, Robert Lewis Dear who was the alleged gunman at the Planned Parenthood shooting in 2015, John Houster who killed nine people at a Louisiana movie theater in 2014, and many others. According to an analysis by Everytown for Gun Safety, 54 percent of all mass-shootings involved a current or former partner or family member.

Her name was Karen Smith & she was shot by her estranged husband in front of her students. We need to talk about guns and domestic violence. pic.twitter.com/3uWiibMwBb

— UltraViolet (@UltraViolet) April 11, 2017

And Anderson was not a first-time offender. He had a history of domestic violence against previous girlfriends, stretching back three decades. He also had a history of threatening gun violence, and had been charged with assault, battery, disturbing the peace, and brandishing a firearm in Los Angeles in 2013. But he was still allowed to own a gun.

According to Susan Sorenson, who studies domestic violence and guns at the University of Pennsylvania, there isn’t any research available on whether some men use domestic violence against their partner as a preparation for a mass shooting, but she said it’s certainly an intriguing theory. “Men who are violent toward their female partners often are violent guys in general–that might be the issue,” she said.

According to data from the FBI, at least 6,875 people were fatally shot by their romantic partner from 2006 to 2014. Eighty percent of those victims were women. That means that every 16 hours, an American woman is fatally shot by a partner or a former partner. There is a law called the Lautenberg Amendment that prohibits people convicted of domestic violence from owning a gun–but that only applies if the couple is married, has been married, or if they have a child together. Anderson was in no way prohibited from owning guns, as Smith was the only woman he ever married and she never reported him to the authorities.

“an estimated 50 women a month are shot to death in the US by former or current partners” https://t.co/ZPSXDjoCAu

— Mona Eltahawy (@monaeltahawy) April 12, 2017

This creates what is sometimes called the “boyfriend loophole,” where partners who have never been married to their victims are free to own firearms even after being convicted of domestic violence. It doesn’t stop anyone from illegally obtaining a weapon, or from buying one privately or over the internet. Domestic violence happens every single day, but it seems like it’s often taken for granted as something that “just happens.”

The U.S. has a rate of gun violence that is nowhere close to the rates of other developed countries. According to data from the United Nations, the U.S. has almost six times the gun murder rate of Canada, seven times Sweden’s, and a whopping 16 times Germany’s.

It’s hard to say whether change is forthcoming. But Shannon Watts, founder of Moms Demand Action for Gun Sense in America, said that advocates for stricter gun control are working to tighten domestic violence gun laws on the state level throughout the country. And since 2013, 22 states have passed bills restricting access to guns for perpetrators of domestic violence.

“This is an issue that red and blue lawmakers can agree on: domestic abusers shouldn’t have guns,” she said. “All countries have domestic violence. The difference is that we arm our abusers.” All available research agrees with this–more gun ownership leads to more gun violence. If a domestic abuser has access to a gun, violence is more than three times more likely to turn deadly. And until lawmakers realize this and significantly tighten gun laws, more shootings will happen and people will keep becoming desensitized.

Emma Von Zeipel

Emma Von Zeipel is a staff writer at Law Street Media. She is originally from one of the islands of Stockholm, Sweden. After working for Democratic Voice of Burma in Thailand, she ended up in New York City. She has a BA in journalism from Stockholm University and is passionate about human rights, good books, horses, and European chocolate. Contact Emma at EVonZeipel@LawStreetMedia.com.

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If you’ve ever been at a college football game and thought, “Man this football game is fun, but it would be even more fun if some people in this stadium were packing heat!” then you probably were not very happy with the Arkansas Senate yesterday.

After a good dose of public outrage and some lawmakers speaking out about its dangers, a new Arkansas concealed carry expansion measure has now been watered down by an exemption passed by a 22-10 vote in the Senate. The exemption removes college sports events from the expansion.

Signed into law by Republican Governor Asa Hutchinson on Wednesday, the new measure would have allowed anyone with a concealed handgun license and eight hours of active shooter training to conceal carry in a publicly-owned building like a state college campus or the state capitol. Private establishments like bars and places of worship would also be included, although those establishments still have the right to prohibit guns from their premises. News of this measure expanding gun rights to college sports venues angered and alarmed many, leading the Senate to pass the exemption for college sports venues less than a day after the law was passed.

Among those who were confused by the very logic of the law was University of Arkansas defensive back Kevin Richardson II:

I’m curious as to why… https://t.co/Ynpo3lGUeL

— Kevin Richardson II (@K_Rich30) March 23, 2017

Speaking to USA Today Sports, Democratic Rep. Greg Leading, who represents the district that includes one of the University of Arkansas campuses, said “Most concealed-carry permit holders are responsible people. That said, accidents happen. People like to have a good time before, during and after football games in the South. People drink. People get emotional. If you’re not allowed to bring an umbrella into a stadium, why should you be allowed to introduce guns into the equation?” To add to Rep. Leading’s point, outside food is prohibited from most stadiums, and, on the very same day the new measure was approved, the SEC implemented a league-wide “clear bag policy” that encourages fans to bring only clear and smaller bags to SEC football games.

As the AP points out, the state of Arkansas is no stranger to supporting and expanding gun rights. In 2013, the state passed a law that allowed faculty and staff to carry concealed weapons on college campuses, given that those schools agreed to allow guns on campus, which none of them ended up doing. Governor Hutchinson is also, as the AP points out, a former chair of a National Rifle Association task force whose mission was to push for armed faculty at Arkansas public schools in response to the Newtown shooting. That shooting happened, of course, in Connecticut–over a thousand miles away from Arkansas.

This exemption is expected to pass in the Arkansas House floor sometime within the next week.

This Arkansas law comes at a time where multiple states with Republican governors are moving to pass some version of concealed carry expansion. This week, North Dakota Republican Gov. Doug Burgum signed into law a bill that institutes Constitutional Carry throughout the state and Ohio’s new gun laws that allow for people to carry a concealed weapon into places like day care facilities and non-secure areas of airports went into effect.

Austin Elias-De Jesus

Austin is an editorial intern at Law Street Media. He is a junior at The George Washington University majoring in Political Communication. You can usually find him reading somewhere. If you can’t find him reading, he’s probably taking a walk. Contact Austin at Staff@Lawstreetmedia.com.

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On Sunday night Kim Kardashian was robbed at gunpoint in her hotel room in Paris; she was there to attend Fashion Week. The robbers, who were wearing masks and were dressed as police officers, stole jewelry totaling $10 million.

Kardashian was staying at a nine-apartment mansion that is often frequented by celebrities like Madonna and Leonardo DiCaprio. Around 2:30 AM on Sunday, the concierge let a couple of men in. They then threatened him with a gun, handcuffed him, and made him take them to Kardashian’s apartment, where they tied her up in the bathroom while holding a gun to her head. After going through her jewelry, they left. Allegedly her stylist managed to alert the real police, who later found the night guard in a staircase with hands and feet bound.

Kim was shaken but physically okay, according to a statement from her spokeswoman. Her children were not in the apartment. She later left Paris on her private jet and flew home to New York.

On Sunday night, her husband Kanye West cut his show at Meadows Music and Arts Festival in New York short with the words “I’m sorry, family emergency, I have to stop the show.” Fans initially reacted with confusion and anger.

Here’s a photo of Kanye West’s show right before it ended. Like everyone was shock it just ended. No reason given, just “family emergency.” pic.twitter.com/y4Rfk5n3h9

— Frank Pallotta (@frankpallotta) October 3, 2016

Last week was not an easy one for Kim Kardashian West. She was the recipient of a prank by internet celebrity prankster Vitalii Sediuk, who tried to kiss her butt when she exited her car. Her bodyguard quickly wrestled him to the ground, but she said she wants to file a report and get a restraining order. Apparently Sediuk was protesting plastic surgery and wanted the Kardashians to promote a more natural look for the millions of young girls who look up to them.

As news of the robbery broke on Monday morning, the internet started reacting not with compassion, but with mockery.

Kim Kardashian gets robbed and the whole world is in an uproar.

Harambe was brutally murdered and the world was silent.

— ædonis | hotep (@lordaedonis) October 3, 2016

Luckily, tweets defending Kim later surfaced on social media, pointing out how bizarre it is to make fun of someone being robbed just because she’s a celebrity.

People making jokes about @KimKardashian tonight would do well to remember that she’s a mother,a daughter,a wife,a friend.Be nice or shut up

— James Corden (@JKCorden) October 3, 2016

Kinda loving @kanyewest for jumping off that stage for his wife… yes sir… love that. Family first.

— Jaime Primak (@JaimePrimak) October 3, 2016

Don’t make memes out of Kim Kardashian being robbed at gunpoint it really isn’t funny. One click and 2 kids could’ve been motherless

— Girls be like… (@girlhoodposts) October 3, 2016

Emma Von Zeipel

Emma Von Zeipel is a staff writer at Law Street Media. She is originally from one of the islands of Stockholm, Sweden. After working for Democratic Voice of Burma in Thailand, she ended up in New York City. She has a BA in journalism from Stockholm University and is passionate about human rights, good books, horses, and European chocolate. Contact Emma at EVonZeipel@LawStreetMedia.com.

The post Kim Kardashian Robbed at Gunpoint in Paris appeared first on Law Street.

Footage from a dashboard camera and a body camera on one of the police officers involved in the shooting of Keith Scott in Charlotte last week have finally been released. It turns out the one officer who wore a camera didn’t turn it on until after Scott was already on the ground.

Two videos were released late Saturday after mounting pressure and some violent protests that left people wounded and one dead. The footage from the dashboard camera shows a plainclothes officer aiming his gun at a car. The officer in the car with the dash cam gets out and joins him. Then Scott is seen exiting his car and backing away, and the officer without a uniform fires four shots. Since the video is from inside the police car, there is no audio to prove what was said. But it’s clear that Scott did not aim any gun at the officers at that point.

The body camera footage is grainy and jumpy and shows an officer standing behind Scott’s car, as the officer wearing the camera comes up and knocks on the window with his baton. Scott is then seen getting out from the car but disappears from the video. Next time he’s in the picture, he’s on the ground. The sound on the camera is not turned on until this point, which is why it’s unclear what happened and who said what. It’s also impossible to see from that footage whether Scott had a gun or not. When the sound is turned on, the officers are heard yelling “handcuffs, handcuffs” and asking each other whether they are okay, while Scott is moaning and lying on the ground dying.

Body camera footage shows Keith Scott shooting https://t.co/W0NhU5sBn8 pic.twitter.com/t44YKbjFlK

— Ruptly (@Ruptly) September 25, 2016

Charlotte was the first major city in North Carolina to start using body cams for officers in 2015. The cameras are always on, but they don’t save the footage until the officer presses a button to activate it. That’s when the audio sets in, and it also automatically saves the last 30 seconds of video from before that.

According to protocol, all patrol officers should wear a camera and must activate it as soon as they anticipate any interactions with civilians. But the officers who first approached Scott were wearing plain clothes and therefore did not have any cameras. They claim they realized Scott had a gun, so they retreated to put on police vests and wait for a uniformed officer. That officer was wearing his camera, but he waited to activate it until after Scott was shot.

This news upset many.

Yet another example of why body cameras are not the way to end police shootings. Sometimes, cops don’t turn them on. https://t.co/Q1jNRKYYkU

— Jamil Smith (@JamilSmith) September 26, 2016

But this might be the last footage you see from a police shooting in North Carolina. A new law goes into effect on October 1 that will prevent the public from obtaining footage from body or dashboard cameras. According to Governor Pat McCrory it’s about: “respecting the public, respecting the family, and also respecting the constitutional rights of the officer.”

Under the new law, police videos like the ones in Scott’s case would no longer be considered public record.

The day before the footage was released, Scott’s wife published her own video of what happened, in which the officers are heard yelling “drop the gun” to Scott inside his car. She repeatedly says, “he doesn’t have a gun,” and also points out that he has a traumatic brain injury and just took his medicine. In the video she begs the officers not to shoot her husband, right up until they shoot him.

Wife of #Charlotte police shooting victim #KeithScott films encounter https://t.co/kL9M8WjC4P

— YouTube Newswire (@ytnewswire) September 23, 2016

The attorney for the Scott family, Justin Bamberg, argued that the officer not activating his camera is both a violation of department policy and also meant there was little evidence to show what had actually happened. He said:

Information that we could have had is forever gone because of this officer’s failure to follow department policy and procedures. Those policies exist for a reason, and there is a reason the CMPD equips its officers with body cameras–because body cameras provide visual evidence so that when tragic things do happen we don’t have to question exactly what happened.

Emma Von Zeipel

Emma Von Zeipel is a staff writer at Law Street Media. She is originally from one of the islands of Stockholm, Sweden. After working for Democratic Voice of Burma in Thailand, she ended up in New York City. She has a BA in journalism from Stockholm University and is passionate about human rights, good books, horses, and European chocolate. Contact Emma at EVonZeipel@LawStreetMedia.com.

The post Officer Did Not Turn on Body Camera Until After Keith Scott Was Shot appeared first on Law Street.

Another mall shooting took place on Monday morning, this time in Houston, Texas. Nine people were wounded before police took the suspect down. Police officers initially responded to a 911 call at 6:30 a.m. after reports of a shooting victim close to a strip mall, but realized that the shooter was still active when they got there.

Officers soon tracked down and killed the gunman, who was firing shots at moving traffic from the parking lot of the mall. The nine wounded people, one in critical condition, initially believed to be six, were inside their own vehicles when they were injured. Police did not release the suspect’s identity, but did say that he is a lawyer, and “there were issues concerning his law firm.”

Active shooter at Weslayan & Bissonnet has been shot by our officers; no reports of other suspects at this time #hounews

— Houston Police (@houstonpolice) September 26, 2016

One witness, Eduardo Andrade, said he heard an explosion when he was driving by the scene of the attack:

As I was driving by Law Street I suddenly heard a big explosion. I covered myself, accelerated and tried to get out of there. I did not know if someone was following me or trying to shoot me.

It is unclear whether this had anything to do with terrorism. According to authorities, they were investigating the suspect’s car for possible bombs.

Houston gunman injures six at US mall before being shot https://t.co/aubyR3pVbM

— The Telegraph (@Telegraph) September 26, 2016

The shooting in Houston comes only three days after a shooting at a mall in Burlington, Washington, which left five people dead. Police arrested that shooter, Arcan Cetin, who was reportedly found unarmed in a zombie-like state after a daylong search on Saturday evening. Cetin had a history of domestic abuse against his stepfather. His ex-girlfriend used to work at the store in which he opened fire. A judge had previously ordered him to not possess a firearm.

Cetin is expected to appear in court on Monday to be formally charged with five counts of first-degree murder. Authorities first described Cetin as being Hispanic, but later changed that to Turkish. No details have been released about the Houston shooter’s ethnicity.

Emma Von Zeipel

Emma Von Zeipel is a staff writer at Law Street Media. She is originally from one of the islands of Stockholm, Sweden. After working for Democratic Voice of Burma in Thailand, she ended up in New York City. She has a BA in journalism from Stockholm University and is passionate about human rights, good books, horses, and European chocolate. Contact Emma at EVonZeipel@LawStreetMedia.com.

The post Lawyer Wounds 9 in Houston Parking Lot Before Being Killed by Police appeared first on Law Street.

Missouri is joining 10 other states by implementing a constitutional carry law, prompting The New York Times to dub it the “Shoot-Me State.”

Republican Missouri lawmakers overwhelmingly voted for less restrictions–a win for gun-rights advocates, overriding Democratic Governor Jay Nixon’s veto on SB 656 last week.

Citizens of Missouri will be able to carry concealed weapons without a permit, background check, or safety training under the new law. The law also institutes Stand Your Ground initiatives, known for lowering the standard for deadly use of a firearm by allowing gun owners to claim self-defense based on perceived feeling of threat.

“Missouri wants to let people carry guns with no training, even when you play Pokemon they start you off w/training” https://t.co/eg7R59haJv

— aka ✯ phil (@fak3r) September 16, 2016

Missouri:The Shoot-Me State: stand your ground, guns to people with violent records, how dumb can we get? https://t.co/qCW50H97IT

— Alexander Stille (@a_stille) September 16, 2016

Damn mfs can carry guns w/ out a license or no papers or age limit on January first in Missouri… Mfs been doing it but now it’s legal

— #SteveeeDriveee (@DaddyZae_) September 16, 2016

The Republican controlled legislature has continuously clashed with the Democratic governor, overriding a record number of the governor’s vetoes Wednesday at 13, adding to the already 83 overrides since he took office in 2009.

Nixon vetoed the legislation in June, stating that citizens who previously may have been denied a permit or would have been denied a permit due to the background check will now be able to carry a concealed gun, according to The New York Times.

Democratic lawmakers have stated that this law will negatively affect minority communities.

“What I don’t want to get to is the point where there is a trigger-happy police officer or bad Samaritan like Zimmerman who says, ‘Black boy in the hood. Skittles. Let’s shoot,'” Senator Maria Chappelle-Nadal, who represents University City, said to the AP, referencing the killing of Trayvon Martin.

On the contrary, Republican lawmakers say that this law will ensure that law-abiding citizens can adequately protect themselves and their families.

The National Rifle Association supported the bill and released a statement following its override.

In addition, concerns about law enforcement were discussed, opponents of this bill were worried that these new provisions will make officers less safe.

Julia Bryant

Julia Bryant is an Editorial Senior Fellow at Law Street from Howard County, Maryland. She is a junior at the University of Maryland, College Park, pursuing a Bachelor’s degree in Journalism and Economics. You can contact Julia at JBryant@LawStreetMedia.com.

The post Missouri Lawmakers Override Governor’s Constitutional Carry Veto appeared first on Law Street.

In the wake of the Orlando shooting, the debate over guns and gun control is now front and center in the political sphere. Earlier this week, Senate Democrats filibustered for almost 15 hours in order to pressure the Senate into talking about gun control. Social media has also been abuzz with arguments on both sides of the debate over gun control.

While all of these stories have been in the news, some specific decisions by lawmakers also drew national attention. Andy Holt, Tennessee state representative for the 76th district, has received criticism for his plan to give away not one, but two AR-15 assault riffles at a fundraiser later this month.

Holt announced this gift on Facebook last Friday, two days before the death of 49 people and injury of dozens more in the Orlando club. After the announcement, the Republican representative was criticized for his decision to raffle off two of these guns because of their similarity to one of the guns found on Omar Mateen, the Orlando shooter.

As a result Holt posted several Facebook posts defending his giveaways. Holt told the Tennessean, “We should not focus on the gun itself. We should focus on the depravity of the heart of the person who’s pulling the trigger.”

Needless to say, several members of the community were outraged by Holt’s giveaway following the horrific shooting.

Wonder if Andy Holt has thought out liability? Or morality, or decency? likely not. https://t.co/JfS8LYy3jE

— p-daddle (@payalayap) June 14, 2016

TN State Rep. Andy Holt is an insensitive, uncompassionate, and heartless man. #ShametoTN https://t.co/hkTXrjkPNB

— Jeremy Jordan (@j_mich23) June 14, 2016

Tenn. State Rep. Andy Holt is a disgrace to our state and tip the religion he professes to believe in. Boo. https://t.co/xkGPftBn06

— Jennifer W. Spirko (@jenspirko) June 14, 2016

In response to his decision, Holt received death threats, although there is confusion over whether or not the threats were real. Following the threats, Holt blamed the media for the negativity surrounding his event:

So, thanks to the brilliant media for their lies that have resulted in death threats to my family and staffer. Not that we are afraid seeing as how we’ve got our shotgun rifles, 4-wheel drive, and know how to survive. But, it is sad. In fact, it’s disgusting.

In addition to his other Facebook posts, Holt responded to his critics with some harsh words:

I’m sick and tired of the media and liberal politicians attacking our right to keep and bear arms. I’ll do everything I can to ensure the 2nd Amendment is protected and people are equipped to exercise their innate right to self-defense. SHARE if you’re standing with me! I wonder if I were giving away airplanes if the headlines would read… “Evil Andy Holt giving away same model of airplane used in 9/11 terror attack for law abiding citizens to use…”

It comes as no surprise that Holt’s decision to raffle off guns is so controversial, given the heavy media coverage surrounding gun violence in the last week. As tragedies like Orlando continue to happen and gun death counts continue to rise, debates over how accessible guns should be will only become more prevalent.

We, as a country, need to decide if 93 gun deaths in 72 hours is a statistic we can live with, in the name of the Second Amendment. Or, maybe, we will work to shape gun policy and stop letting Representatives like Holt control the narrative on what our right to bear arms should look like at the expense of thousands of lives a year.

Alexandra Simone

Alex Simone is an Editorial Senior Fellow at Law Street and a student at The George Washington University, studying Political Science. She is passionate about law and government, but also enjoys the finer things in life like watching crime dramas and enjoying a nice DC brunch. Contact Alex at ASimone@LawStreetmedia.com

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It was a very dark weekend for Orlando, Florida. On Friday night, singer Christina Grimmie was shot to death following her concert, after which the gunman took his own life. Police have now identified the man as Kevin James Loibl, 27, but his motives are still unknown.

Grimmie opened for the band Before You Exit at the Plaza Live in Orlando, and then spent some time meeting fans and writing autographs. That’s when Loibl seized his opportunity and shot her with a small handgun. Grimmie’s brother immediately rushed to tackle the shooter to the ground, which prevented more people from being harmed, said the Orlando police in a statement. Loibl then shot himself. Grimmie later died in the hospital from her injuries.

OPD can confirm 27 year old Kevin James Loibl, suspect who shot Christina Grimmie, is from St Petersburg, FL pic.twitter.com/iN6RUi3VRx

— Orlando Police (@OrlandoPolice) June 11, 2016

Why Loibl shot Grimmie is still a mystery and the police have been searching his computer and phone to try and determine whether they knew each other, or if he had any other reason to want her dead. What we do know is that he lived in St. Petersburg, but traveled the two hours to Orlando carrying two handguns and a big hunting knife, just to kill Grimmie, and was planning on returning home afterwards. Reports say he went by public transportation, and that he had no previous criminal record.

This is a note posted to the door of Loibl’s family home in St. Petersburg:

Here is the note on the door of home where Kevin Loibl lived. #ChristinaGrimmie @FOX13News pic.twitter.com/dMDqtfELcb

— Evan Lambert FOX 13 (@EvanLambertTV) June 11, 2016

Twenty-two-year-old Grimmie had her breakthrough in the sixth season of the “Voice” that aired on NBC two years ago. She was coached by Maroon 5’s Adam Levine, who has offered to pay for the funeral. Social media was filled with tributes to Grimmie by Levine and others in the music industry over the weekend.

Behati and I are absolutely devastated and heartbroken by Christina Grimmie’s death. Our hearts go out to her family pic.twitter.com/y4OMkm0uXu

— Adam Levine (@adamlevine) June 11, 2016

Before You Exit, the band she was touring with, tweeted this message:

Today we lost an angel, sister, and a beloved friend. #RipChristina pic.twitter.com/EkwTKsaLFr

— Before You Exit⇞ (@beforeyouexit) June 11, 2016

NBC’s Carson Daly is the host of “The Voice” and told TODAY: “Christina really was, she was special. She would walk in a room and have an infectious laugh. She was determined; she was confident. But she was so incredibly sweet.”

My heart is absolutely broken. I miss you Christina pic.twitter.com/KWGwZZlj4t

— Selena Gomez (@selenagomez) June 11, 2016

Grimmie was a personal friend of Selena Gomez and her family. Gomez’s stepdad, who was also Grimmie’s manager, started a fundraiser to help Grimmie’s family out and has so far raised over $120,000.

Grimmie’s killing was followed early Sunday morning by the deadliest mass shooting in American history at a gay nightclub, also in Orlando.

See Law Street’s piece on whether mass shootings could actually lead to looser gun laws.

Emma Von Zeipel

Emma Von Zeipel is a staff writer at Law Street Media. She is originally from one of the islands of Stockholm, Sweden. After working for Democratic Voice of Burma in Thailand, she ended up in New York City. She has a BA in journalism from Stockholm University and is passionate about human rights, good books, horses, and European chocolate. Contact Emma at EVonZeipel@LawStreetMedia.com.

The post Police Identifies Gunman Who Killed Singer Christina Grimmie appeared first on Law Street.

On the internet, everyone can have an opinion. The idea behind Change.org is that if enough people share an opinion, the powers that be will listen and accommodate their requests. Some petitions are superficial, like this one demanding that Instagram present photos chronologically. Some are touching, such as this one by the mother of a murder victim asking that the killer not receive a death sentence. One petition that has been getting attention recently is a petition for the Republican convention in Cleveland—an event with the potential to incite riots—to be an open carry zone for firearms.

Ohio is already an open carry state, but Quicken Loans Arena, the venue for the RNC convention, forbids firearms inside the premises. The petition explains in no uncertain terms how dire the need for firearms at the convention truly is. The author, a man named Len Davies refers to Quicken Loans Arena’s policy as “a direct affront to the Second Amendment,” arguing that it puts “all attendees at risk.” Davies even quotes the NRA as saying, “gun free zones… tell every insane killer in America… [the] safest place to inflict maximum mayhem with minimum risk.”

If the petition comes to pass, the GOP candidates (as well as the managers of Quicken Loans Arena) will have a tricky decision on their hands. From one point of view, open carry is a no-brainer because all three republican candidates have voiced their disapproval of gun-free zones. The petition cites several quotes from each candidate: Donald Trump has called multiple times for the expansion of open carry areas, saying “you know what a gun-free zone is to a sicko? That’s bait.” Ted Cruz has said “look, if you’re a lunatic ain’t nothing better then having a bunch of targets you know that are going to be unarmed.” John Kasich worked to end “gun-free zones” at National Guard facilities in Ohio.

While the decision would ultimately come down to the venue’s management, candidates and figureheads of the RNC will be encouraged to respond to this petition. Supporting open carry at an event like this one could be a very dangerous move, but denying open carry could be seen as a violation of second amendment rights. If a candidate supports open carry in their state, that should mean they see it as a safe choice and would have no issue following the same rules at an RNC event. The petition decries the “hypocritical act of selecting a ‘gun-free zone’ for the convention.”

Some of the petition’s supporters may have ulterior motives, however. Many tweets and Facebook posts seem to indicate that the petition’s proponents aren’t quite friends of the RNC and are sending a tongue-in-cheek request for mayhem and chaos at the Cleveland convention. It’s also likely the petition’s author isn’t a ‘true conservative,’ as some elements of his petition read so strongly that they may be a parody. Davies capitalizes “HUSSEIN” in Barack Obama’s full name, and refers to ISIS using Dubya’s favorite phrase—”evil-doers.”

These petitions do occasionally enact real change but are often just digital wishful thinking. Don’t hold your breath for Cleveland to become the ‘wild wild (Mid)West’ just yet. Expect this petition to make some buzz, especially if it reaches its goal for petitioners. If you believe in the cause, add your name, and if you don’t, add your name just to add fuel to the fire. In all likelihood, nothing will change. Today, the Secret Service announced unequivocally that there will be no guns at the RNC convention, but it never hurts to try.

Sean Simon

Sean Simon is an Editorial News Senior Fellow at Law Street, and a senior at The George Washington University, studying Communications and Psychology. In his spare time, he loves exploring D.C. restaurants, solving crossword puzzles, and watching sad foreign films. Contact Sean at SSimon@LawStreetMedia.com.

The post Open Carry Petition A Double-Edged Gun for GOP appeared first on Law Street.

Jeb! Bush makes me sad. He’s trying oh so hard, and failing oh so miserably to win the 2016 Republican nomination. Now, he’s done some truly awkward and bizarre things over the course of this election cycle–check out fellow Law Streeter Sean Simon’s roundup of the best Jeb! Bush moments–but one of the most bizarre ones actually happened last night. Jeb! tweeted out this photo:

America. pic.twitter.com/TeduJkwQF3

— Jeb Bush (@JebBush) February 16, 2016

Obviously, we all know what Jeb! was getting at here–he’s a real, tough gun owner, just like the voters in South Carolina he’s trying to woo! He stands for the Second Amendment! He gets his name engraved on his gun, because nothing says tough like making sure your firearm matches your monogrammed bathrobe! He’s just like you! But, once the internet got its hands on the meme-worthy potential of this tweet, that message was utterly lost. Check out some of my favorite responses–some funny, some poignant–to Jeb!’s weird gun tweet in the slideshow below:

Yes @JebBush. America. pic.twitter.com/4Yhtdl2ygY — Éoin (@LabourEoin) February 16, 2016

Anneliese Mahoney

Anneliese Mahoney is Managing Editor at Law Street and a Connecticut transplant to Washington D.C. She has a Bachelor’s degree in International Affairs from the George Washington University, and a passion for law, politics, and social issues. Contact Anneliese at amahoney@LawStreetMedia.com.

The post The Best Twitter Responses to Jeb! Bush’s Gun Tweet appeared first on Law Street.

Today in the category of “news I thought was a joke but actually is real” we have people watching a puddle in the UK via Periscope, a Canadian company that sort of solved that debate about how dogs wear pants, and Oregon terrorist Ammon Bundy compared himself to Rosa Parks. Happy Wednesday, everyone.

In case you aren’t caught up on your crazy people in Oregon news, here’s the skinny. Over the weekend a group of armed men took over a wildlife reserve in Oregon. Fellow Law Streeter Alexis Evans wrote a good rundown of exactly what’s happening there, but long story short: there’s a standoff in which the armed “militia members” are demanding vague things about the Constitution and federal land and no one really knows when this is going to end (although law enforcement is developing a plan to deal with the situation.)

The entire thing has been bizarre and upsetting to say the absolute least, but it got even more bizarre and upsetting last night, when the ringleader of the group Ammon Bundy tweeted this:

We are doing the same thing as Rosa Parks did. We are standing up against bad laws which dehumanize us and destroy our freedom.

— Ammon Bundy (@Ammon_Bundy) January 6, 2016

That’s right–he compared their armed takeover of a federal building to Rosa Parks, who is basically the poster lady for peaceful resistance. Bundy’s group has made it clear that they’re willing to be basically the opposite of peaceful, given that they’ve said that, “if force is used against us we will defend ourselves.” Unsurprisingly, people are not happy with Bundy’s delusional comparison, and took to Twitter with some sarcastic and poignant responses.  

Newly discovered photo of the #RosaParks bus-jacking of 1955… #OregonUnderAttack pic.twitter.com/zlgKuluHye — Goldie Taylor (@goldietaylor) January 6, 2016

#AmmonBundy should bone up on his history; particularly in the area of civil rights. #RosaParks didn’t seek change via a gun-toting militia.

— Elgin Charles (@ElginCharles) January 6, 2016

Did someone named Rosa Parks get a $500000 government loan, arm herself, take over federal property & demand snacks? https://t.co/HE9RqazRj6 — sfpelosi (@sfpelosi) January 6, 2016

A list of people who should compare themselves to Rosa Parks: 1. Rosa Parks

— Virginia Montanez (@JanePitt) January 6, 2016

White people, we need to finally all agree that there is no context in the universe where we can compare ourselves to Rosa Parks. Just stop. — Andrew, 2016 Edition (@Truly_Defective) January 6, 2016

Cliven Bundy: “You know, black people was better off being slaves.” Ammon Bundy: “Shut UP, dad, we’re TOTES Rosa Parks!”

— GAIL SIMONE (@GailSimone) January 6, 2016

Rosa Parks and Ammon Bundy actually have a lot in common both human same number of arms and legs weakness for hats — Adam Serwer (@AdamSerwer) January 6, 2016

So, Ammon Bundy did accomplish one thing with his Rosa Parks comparison–he made himself even less likable. 

Anneliese Mahoney

Anneliese Mahoney is Managing Editor at Law Street and a Connecticut transplant to Washington D.C. She has a Bachelor’s degree in International Affairs from the George Washington University, and a passion for law, politics, and social issues. Contact Anneliese at amahoney@LawStreetMedia.com.

The post Delusions of Grandeur: Ammon Bundy Compares Himself to Rosa Parks appeared first on Law Street.

Baltimore recorded its 300th homicide of 2015 last month, marking the highest number of killings for the city since 1999. Given the decrease in the city’s population over the past several decades, the actual murder rate in 2015 may be the highest in the city’s history. While the rising number of homicides is certainly troubling for Baltimore, it is not the only U.S. city experiencing a spike in homicides. The explanations for this abrupt rise, after years of decline, range from the after-effects of much-publicized police killings to a drug epidemic to simply warmer weather. This article will examine this rise and seek to determine if it is an outlier or a sign of some new trend.

Murders on the Decline?

Before even getting to whether homicides are an increasing threat or even up in 2015, the numbers have to be put into perspective. The much larger trend at play has been a large and consistent decline in violent crime, including homicides, over the past few decades.

Since 1993, the violent crime rate per 100,000 people in the United States has dropped by more than 50 percent. Additionally, while the drop was felt nationwide, it was also specifically evident in cities like New York that have historically been associated with crime, though that association may be starting to wear off. In 1990, there were 2,245 homicides in New York City. By contrast, there were 328 murders in 2014, the lowest number seen since 1963 when New York was also a much smaller city. In other words, crime is down, way down, from twenty years ago. Two other examples are Los Angeles and Washington D.C., which saw their murder rates drop 90 and 76 percent respectively since 1992.

The explanations behind these drops range far and wide. A number of factors have been suggested, including a better economy, higher incarceration rates, the death penalty, more police officers, and even the greater acceptance of abortions to name a few. While all these have been suggested, however, none has necessarily been shown to hold water. Interestingly one of the most scientifically supported reasons has been the reduced use of lead in everyday goods because lead exposure in children is believed to cause more violent behavior. Reduced drug and alcohol use is another factor that has been cited in the reduction.

What’s Going on This Year?

In August, the New York Times published an article noting that 35 U.S. cities have seen their murder rates rise in 2015. This includes a number of major cities in the U.S. such as New York, Chicago, Philadelphia and even the nation’s capital, Washington D.C. After years of dramatic decline, what could be causing these rates to reverse course and begin to rise again?

The Devil is in the Details

While the data seems to suggest a rise in violent crime and there are several plausible sounding theories to support it, is it actually happening?  The answer to that question is both yes and no. After the New York Times published its article, Five Thirty Eight decided to take a closer look at the statistics. Using partial-year data for the nation’s 60 largest cities, it found that homicides are indeed up 20 percent from last year in 26 of the nation’s 60 largest cities and 16 percent overall. However, they were also down in 19 of the same 60 cities including places like Boston, Las Vegas, and San Diego to name a few. In other words, the results used in the sample from the Times article may be skewed. While certain cities’ homicide numbers are up, at most they are only up a fraction or not at all. It is also important to look at the raw numbers in addition to the percentages when there is a relatively small number of homicides to begin with. For example, Five Thirty Eight found that Seattle, Washington experienced a 20 percent increase in homicides at the end of August relative to the previous year, but that increase was the result of three additional murders–going from 15 in 2014 to 18 this year. It is also important to acknowledge that the data is preliminary and only includes part of the year. The full, definitive dataset will not be available until the FBI publishes its annual statistics next fall.

While certain cities’ homicide numbers are up, in most they are only up a fraction or not at all. It is also important to look at the raw numbers in addition to the percentages when there is a relatively small number of homicides to begin with. For example, Five Thirty Eight found that Seattle, Washington experienced a 20 percent increase in homicides at the end of August relative to the previous year, but that increase was the result of three additional murders–going from 15 in 2014 to 18 this year. It is also important to acknowledge that the data is preliminary and only includes part of the year. The full, definitive dataset will not be available until the FBI publishes its annual statistics next fall.

Thus, while the overall rise in the national rate of 16 percent is statistically significant–Five Thirty Eight’s finding among the largest 60 cities–many cities’ individual changes are not. Statistical significance is a test to determine whether or not a change or relationship is the result of chance. It is also worth noting that in 2005 almost an identical rise of 15 percent in the national rate of homicides occurred before the number regressed to the mean and continued its slow decline.

The Who, What, Where, and Why

There seem to be as many explanations for murders may be rising in these cities as there were in explaining the large decline in violent crime over previous two decades. However, many of theories behind the recent rise in homicides do not seem to stand up to scrutiny either.

One that has gained a lot of traction is a theory known as the “Ferguson Effect.” According to this theory, a major contributing factor to the spike in violence is a growing reluctance among police officers to carry out routine police work in fear of criticism. This theory is largely a response to the controversial shooting of Michael Brown in Ferguson, Missouri as well as the death of Freddie Gray while in the custody of Baltimore policy. Put simply, bad guys are running free because police officers fear public damnation.

Ironically, there is competing theory from a community perspective, arguing that police actions have made regular citizens less likely to go to the police for assistance and more willing to take matters into their own hands. In either case the rise in violence in St. Louis or Baltimore, which has been attributed by some as the result of a Ferguson Effect, actually started prior to the highly publicized incidents of police brutality so these explanations do not seem very plausible. Attorney General Lauretta Lynch also testified before Congress saying that there is “no data” to support that theory.

Another explanation is the vast number of guns in the United States. While the exact number of guns in civilian circulation is impossible to pinpoint, it is estimated there are as many as 357 million nationwide–approximately 40 million more guns than U.S. citizens. Once again, while having more guns around likely leads to more gun-related deaths, there were hundreds of millions of guns around prior to this year so that explanation is also not very convincing.

Others argue that an increase in gang violence, fueled by drugs, has led to increased homicides. Of the reasons given, increased gang warfare is one of most likely explanations because it would likely affect only certain neighborhoods or cities and not the entire country. Some argue that cities like Chicago, are experiencing an increase in gang violence and illegal guns, which may explain recent spikes in homicides, but that is unlikely to be the case for every city.

Even the economy has been blamed as part of the “routine activities theory,” which suggests that when people are better off financially they more likely to go shopping or out to eat and thus more likely to encounter criminals. Others argue that crime generally goes down when the economy is doing well. However, John Roman, a senior fellow at the Justice Policy Center at the Urban Institute, noted in an interview with Vox that a good economy can also lead to higher crime if improvements are not distributed equally and the needs of the underserved are not addressed.

When you look at all of the data and try to make sense of it with the competing theories, it seems likely that each city has its own explanation. We do not yet know whether or not the spike identified this summer is indicative of a trend, but if that is the case we likely need more data to determine what might be causing it.

The accompanying video looks at the increase and some of the reasons suggested for it:

Perception is Believing

Despite what the numbers say or whether the theories much of this data is based on are viable, people ultimately make up their own minds on what is true or not. In a 2013 Pew Research Center survey, 56 percent of  those polled believed that gun violence was higher than it was 20 years earlier, but in reality, gun homicides had nearly been cut in half by 2013.  This poll was conducted before the recent spate of highly publicized police killings, indicating the number may even be even higher now. It is not surprising the notion of higher homicide rates resonate with people, even if they are a one term aberration and near historic lows. The following video looks at the perception or misperception of crime in the United States:

Conclusion

While violent crime, including homicides, has been decreasing since the early 90s, recent evidence suggests there may be a spike in homicides this year–at least in some of the United States’ largest cities. But it remains unclear whether this is emblematic of a trend, or even if it was just a brief increase as has often occurred in the past. Even with this increase, however, the rate is nowhere near approaching the record highs from two-decades ago.

In light of these findings, many questions emerge. Why is the homicide rate up this year? Are these numbers skewed by an unrepresentative sample? Is this the sign of a trend or just a temporary blip? Questions like these will not be answered for years if they are answered at all. While it is necessary to try and understand the data in order to improve policing and crime-related public policy, it is important to take a more local look at why homicides might be going up in each city. A spike in several cities is not necessarily indicative of a national problem.

Resources

The Washington Post: Baltimore’s 300th Killing This Year: A violent Milestone in a Riot-Scarred City

NYC: News from the Blue Room

The New York Times: Murders in New York Drop to a Record Low, but Officers Aren’t Celebrating

Forbes: What’s Behind the Decline in Crime?

The New York Times: Murder Rates Rising Sharply in Many U.S. Cities

Vox: Why Murder Rates are Up in St. Louis, Baltimore and Some Other Cities

The Washington Post: There are Now More Guns Than People in the United States

Five Thirty Eight: Scare Headlines Exaggerate the U.S. Crime Wave

Stat Pac: Statistical Significance

Pew Research Center: Gun Homicide Steady After Decline in the 90s; Suicide Rates Edge Up

Michael Sliwinski

Michael Sliwinski (@MoneyMike4289) is a 2011 graduate of Ohio University in Athens with a Bachelor’s in History, as well as a 2014 graduate of the University of Georgia with a Master’s in International Policy. In his free time he enjoys writing, reading, and outdoor activites, particularly basketball. Contact Michael at staff@LawStreetMedia.com.

The post Rising Homicides in Some American Cities: What’s Actually Going on? appeared first on Law Street.

Students at the University of Texas-Austin are taking public protest to a whole new, innovative level. In an attempt to protest a new law signed by Governor Gregg Abbott that allows “campus carry”–essentially people with conceal carry licenses may now carry their handguns on public university property. However, these enterprising students noticed that UT-Austin still has some obscenity rules on the books, meaning that someone could feasibly get cited for carrying around an “obscene” sex toy, such as a dildo. So, hundreds of UT-Austin students are planning on doing exactly that next August, when the law will go into effect. They’ll be walking around for the day and attending a rally, all with sex toys strapped to their backpacks.

The Facebook page for the event, started by recent UT-Austin alum Jessica Jin, explains the motivation for the event, stating:

The State of Texas has decided that it is not at all obnoxious to allow deadly concealed weapons in classrooms, however it DOES have strict rules about free sexual expression, to protect your innocence. You would receive a citation for taking a DILDO to class before you would get in trouble for taking a gun to class. Heaven forbid the penis.

The page goes on to explain the details of the forthcoming protest:

Starting on the first day of Long Session classes on August 24, 2016, we are strapping gigantic swinging dildos to our backpacks in protest of campus carry.

ANYBODY can participate in solidarity: alum, non-UT students, people outside of Texas. Come one dildo, come all dildos.

“You’re carrying a gun to class? Yeah well I’m carrying a HUGE DILDO.”

Just about as effective at protecting us from sociopathic shooters, but much safer for recreational play.

As one would assume, the entire tongue-in-cheek protest offers plenty of room for innuendo. The entire thing is being called a “strap-in” as opposed to a sit-in, and protestors are getting the word out with the accompanying hashtag #cocksnotglocks.

#CocksNotGlocks America. Sex is good. Shooting each other is not. http://t.co/ferzga2siQ

— Rachel Delmar (@RachelDelmar) October 11, 2015

‘We glorify violence in our media but vilify sex.’ #Cocksnotglocks http://t.co/mfzMQXqd3H — K Merie (@lezcakes) October 11, 2015

While the event is making waves, it’s not all in the form of good feedback. The Facebook page is also receiving a lot of negative comments from those who support the conceal carry law, and Jin has left it up to highlight the violent and upsetting rhetoric being used by those who oppose the protest. In fact, Jin has already received multiple death threats for the event. Yet, supporters keep joining the Facebook group, and Jin is being applauded by many for her creative and catchy activism.

Overall, this protest has a little bit of everything–humor, shock value, and a really good point: many UT Austin students don’t want conceal carry on their campus, especially in today’s environment of consistent mass shootings on college campuses. News of the protest has gone viral, and rightly so. Come August 24 of next year, expect to see a lot of dildos around UT-Austin’s campus.

Anneliese Mahoney

Anneliese Mahoney is Managing Editor at Law Street and a Connecticut transplant to Washington D.C. She has a Bachelor’s degree in International Affairs from the George Washington University, and a passion for law, politics, and social issues. Contact Anneliese at amahoney@LawStreetMedia.com.

The post UT-Austin Students to Protest New Conceal Carry Law by Carrying Sex Toys appeared first on Law Street.

Happy Friday everyone–hope your short week flew by! If you need something to pass the time at the end of this work week, check out the weird arrests of the week below.

A Different Kind of Prize

Image courtesy of Thomas Hawk via Flickr

Katie Rees, who was formerly Miss Nevada and who had a chance to win Miss USA in 2007, was arrested for possession of meth. But the interesting part is that this is the second time that she has been arrested for meth this year, she was nabbed selling it in July. That’s not very pageant-worthy!

Anneliese Mahoney

Anneliese Mahoney is Managing Editor at Law Street and a Connecticut transplant to Washington D.C. She has a Bachelor’s degree in International Affairs from the George Washington University, and a passion for law, politics, and social issues. Contact Anneliese at amahoney@LawStreetMedia.com.

The post Weird Arrests of the Week appeared first on Law Street.

President Obama recently acknowledged that his failure to pass common sense gun control laws in the U.S. has been his greatest frustration in his presidency. In a Thursday interview with BBC, President Obama claimed that it was distressing not to have made progress on the issue, even in the face of repeated mass killings.

His comments came hours before another mass shooting took place in Lafayette, Louisiana Thursday night. John Houser killed two people and wounded nine others at the Lafayette multiplex Thursday night before he turned his gun on himself and took his own life, police said.

However Obama signaled that he would continue to work on gun laws during his remaining time in the White House. He stated: 

It is the fact that the United States of America is the one advanced nation on earth in which we do not have sufficient common-sense, gun-safety laws. Even in the face of repeated mass killings.

If you look at the number of Americans killed since 9/11 by terrorism, it’s less than 100. If you look at the number been killed by gun violence, it’s in the tens of thousands. And for us not to be able to resolve that issue has been something that is distressing. But it is not something that I intend to stop working on in the remaining 18 months.

Nationally, guns kill 33,000 Americans and injure 80,000 a year. The total cost of gun violence is $229 billion a year, almost as much as we spend on Medicaid. The Harvard Injury Control Research Center recently found that there’s a substantial evidence that indicates more guns means more murders. But despite the high levels of gun violence, Congress has no plans to investigate a solution.

In regard to gun control laws in the United States, Louisiana has some of the weakest gun laws in the nation. It does not require gun dealers to obtain a state license. The state also has no laws that restrict assault weapons or .50 caliber rifles.

One week after the shooting at Charleston’s Emmanuel AME Church, the House Appropriations Committee voted 32-19 against an amendment that would reverse a 19-year-old ban on funding for the Centers of Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) to research the causes of gun violence in public health. Their reasoning is that gun violence is not a disease, and therefore does not fall under the CDC’s research domain.

The CDC had been conducting research into gun violence as a “public health phenomenon” and began publishing studies that indicated a strong correlation between the presence of guns and firearm-related deaths. Prior this, the CDC’s budget was cut in 1996 by $2.6 million, the exact amount they had spent on researching gun facilities in 1995. As a result of that cut, many scientists stopped doing gun research, and the number of publications on firearm violence decreased dramatically. Reuters has reported that government research into gun mortality has shrunk by 96 percent since the NRA’s campaign in the 1990s.

Although Obama has claimed that he will work to address gun violence in the United States during his remaining time as president, it is unclear how he will go about endorsing these big changes without the support of Congress. That being said, last week’s events show that some sort of common sense change is clearly necessary.

Angel Idowu

Angel Idowu is a member of the Beloit College Class of 2016 and was a Law Street Media Fellow for the Summer of 2015. Contact Angel at staff@LawStreetMedia.com.

The post Obama Rallies Against Lack of Common Sense in American Gun Control Laws appeared first on Law Street.

Iconic restaurant chain Whataburger just announced it will not allow the open carrying of guns on its properties. The company has locations in 10 states, including Texas, which recently passed legislation stating that licensed Texans can openly tote their handguns in a hip or shoulder holster.

Whataburger President and CEO Preston Atkinson wrote an open letter than can be viewed on the company’s website. Atkinson writes that the company must think about how the open carry policy affects its employees and customers. He stated:

From a business standpoint…we have to think about how open carry impacts our 34,000+ employees and millions of customers.

The open-carry law will be put into effect starting January 1, 2016, but Texas Restaurant Association CEO Richie Jackson said he was not surprised by Whataburger’s early announcement. Under the new law, “gun rights do not trump property rights.”

Other Texas area restaurants are expected to follow Whataburger’s lead.

Residents of the Lone Star state will likely react both positively and negatively to Whataburger’s announcement. Naysayers like Open Carry Texas founder C.J. Grisham will probably boycott the restaurant (let’s hope he can resist the siren call of the famous Patty Melt) while supporters like the members of Moms Demand Action will undoubtedly express their gratitude and continue to visit Whataburger locations.

But what if Whataburger had remained silent on this issue—or, heaven forbid, openly praised the open-carry bill?

For starters, it probably would have lost a lot of business from customers who brought their families or sports teams onto Whataburger properties. (Nothing says “good sportsmanship” like grabbing a seat next to a man with a gun-holster after the big game).

Secondly, this would have meant a huge change in the training of employees. How would you feel if you had to constantly survey customers and be on the lookout regarding who was visibly armed?

Before Whataburger released its open letter, moms like “Moms Demand Action” spokeswoman Stephanie Lundy reflected on what would happen to their teenaged sons and daughters who worked the late shift at fast-food restaurants. Since when does the job description of a minimum-wage occupation include assessing if someone was going to use a firearm to rob their place of business?

To quote Mary Jones, a woman who was featured in the Associated Press coverage of the Whataburger situation: we are not in the Wild, Wild West. Leave your firearms at home if you want to eat some French fries.

Corinne Fitamant

Corinne Fitamant is a graduate of Fordham College at Lincoln Center where she received a Bachelors degree in Communications and a minor in Theatre Arts. When she isn’t pondering issues of social justice and/or celebrity culture, she can be found playing the guitar and eating chocolate. Contact Corinne at staff@LawStreetMedia.com.

The post Iconic Restaurant Chain Will Not Follow Texas Open Carry Law appeared first on Law Street.

This year, Chicago’s celebration of the Fourth of July quickly turned into a bloody massacre. Reports vary on the exact amount of fatalities and people injured, although it appears that at least ten people were killed, and over fifty others were harmed due to gunfire in multiple different incidents throughout the city. This bloodshed was horrifying, although it’s only one of many instances of gun violence in the Windy City in recent years that have left countless people dead and put residents on high alert.

Among the victims was a seven-year-old boy, Amari Brown, who was fatally shot while watching the fireworks with his father, Antonio. Investigators believe that the intended target of the gunfire was his father, who is a known gang member with forty-five past arrests and who refused to cooperate with detectives during the investigation into his son’s death. Chicago Police Superintendent Garry McCarthy made an emotional plea to the public, urging people to put an end to this senseless brutality that has swept the city in not only the past few months but throughout recent years.

Chicago has a notorious gang population and the usage of guns is staggering. The problem is not too little of a police presence on the streets, given that it was actually increased by thirty percent over the holiday weekend, nor was it a lack of gun confiscations and arrests since these numbers were also higher than usual. Instead, McCarthy believes that there is a “broken system,” since criminals never really have to deal with the repercussions of their actions. He claims that gun control laws are too lenient in the city, despite Chicago having some of the strictest gun laws in the country.

Shooting during July 4th celebration leaves 7-year-old dead; police say bullet meant for dad http://t.co/GmReoTORHe pic.twitter.com/KLyrggsJ3U

— CBS News (@CBSNews) July 6, 2015

Sadly, these vicious shootings aren’t anything new for Chicago–the city has a long history of gun violence. Police have amped up their seizure of illegal weapons, which has proven to be effective since shooting incident rates are actually down compared to this same short period of time last year, but it’s not quite enough. Chicago has been plagued with crime for many years, garnering attention from news sources nationwide. It is the third largest populated city in the country, and yet its homicide rate is drastically higher than New York or Los Angeles. Evidently, changes must be made in order to put an end to this constant carnage. The cops are working feverishly to deter and terminate gun usage, although this is impossible to do without the full support and cooperation of the public.

One of the victims last weekend was seventeen-year-old Vonzell Banks, who was gunned down in a park that was named after Hadiya Pendleton, an honors student who was murdered in cold blood there in 2013. Pendleton’s death became a symbol of national gun violence, as she was killed while walking with friends through the park only a mile away from President Obama’s Chicago home, not long after she attended his inauguration. Unfortunately, the amount of shootings in this city has hardly decreased since her passing.

Amidst tragedy, authorities are hoping that they can turn these deaths into something positive. In memory of the many victims, they are encouraging the public to band together and not only be vigilant for other possible acts, but also work toward discouraging future gang activity within the community. One tactic that officials have used is creating mentoring programs and day camps for local children as a way to discourage them from becoming involved in gang activity. They are trying to reach kids at a young age so that they always have somewhere to turn to where they can grow and prosper rather than resorting to violence or crime.

In recent years, Chicago has become what can only be compared to a battlefield in certain parts of the city, with some residents even giving it the nickname of “Chiraq.” It has been known for a long time that Chicago is experiencing a surge of unnecessary violence, although the death of the seven-year-old sparked citywide cries for justice and peace. Hopefully those cries will finally start to make a difference.

Toni Keddell

Toni Keddell is a member of the University of Maryland Class of 2017 and a Law Street Media Fellow for the Summer of 2015. Contact Toni at staff@LawStreetMedia.com.

The post Endless Bloodshed on the Streets of Chicago Mars Holiday Weekend appeared first on Law Street.

The recent shooting at the Emanuel A.M.E. Church in Charleston, South Carolina opened up a number of old wounds for the country and reinvigorated several dormant concerns that seem to linger in the American consciousness. Chief among these concerns is both racism and America’s lack of gun control laws. While many were quick to put the blame in this case on a twisted, racist individual, there were others who said it was just one more in the litany of examples of the side effects of a culture that enthusiastically embraces guns without any real checks. Read on to learn more about gun control in this country, the role of groups such as the National Rifle Association, and what impact this has on the lives of everyday Americans.

History of Gun Control

What does the Second Amendment actually mean?

Any and all issues concerning guns in the United States start with the Second Amendment. While people associate the amendment with protecting their right to own firearms, the exact wording is as follows: “A well-regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed.” The amendment was originally designed as a check against the federal government, in essence to protect the states from being overwhelmed by its standing army.

According to former Supreme Court Justice John Paul Stephens, over the years the law has been misinterpreted and manipulated for political gain. Originally it was designed so that people could bear arms as part of a militia in order to protect against the federal government. In other words, these people would own weapons as a function of their status within a militia. In fact, this was the way the law was interpreted for most of American history. But beginning in 2008, in a controversial Supreme Court decision regarding handguns, the amendment was interpreted to owning guns in general, instead of for a purpose. On top of this, the type of weapons protected also expanded. Specifically, in 1939 in a famous case cited by Stephens, sawed-off shotguns were ruled illegal because they did not fit the requirement of self-protection that was originally interpreted as the law’s modus operandi. However, as recent efforts have shown in which automatic weapons have become allowable these same rules no longer apply.

Failed Efforts at Reform

While gun control advocates are seemingly losing the battle over gun ownership in the U.S., this has not always been the case. On the contrary, the opposite held true for much of America’s history. The first efforts at regulation were in 1934. Following the high number of deaths resulting from the use of automatic weapons by prohibition-era gangsters, the federal government passed the National Firearms Act, which both made automatic weapons too expensive for the average person to afford and prevented the importation of the weapons.

The Gun Control Act was passed in 1968, in the aftermath of the high-profile killings of Martin Luther King Jr. and Robert Kennedy. This legislation created the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms (ATF). ATF was tasked with regulating the sale of guns and the weapons themselves.

The tide began to turn against gun control advocates, however, with the passage of the 1986 Firearm Owners’ Protection Act, which limited the ATF in its crackdown of gun owners and dealers. The gun control side had one last hurrah with the Brady Act in 1994, which outlawed the sale of assault weapons. This law nevertheless had a built-in sunset provision of ten years. When it came up for reauthorization in 2004 it was not renewed.

Along with the recent court decisions supporting gun ownership rights, the country’s representatives also seem to be opposed to regulating the weaponry. This became clear in the wake of the Sandy Hook massacre when both new legislation and efforts to expand existing legislation, which called for background checks, failed to gain traction even in the shadow of the massacre of 20 elementary school children. Click here to view a video explainer on the history of gun control in the United States.

Guns in America

An Abundance of Firearms

Despite all the discussion over protecting gun owners’ rights, only a minority of the population actually owns any guns at all. While exact figures do not exist, according to a 2013 survey by the Pew Research Center, only about 37 percent of Americans own firearms. However, while less than half of the U.S. owns a gun, there are an estimated 270 to 310 million in circulation among the civilian population. In other words, one for every man, woman, and child. To put this into context, although the U.S. accounts for only about five percent of the world’s population, it is home to between 35 to 50 percent of its firearms. While the overwhelming majority of these are owned by law-abiding citizens, the sheer volume of available weapons has led to a serious issue with gun violence in the United States.  The following video depicts the level of gun ownership, gun fatalities, and attempts at gun control.

Gun Deaths by the Numbers

While those who favor protecting gun rights over gun control cite protection as a main reason, it has to be asked, are guns making the U.S. any safer? Going strictly by numbers and in comparison to other industrialized nations, the answer is a resounding no. On an average day in the U.S., 88 people die from a gun-related incident. The yearly total extrapolates to roughly 32, 251, the approximate figure in 2011 according to the CDC.

These rates dwarf those of countries in Western Europe to which the United States is often compared in other metrics. The U.S. in 2010 for example had a homicide rate that was 6.6 times higher than that of Portugal, who had the highest rate in Western Europe. To put it another way, that same year the U.S. had a higher homicide rate per capita than Pakistan, a country renowned for terrorism, and was only slightly behind other nefarious locales such as the Democratic Republic of Congo and Iraq. Perhaps the most chilling comparison is the 2013 numbers which show major American cities with homicide rates similar to that of notoriously violent countries such as El Salvador, Honduras, and Mexico. While it should be made clear that all gun-related deaths in the U.S. are not homicides, the fact that these are also some of the highest figures in the world is telling in itself.

The level of gun violence is so high in the United States that Surgeon General Vivek Murthy argued prior to being appointed to the position in 2014 that it is a public health crisis.

In defense of guns, some proponents compare them to automobile fatalities and suggest that no one ever considers banning cars. This comparison may soon be losing traction, however. Not even taking into account factors such as cars being used for longer time periods and much more frequently than firearms, overall vehicle fatalities are declining. In fact, while gun deaths continue to rise, projections for automobile deaths continue to fall and it is widely speculated that gun-related fatalities will soon eclipse those from automobiles.

Opinions of Guns

With all this in mind, what is the perception of gun control and gun ownership in this country today? According to a recent Pew Research Poll, for the first time since polling began in the early 1990s, more people view protecting gun rights as important than they do controlling gun ownership. The main motivation behind this is a perceived threat and belief in an increased crime rate. However, crime rates have remained consistently low since the beginning of their precipitous fall in the early 1990s.

Nonetheless, the main reason why those polled owned guns was for protection. This is in stark contrast to just 16 years ago when the main reason given by respondents was hunting. These numbers can be broken down further; white people, men, and those who identify as Republican are also more in favor of protecting gun ownership rights and believe guns are a means of protection that makes a home safer.

The fact that support for gun ownership is going up as crime rates remain low presents a paradox. The perception then according to these polls is people are either being misinformed or misinterpreting the issues relating to gun ownership.

The NRA

The National Rifle Association (NRA) has a major impact on the perception of firearms in the United States. In 2014 for example, the NRA donated $984,152 in political contributions, spent $3.36 million on lobbying, and another $28.2 million on outside spending. Nevertheless, while this may seem like a lot, the organization ranked 315 in contributions, 150 in lobbying, and 10 in outside spending among all groups.

Thus, the NRA seemingly has far more clout than is warranted based on how much money it spends. From where then does its power come? The answer is in the rating system the NRA has for candidates. The system provides a letter grade, similar to one from elementary school, based on how a candidate votes on a bill related to guns. An A-grade indicates a candidate’s strong adherence to individual gun ownership and conservative values.

Watch the video below for more information about the NRA.

Conclusion

The United States is a heavily weaponized country, in fact the most heavily weaponized in the world. This extends from its military, which is the best funded by far, to its police forces, which are quickly resembling its military in terms of equipment. This has even pervaded the towns, communities, and neighborhoods as regular Americans are armed like no other people on the globe.

This is the result of years of lobbying by pro-gun groups, namely the NRA, and decisions by the government and courts to protect gun ownership. Subsequently, the widespread availability of these weapons has also led to extremely high numbers of gun-related deaths and homicide rates that on average rival some of the most dangerous countries in the world.

While these facts have caused some to take pause, they have not led to any real change in regulating these weapons, whether this takes the form of outlawing guns in general or requiring more thorough background checks for the mentally ill. The numbers on this issue are unquestionable. The debate, however, on how to handle this issue is still wide open to a variety of corrective actions.

Regardless though, the recent events in Charleston showed that whether it is guns themselves or those wielding the weapons, they have contributed to immense suffering and loss in this country. Whether protecting the right to own these weapons supersedes these individual tragedies is where the debate now begins.

Resources

Atlantic: America’s Top Killing Machines

Economist: Why Gun Control is Doomed

Washington Post: The Five Extra Words That Can Fix the Second Amendment

Breitbart: Gun Control

Pew Research Center: A Minority of Americans Own Guns, But Just How Many is Unclear

Humano Sphere: Visualizing Gun Deaths

National Journal: Senate Confirms Gun Control Advocate as Surgeon General

Pew Research Center: Despite Lower Crime Rates, Support For Gun Rights Increases

Pew Research Center: Why Own a Gun? Protection is Now Top Reason

Open Secrets: National Rifle Association

GQ: How the NRA’s Grading System Keeps Congress on Lockdown

Michael Sliwinski

Michael Sliwinski (@MoneyMike4289) is a 2011 graduate of Ohio University in Athens with a Bachelor’s in History, as well as a 2014 graduate of the University of Georgia with a Master’s in International Policy. In his free time he enjoys writing, reading, and outdoor activites, particularly basketball. Contact Michael at staff@LawStreetMedia.com.

The post America’s Focus on Guns by the Numbers appeared first on Law Street.

With the advent of 3-D printers, we will someday soon possibly be able to print almost anything from the convenience of our homes. With that technology in place, it was only a matter of time before some enterprising individuals figured out how to print guns. But now the government is going after the developers of these printable guns, in the form of legal action. It’s not just about the printed guns though, the implications of this legal battle could have a big affect on the interpretation of the First Amendment.

Back when the news of printable guns first came out, the leading force appeared to be a company called  Defense Distributed, led by a man named Cody Wilson. The company was the first to publish printable gun instructions online, in the form of a 3D-printed pistol. At the time, I wrote about how various different areas were outlawing the use of 3D-printed guns.

After Defense Distributed first put the directions up on its website, the State Department sent a letter to the company asking it to take down the website. The State Department claimed that Defense Distributed was violating US Arms Export control laws, particularly the International Traffic in Arms Regulations (ITAR) The latter threatened that if the directions weren’t taken down, the state would prosecute Wilson  would be prosecuted. It’s now that letter that has sparked the court battle between the State Department and Wilson.

Wilson has filed a lawsuit against the State Department, as well as individuals high up in the department, such as Secretary of State John Kerry. The lawsuit specifically names the Directorate of Defense Trade Controls (DDTC) as the section of the State Department, who sent the letter. Defense Distributed is working in conjunction with the Second Amendment Foundation on the lawsuit.

The argument that Defense Distributed is making is truly fascinating–the company is arguing that by trying to restrict it from posting the instructions online, the State Department is restricting its First Amendment right to free speech. Alan Gura, the lawyer for Defense Distributed stated about the lawsuit:

The internet is available worldwide, so posting something on the internet is deemed an export, and to [the State Department] this justifies imposing a prior restraint on internet speech. That’s a vast, unchecked seizure of power over speech that’s…not authorized by our constitution.

It makes some sense, but whether or not this argument will actually be successful seems to be more doubtful. It appears to come down to whether or not gun blueprints are viewed as speech, or, “technical data,” which the U.S. government can certainly make a strong argument for being able to control.

As technology continues to improve on multiple fronts, these are questions that will continue to come before the courts. Whether or not Defense Distributed is successful could affect the use of printable guns moving forward.

Anneliese Mahoney

Anneliese Mahoney is Managing Editor at Law Street and a Connecticut transplant to Washington D.C. She has a Bachelor’s degree in International Affairs from the George Washington University, and a passion for law, politics, and social issues. Contact Anneliese at amahoney@LawStreetMedia.com.

The post Are These Weapons Protected by Free Speech? appeared first on Law Street.

What’s the worst thing you’ve ever accidentally left in a bathroom? A cell phone? Purse? Credit card? How about a Glock pistol?

If you were lucky enough to find the missing item, who returned it to you? A co-worker? Boss? Janitor? Perhaps an eight-year-old child?

Here’s the situation: you are a member of House Speaker John Boehner’s police detail. You are protecting your charge when suddenly, nature calls. You answer this call in a lavatory at the Capitol. As you walk back to your post, you do not notice that you left your gun inside the restroom, in plain sight.

The firearm, a loaded Glock, was found by a child who was visiting the Capitol with his parents.

Courtesy of Giphy.com.

You might think to yourself, “How could I have done that!? The gun did not even have a safety on it. I hope no one else ever does what I just did. Come to think of it, I wonder how many times something like this has happened before. I’ve heard of instances where housekeepers or janitors have found unattended guns, but never one where a kid found one. Oh dear. Well, at least Capitol Police are not required to disclose any details about this incident.”

^^But of course, these are all just hypothetical thoughts, and no one knows the true identity of the individual who left his gun in the Capitol restroom. The only thing the public knows about the absent-minded individual is that he got suspended for six days without pay, and could potentially be fired.

Corinne Fitamant

Corinne Fitamant is a graduate of Fordham College at Lincoln Center where she received a Bachelors degree in Communications and a minor in Theatre Arts. When she isn’t pondering issues of social justice and/or celebrity culture, she can be found playing the guitar and eating chocolate. Contact Corinne at staff@LawStreetMedia.com.

The post This is Probably the Worst Way to Forget Your Glock appeared first on Law Street.

I spent all of last week in Costa Rica, so I had a lot of catching up to do when I returned. And when I went to check my news feed for weird legal stories to write about here, it did not disappoint. A man shot both an armadillo (or an armadilla, as it is pronounced in the South) and his mother-in-law (I feel as if there is a good mother-in-law joke in there somewhere), and a 70-year-old woman was arrested for smuggling cocaine in her girdle – though for me, the real crime there is that someone still wears a girdle in this day and age.

The Shot Heard Round the Yard

The expression kill two birds with one stone recently took on a whole new meaning. A Georgia man was out shooting armadillos with his pistol. It is, apparently, encouraged in his town to shoot armadillos in general, but pistols are not the gun of choice in such a situation. Why? Because if you shoot an armadillo with a pistol, here is what might happen:

• The bullet ricochets off the animal’s sturdy back;
• The bullet then hits a fence;
• The bullet ricochets off the fence;
• The bullet flies through the back door of your mother-in-law’s mobile home;
• The bullet goes through the recliner where your mother-in-law is sitting; and,
• The bullet finally stops … after hitting your mother-in-law in the back.

The lady in question walked away just fine and is not pressing charges; however, I would not recommend any of you mom-in-law haters out there try this at home. It might not work out so well for you.

Granny’s Got a Drug Cartel

It’s not often that we hear of a story where people are trying to find out what’s inside a 70-year-old woman’s underwear, but recently at JFK airport TSA officials did just that. Olive Fowler is not your average little, old lady. Sure, she wears girdles and granny panties just like everyone else, but her Victoria’s Secret is a little darker than most of the others.

Sweet lil’ Olive was spotted at JFK sweating profusely – wait! As anyone of her generation could tell you, women don’t sweat, they glisten – and avoiding the eyes of cops. So she was taken away for additional screening. The TSA officials found more under her girdle than they had bargained for, in the form of $73,000 worth of cocaine. She was taken away by the authorities and will likely face jail time.

The moral of this story is that you should not judge a book by its cover. Even the dusty ones that look old and boring can be a gold mine (which now gives new meaning to the expression digging for gold).

Ashley Shaw

Ashley Shaw is an Alabama native and current New Jersey resident. A graduate of both Kennesaw State University and Thomas Goode Jones School of Law, she spends her free time reading, writing, boxing, horseback riding, playing trivia, flying helicopters, playing sports, and a whole lot else. So maybe she has too much spare time. Contact Ashley at staff@LawStreetMedia.com.

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The United States is running out of lethal injection drugs. European pharmacies have refused to sell any more of their pentobarbital or other such supplies to America after they received information that the drugs were being used to kill inmates. Most of the E.U. has abandoned the use of capital punishment; the U.S. is the only Western country that still carries out executions.

As followers of the American penal system and/or fans of Gone Girl know, the rules regarding capital punishment vary from state to state. At present, 32 states in the U.S. enforce the death penalty, including Utah and Texas.

Lawmakers are seeking “back ups” to lethal injection. Utah Governor Gary Herbert signed a bill on Monday that allows death row prisoners to be killed by firing squad when execution by lethal injection is not available.

Read More: Lethal Injection Crisis: How States Are Solving the Problem

What are the procedures for a firing squad execution, you may ask? Officers volunteer to be part of a three-person shooting team. The anonymous trio shoots at a target over the inmate’s heart. One of the three guns that is used is loaded with a blank round, so nobody knows exactly which officer killed the inmate.

Read More: It’s Time to Bring Back the Firing Squad

If you are part of the 55 percent of Americans who support the death penalty for convicted murderers, you might agree with Fordham Law Professor Deborah Denno’s evaluation of death by firing squad:

It’s the only method we have in this country for which people are trained to kill. It appears the death is the quickest.

Other methods of capital punishment have also been discussed. The electric chair, death by hanging, and gas chambers were ruled out. Judge Alex Kozinski expressed his views on the use of another controversial killing method:

The guillotine is probably best, but seems inconsistent with our national ethos.

If you are an American who is not in favor of the death penalty, you might support exploring the other alternative—eliminating capital punishment altogether. Organizations such as Amnesty International are looking to get rid of the death penalty in America and educate people about the politics of its capital punishment system.

The change of policy in Utah has brought national attention to issues of justice and morality within the U.S. prison system. Will this issue incite a push for reform? Perhaps it is necessary to re-evaluate our country’s “national ethos,” to borrow a phrase from Judge Kozinski.

Corinne Fitamant

Corinne Fitamant is a graduate of Fordham College at Lincoln Center where she received a Bachelors degree in Communications and a minor in Theatre Arts. When she isn’t pondering issues of social justice and/or celebrity culture, she can be found playing the guitar and eating chocolate. Contact Corinne at staff@LawStreetMedia.com.

The post Death by Firing Squad Now Legal in Utah appeared first on Law Street.

It’s been a little over two years since the horrifying shooting at Sandy Hook Elementary School, in Newtown, Connecticut, but legal battles over the tragedy are still ongoing. Most recently, the families of eight of the Newtown victims have filed a lawsuit against the estate of shooter Adam Lanza’s mother, alleging that she was negligent because she left her guns accessible to her son.

Nancy Lanza owned a Bushmaster AR-15 rifle, often classified as an assault weapon. On December 14, 2012, Adam Lanza accessed that rifle from his mother’s house and used it to kill 26 people at Sandy Hook Elementary. He also killed his mother at their home before going to the school.

Since Nancy Lanza is deceased, the lawsuit is being filed against her estate, and more particularly, its insurance policy. Samuel Starks is named as the defendant, as he’s the administrator of that estate, and he has said that he estimates its worth at $64,000; however, it is estimated that homeowner insurance polices that Lanza had are worth up to $1 million. That’s a normal avenue in cases like this, as according to the Connecticut Post:

Bridgeport lawyer Josh Koskoff, representing eight of the families suing, said homeowner’s insurance applies when a person is injured as a result of an unsecured firearm in a home being accessed by a third party.

Technically, there are two separate lawsuits filed against Lanza. One involves three of the children killed and four of the educators killed. Two of the teachers who were injured have also signed onto that lawsuit. A separate suit, on behalf of one of the deceased children, has also been filed.

The lawsuits both point out that Adam Lanza has access to the gun “despite the fact that she knew, or should have known, that his mental and emotional condition made him a danger to others.”

This isn’t the first lawsuit brought by some of the families of the victims of the Sandy Hook tragedy. In December 2014 on the two-year anniversary of the shooting, nine of the families filed a lawsuit against Bushmaster, the manufacturer of the Bushmaster AR-15 rifle. Camfour, the distributor the gun, and Riverview Sales, the shop that sold it to Nancy Lanza, were also all named in the suit.

Yet another lawsuit has been filed by the parents of two of the deceased students against the town, stating that it didn’t properly protect the school. The crux of that lawsuit was that one of the substitute teachers who was killed in the school that day, Lauren Rousseau, wasn’t given a key to lock her classroom door. As a result, Lanza was able to enter and kill 14 out of the 15 people in that room.

In a lot of ways these lawsuits are mainly symbolic. There’s not going to be much money that comes out of them, most likely, but they send a message to a number of people that what happened that fateful day was wrong. Guns should not be accessible to someone who has exhibited mental or emotional issues. Distributors should not sell guns that have the potential to be used to kill many people. Schools need to take all steps to make sure that even substitute teachers have the ability to secure their classrooms. These are the kinds of messages that the plaintiffs are hoping to send with these lawsuits–whether or not they’ll be successful will be up to the courts.

Anneliese Mahoney

Anneliese Mahoney is Managing Editor at Law Street and a Connecticut transplant to Washington D.C. She has a Bachelor’s degree in International Affairs from the George Washington University, and a passion for law, politics, and social issues. Contact Anneliese at amahoney@LawStreetMedia.com.

The post Families of Sandy Hook Victims File Lawsuit Against Nancy Lanza’s Estate appeared first on Law Street.

Hey y’all!

I have always been partial to the ‘Don’t Mess With Texas’ slogan; it gives a good heads up to anyone who wants to break the law or cause a ruckus in this great state! Osiel Cárdenas Jr., however, apparently did not get that memo.

Osiel Jr., son of former drug lord Osiel Cardenas Guillen, was reportedly arrested by U.S. Customs and Border Patrol agents after they discovered nearly 500 rounds of ammunition and tactical weapons gear hidden in different parts of his sweet Cadillac Escalade SUV. Junior was attempting to cross a bridge going over the Rio Grande that connects South Texas to Mexico but got caught. He admitted to the items being his and to knowing that it was illegal to smuggle them into Mexico. What a winner–his dad must be so proud.

The inspection of the Cadillac Escalade SUV uncovered 290 rounds of 9mm ammunition, 161 rounds of .223 caliber ammunition, 29 rounds of 7.62 mm ammunition, two .223 rifle magazines, and other tactical weapons gear hidden in various parts of the car that included the glove box, center console, and a factory compartment behind the stereo buttons. A pat down of Osiel Jr. also brought to light 14.2 grams of marijuana hanging out in his underwear. That’s a strange place to keep your pot but hey, to each his own.

Osiel Cárdenas Jr. is scheduled for a hearing at a detention center tomorrow. The realities of smuggling across the border are real. If that is going into Mexico I can only wonder what is being brought into the states that we know nothing about. Border Patrol is a vital part of keeping this country safe and a lot of that comes through Texas.

Allison Dawson

Allison Dawson was born in Germany and raised in Mississippi and Texas. A graduate of Texas Tech University and Arizona State University, she’s currently dedicating her life to studying for the LSAT. Twitter junkie. Conservative. Get in touch with Allison at staff@LawStreetMedia.com.

The post Son of Drug Kingpin Busted for Smuggling Weapons, Drugs at Border appeared first on Law Street.

Since the arrest in 2009 of Philip Markoff, aka the “Craigslist Killer,” the website has faced increased scrutiny by the media. Law Street decided to take a closer look at the site and its media coverage to see how dangerous Craigslist really is. We wanted to know: Was Markoff’s an isolated act, or an incident on a continuum? Our findings are noteworthy. This marks the first tabulation of all Craigslist murder trials and convictions from 2009 through June 2014. Law Street identified 58 murderers and 45 murder victims connected to Craigslist postings through last June. Twenty-two murder cases are still pending. The oldest pending case dates to 2012, and eight are from 2014, indications that the killings continue. Craigslist did not reply to multiple inquiries.

Click here to read the Killers of Craigslist in single-page format.

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Research and Analysis by Law Street’s Crime in America team: Lexine DeLuca, Jake Ephros, Chelsey Goff, Anneliese Mahoney, Marisa Mostek, Kevin Rizzo, Nicole Roberts, and Trevor Smith.

Featured image courtesy of [Janine via Flickr]

Chelsey D. Goff

Chelsey D. Goff was formerly Chief People Officer at Law Street. She is a Granite State Native who holds a Master of Public Policy in Urban Policy from the George Washington University. She’s passionate about social justice issues, politics — especially those in First in the Nation New Hampshire — and all things Bravo. Contact Chelsey at staff@LawStreetMedia.com.

The post Killers of Craigslist appeared first on Law Street.

It’s Friday, which means that yet again we’ve had a week full of weird arrests. From stupid criminals, to equally stupid cops, it’s been a wild week!

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Anneliese Mahoney

Anneliese Mahoney is Managing Editor at Law Street and a Connecticut transplant to Washington D.C. She has a Bachelor’s degree in International Affairs from the George Washington University, and a passion for law, politics, and social issues. Contact Anneliese at amahoney@LawStreetMedia.com.

The post Weird Arrests of the Week appeared first on Law Street.

Here’s some gross and weird racism to start off your Wednesday: a gun range in Arkansas has declared that it is a “Muslim-Free Business.” Jan Morgan runs the Gun Cave Indoor Shooting Range, and is an ardent supporter of the Second Amendment (although apparently not the rest of our Bill of Rights). She also subscribes to a particularly paranoid form of logic.

According to Morgan, the decision to ban Muslims from her business was based on an encounter in which:

Two Muslims walked in to my range last week with Allah Akbar ring tone and message alert tones on their smart phones. They spoke very little English, one did not have proof of U.S. citizenship, yet they wanted to rent and shoot guns. Their behavior was so strange, it was unnerving to my patrons. No one would enter the range to shoot while they were there. Some of my customers left.

First of all, what in the world is an “Allah Akbar” ring tone? Allah Akbar is a phrase that means, essentially, “God is the Greatest.” It’s used in prayer or in times of distress. The name of the Libyan national anthem is similar — “Allahu Akbar” — but I highly doubt that’s what this woman was referring to. Was it just the phrase “Allah Akbar” over and over again?

On a more serious note, Morgan very well may have been concerned by the behavior of these two men. My guess is that the encounter she’s describing has been a little over exaggerated, but let’s pretend that it’s not. She and her customers may well have been concerned, and if they broke a reasonable rule that she’d created at her business — for example, having a valid ID — she had every right to refuse them service. Gun range owners do have the discretion to turn away people who seem, for example, drunk, or mentally ill. But that’s an individual decision based on the customer in question, not a blanket one.

Where the huge disconnect comes in, is that this apparently prompted her to ban anyone who is Muslim from her gun range, which makes about as much sense as banning all men because those two she encountered happened to be male. Or banning all young white men, because they are the most common to partake in mass shootings.

Morgan goes on to justify her paranoia and splendid racism with a list of nine reasons. Some are your garden variety xenophobia, but there are some standout examples of logical fallacies as well. Here’s a fun one:

In the 14 hundred year history, muslims have murdered over 270 million people. Not all muslims are terrorists, but almost all terrorists in the world right now are muslim. Since you can’t determine by visual assessment, which ones will kill you and which ones will not, I am going to go with the line of thought that ANY HUMAN BEING who would either knowingly or unknowingly support a “religion” that commands the murder of all people who refuse to submit or convert to that religion, is not someone I want to know or do business with. I hold adults accountable for the religion they align themselves with.

I enjoy how she starts this statement off with how not all Muslims are terrorists, but concludes that that doesn’t really matter. And she’s right, you can’t tell someone’s religion just by looking at them, so I’m assuming this leaves Morgan a couple choices: either ask her customers’ religion before they enter her business, or profile anyone who fits her definition of what someone who is Muslim looks like. Either is offensive, degrading, and inappropriate.

Also included in Morgan’s manifesto are random comments about Sharia Law coming to the United States, which no one can really prove, and lots about the violence of the “Koran.”

Morgan will have a suit brought against her by the ACLU. The executive director of the Arkansas ACLU, Rita Sklar, explained, “It’s unconstitutional, it’s illegal under the Civil Rights Act. It’s a violation of the right to religious liberty.”

Morgan, though, seems to have some support. If you want to really depress yourself, check out the comments on any article about this issue, or the Twitter mentions. That bothers me more than one crazy wingnut banning Muslims from her business, because it reminds me that so much of the country thinks this way.

Finally, Ms. Morgan claims she is a supporter of the Second  Amendment, but I think she needs a reminder of what the Second Amendment actually says:

A well regulated militia, being necessary to the security of a free state, the right of the people to keep and bear arms, shall not be infringed.

And let’s put all arguments about the Second Amendment aside for a minute here, because although I have conflicted feelings about what it actually means, there’s one thing in there that’s crystal clear: “the right of the people to keep and bear arms, shall not be infringed.” There are no caveats in there. This is in an Amendment to our Constitution, a document that tells us that all men are created equal. Not all Christians are created equal, or all white people are created equal, or all Americans. Everyone. While Morgan does own a private business, her love of the Second Amendment doesn’t mean that it’s right to ignore the rest of the document. The Bill of Rights isn’t multiple choice.

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Anneliese Mahoney (@AMahoney8672) is Lead Editor at Law Street and a Connecticut transplant to Washington D.C. She has a Bachelor’s degree in International Affairs from the George Washington University, and a passion for law, politics, and social issues. Contact Anneliese at amahoney@LawStreetMedia.com.

Featured image courtesy of [John Biehler via Flickr]

Anneliese Mahoney

Anneliese Mahoney is Managing Editor at Law Street and a Connecticut transplant to Washington D.C. She has a Bachelor’s degree in International Affairs from the George Washington University, and a passion for law, politics, and social issues. Contact Anneliese at amahoney@LawStreetMedia.com.

The post Arkansas Woman Bans “Muslims” From Her Gun Range appeared first on Law Street.

To blog about such a controversial topic like the use and possession of guns in the United States is something I want to tread carefully with. Everyone is entitled to his or her opinion surrounding the debate, but this week I could not help but question the legality of guns when coming across two particular cases.

On Thursday, Don Spirit killed his six grandchildren, aged from three months to 10 years old, and his daughter before turning the gun on himself. Spirit, whose case has been described as a murder-suicide, was someone who had already been involved in the criminal justice system. According to Fox:

In 2001, Spirit pleaded guilty to a charge of possession of a firearm by a convicted felon, after he fatally shot his 8-year-old son in the head in a hunting accident. Spirit, who also was convicted in 1998 for felony possession of marijuana, was sentenced to three years in prison for the shooting.

The details of the investigation are still in the very early stages, so it is hard to understand the motive — if there was one — the facts surrounding Spirit’s mental health, and his relationship with the victims. Aside from knowing these facts, I cannot help but wonder how Spirit even managed to have a gun after being convicted of a shooting in 2001? Gun accessibility legislation for ex-convicts really needs to be reconsidered in light of this case.

What I feel a lot of people fail to recognize is that the most common method of suicide in the United States is through the use of guns. According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), in 2011 there were 39,518 deaths by suicide. An overwhelming amount of these deaths (19,990) were the result of firearms.  If we are a country that aims to protect our citizens and the rights of others, surely we should look out for ourselves just as much? If we have such easy accessibility to the weapons of our choice that could end our lives, should we not reconsider the laws surrounding them? Do not get me wrong, I am more than aware that the black market for firearms is an ever-growing underground business, but if we cannot efficiently manage the legal selling and keeping of licensed handguns, we have no hope to stop the illegal sales and handlings.

My point needs to be extended to the safety of those living with others who have access to guns. On the same day as the tragic deaths resulting from Spirit’s heinous act, a fifth grade boy was arrested in Michigan after being found to have stolen his grandfather’s pistol. Not only was the boy found with the gun, but he had also created a list of names in the back of his homework book of people he allegedly planned to harm. As a result of this discovery, the boy has been suspended from school for ten days, and could face possible expulsion. Again, this could be my criminological thinking coming out, but I cannot help but wonder whether this punishment will actually solve the problem of what the boy intended to do? I certainly do not think he should be given jail time, or any formal sentence, but I do think that he needs to be aware of just how serious his actions were. Why? Because if he is not aware of it, what is to stop him doing it all over again, and just being more careful.

I fear that in a culture where are part of normality, when conflict arises in such intense situations, sometimes the only resolution seems to be in the form of violence via the use of weapons. I personally do not think this reflects on the attitudes and actions of those involved in this violence, I think it is the instinct that they have been taught their entire lives, to protect themselves in an extremely lethal way. In order to enact firmer laws that protect our safety, we have to start working on understanding the reason for such laws. As someone who is British, and not used to the debate on the use of guns, one of the main things I have come to realize is that it is a right for US citizens to own a gun, and by restricting this right through legislation, essentially the country contradicts all it stands for. As hard as it is to stand back from what an entire population believes in, more awareness needs to be raised toward the consequences of guns, not just for now, but for the future.

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Hannah Kaye (@HannahSKaye) is originally from London, now living in New York. Recently graduated with an MA in criminal justice from John Jay College. Strong contenders for things she is most passionate about are bagels and cupcakes.

Featured image courtesy of [Auraelius via Flickr]

Hannah Kaye

Hannah Kaye is originally from London, now living in New York. Recently graduated with an MA in criminal justice from John Jay College. Strong contenders for things she is most passionate about are bagels and cupcakes. Contact Hannah at staff@LawStreetMedia.com.

The post Two More Disturbing Gun Cases Beg the Question When Will We Change? appeared first on Law Street.

In an era when it seems like there’s constantly a story about a shooting on school grounds, we’re always looking for solutions to our school shooting epidemic. One long-discussed argument has been to arm teachers, and people across the country are taking action to do just that.

In many conservative-leaning states, the push to arm teachers is getting pretty serious. As of this year, in 28 different states, adults who own guns will be allowed to carry them into school buildings under certain parameters. Recently, legislation was passed in Alabama, Georgia, Kansas, Oklahoma, South Dakota, Tennessee, and Texas related to arming teachers and staff members in public schools.

There’s also been some expansion of the way in which those who are armed in schools are trained. In some places, free classes are offered for staff members who want to carry guns into schools in an attempt to protect students. The Centennial Gun Club in Colorado is offering free classes to teachers who want to learn how to carry and operate guns. A former Colorado teacher named Tara who is thinking of returning to the classroom named explained her interest in the class, saying:

While I am a teacher, those kids, those students in my class are my kids, and my first responsibility is to protect them at all costs. When all the school shootings happened I realized that I wanted it more for my own personal protection and I thought that that idea of being prepared to protect translates very well to the classroom for teachers.

That’s all well and good, but what they don’t seem to be offering is classes that particularly relate to stopping armed intruders or using a gun under high-pressure circumstances.

In other places, the emphasis is on cutting the response time in case of an armed intruder by training designated staff members who have access to weapons. In some cases, teachers need to disclose information to superiors that they’re bringing a gun into the classroom, in other states the legislation doesn’t require that kind of step. While the laws are varied, one thing is pretty clear — bringing more guns into schools in an attempt to stop horrific tragedies like the Sandy Hook shooting has become a fairly popular mindset, without any whiff of consistency from state to state or even school district to school district.

Now, I’m very split here. On one hand I’m frustrated. Part me of thinks that we literally are so bad at finding solutions to our mass shooting problem that we’re just bringing more guns into schools as an answer. That is where we are. We so fundamentally can’t agree on how to deal with gun violence that we can’t even make the laws or required training consistent. Never mind the fact that arming people more to prevent shootings is a kind of miniature mutually assured destruction. Never mind that while shootings are occasionally stopped by bystanders, it’s relatively rare. Never mind that the ability to stop a shooting takes a blend of training, instinct, and temperament that requires way more than one class to learn. Never mind that in the last year, 100 children died in accidental shooting deaths in the United States. Never mind that by bringing guns into our classrooms, we are teaching our children that school is not a safe place, and that gun violence is a reasonable answer. That’s the obnoxious liberal in me talking.

But on the other hand, I have a side that I like to think is rational, and that side is also kind of frustrated. Now, I want to be clear, because I’ve learned from experience that this kind of disclaimer is needed: this is not an attack on the Second Amendment. This is an attack on the complete lack of common sense that we are now employing. If we sat down, as a nation, and truly determined that the best way to protect children is to arm their teachers, fine. We can do that, if we really think that will work. It’s a plan, at least, and as much as I don’t think it’s a good plan, I would be ecstatic to be proven wrong.

But what we have right now is such a fundamental disagreement on literally everything to do with this debate that we’re half-assing it. We’re passing laws that allow certain people to bring guns into schools under the guise of protection without necessarily creating corresponding legislation to make sure that the plan has the chance to be effective. We’re ignoring the possibly negative ramifications of these laws because it’s just easier that way. We are so far from being able to have a rational debate on this topic that any ability to be able to work together has been thrown out the window.

Every gun death is a tragedy, and the only way we’re going to be able to prevent situations like Sandy Hook, or Columbine, or UC-Santa Barbara from happening again is if we all grow up and talk about this in a rational way.

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Anneliese Mahoney (@AMahoney8672) is Lead Editor at Law Street and a Connecticut transplant to Washington D.C. She has a Bachelor’s degree in International Affairs from the George Washington University, and a passion for law, politics, and social issues. Contact Anneliese at amahoney@LawStreetMedia.com.

Featured image courtesy of [Wendy House via Flickr]

Anneliese Mahoney

Anneliese Mahoney is Managing Editor at Law Street and a Connecticut transplant to Washington D.C. She has a Bachelor’s degree in International Affairs from the George Washington University, and a passion for law, politics, and social issues. Contact Anneliese at amahoney@LawStreetMedia.com.

The post Risky Idea Alert: Arming Teachers in School appeared first on Law Street.

Mark Sobie, 43, was a convicted felon. In 2010, he turned himself in after robbing a bank in Michigan; he had used a fake gun for this operation. He served 30 months in a federal prison and this charge prevented him from buying or possessing a firearm. However, when it came to renting a gun, Sobie was never subjected to a background check. So, when he visited Silver Bullet Firearms in 2012, he was able to rent a gun, no problem. Sobie then took his own life at the shooting range in Michigan, with a blow to the face from the rental gun.

This was not a unique phenomenon. This was actually the second suicide at that particular range. There’s an interesting loophole in acquiring firearms; no thorough background check is completed for customers who rent guns. Over 12 years, more than 64 people have committed suicide at gun ranges in just three California counties. Reports of other similar incidents occurred in Massachusetts, Wisconsin, Virginia, Utah, Texas, and Oklahoma. If this is something plaguing our nation, why isn’t anyone talking about it? And why is there no federal legislation in place that requires background checks for gun rentals?

Initiating Action

The numbers are admittedly small. But every life is valued, and the family members of those who have taken their lives are speaking up. Sobie’s sister said his life could have been saved if the shooting range had conducted a background check.

There’s also a case where a woman killed her son, then committed suicide in front of other customers. Her name was Marie Moore, she had a history of mental illness, and according to police reports she had already attempted to commit suicide. A background check would have prevented her from access to a rental gun. But for lack of legislation, she was unstoppable and she murdered her son before taking her own life. Some gun ranges are responding to these violent outbursts by no longer renting firearms to their customers. Purchasing a firearm is a much more extensive process than simply walking into a shooting range, flashing an I.D. and signing a sheet of paper.

According to the Law Center to Prevent Gun Violence, “training and testing requirements in licensing laws are designed to ensure that gun owners understand relevant firearms laws, and know how to safely store and handle firearms.” Anyone who wants to buy a firearm must undergo a background check. Some states also require purchasers to receive a permit for owning a firearm. So why aren’t these same standards upheld for someone who wishes to rent a gun? It doesn’t matter where you are, if you have a gun in your hand, you should have to undergo some sort of screening to gain access to a lethal weapon.

Possible Solutions

This is no attack on the NRA or supporters of gun rights. It’s merely a call to action for some preventative action. The New Hampshire Firearms Safety Coalition has already started making some changes by focusing on suicide prevention rather than limiting gun rights. The first step NHFSC took was to unite people of all different interests including “gun store owners, shooting instructors, gun rights advocates and suicide prevention advocates to develop strategies to keep guns out of the hands of people who might use them to hurt themselves.”

They’ve used an informal and more personal process to take action. The NHFSC mailed suicide prevention posters to gun stores across New Hampshire. According to Politico Magazine, 48 percent of gun shops left the posters up for four to six months after they were mailed out. Some prevention groups in Las Vegas and Maryland have also adopted the practice of posting suicide prevention materials. So, could this informal process gain solid ground?

I have hope that it could. Gun control is a sore subject and many gun rights activists are hesitant to put further limitations on gun access. However, in this case, gun owners wouldn’t have to undergo further screening. People who are not knowledgable about gun control or familiar with responsible gun handling have easy access to guns through the gun rental loophole. Mandating a background check could take a step forward in suicide prevention and it wouldn’t encroach on gun owners’ rights. If more states adopted similar legislation, we could neutralize a bit of the debate surrounding guns.

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Natasha Paulmeno (@natashapaulmeno)

Featured image courtesy of [Kevin Buelher via Flickr] 

Natasha Paulmeno

Natasha Paulmeno is an aspiring PR professional studying at the University of Maryland. She is learning to speak Spanish fluently through travel, music, and school. In her spare time she enjoys Bachata music, playing with her dog, and exploring social media trends. Contact Natasha at staff@LawStreetMedia.com.

The post The Gun-Rental Loophole: Dangerous and Deadly appeared first on Law Street.

Tucson. Aurora. Newtown. What did these shootings have in common? The weapon and the ammunition. Or the types at least. Semi-automatic firearms allow the shooter to fire as fast as his finger can pull the trigger. Pair one of those with oversized ammunition magazines and he is capable of causing unthinkable damage in a matter of minutes. Rachel Maddow highlighted the correlation between the capacity of the ammunition magazine with the duration of the shooting spree and how many people are shot. But New Jersey Governor Chris Christie doesn’t seem to understand this correlation in the gun debate — that’s why he vetoed a bill that would limit the size of magazines.

For that, I am furious. Personally, I choose not to remember the names of the monsters who committed these acts because they should not be granted notoriety for their crimes — that would only make their twisted dreams come to fruition. We must pay attention to and deal with the issue at hand: mental illness and access to weaponry. I am no cheerleader for the NRA but I do believe in the right to bear arms. For self protection and even *shudder* hunting, we cannot deny our fellow countrymen (the sane ones) these rights.

Can we compromise?

Both sides are extreme, but I think we could come to an agreeable compromise. But not Gov. Christie, he’s definitely not on board with that. In his eyes we either abolish the Second Amendment entirely, or we continue allowing 15-round magazines to be produced and accessible to the armed public. Last week Christie vetoed a bill that would limit the size of gun magazines to ten rounds. This bill was petitioned by two families who lost children at the Sandy Hook Elementary shooting. Christie avoided them, even when they personally delivered the petition to the governor’s office. He denied them, point blank, period. And this was his weak defense:

So are we saying then that the ten children on the clip that they advocate for, that their lives are less valuable? If you take the logical conclusion of their argument, you go to zero. Because every life is valuable. And so why ten? Why not six, why not two, why not zero? Why not just ban guns completely?

This is a joke…right? I mean, if we can’t save five people in the next shooting, we should just let all 15 victims get shot because everyone’s life is equally valuable. Yeah, that totally makes sense. What’s the big deal about five bullets?

Size matters

The heroine of the Tucson story is a woman who bravely tackled the shooter in the moments when he ceased fire. He was equipped with a magazine that held more than double the standard amount of rounds (15). When the shooter paused to refill his Glock with another 33-round magazine, Patricia Maisch, then 61, wrestled the ammo from him while a few men threw the shooter to the ground. The number of victims from that shooting could have been fewer if he had had to reload sooner.

The same goes for the 2012 Aurora movie theater shooting. That shooter had a drum magazine capable of carrying 100 rounds attached to his AR-15 rifle. Could you imagine how the number of victims from that massacre could have been reduced if he were forced to reload about six times? Christie obviously cannot because that would be favoritism, or something.

Most importantly, I’d like to point out the difference this would have made at the Newtown shooting. The shooter in this case was armed with three different weapons and unfathomable amounts of ammunition, which he carried on his body. This guy came from a family with a long history of love for guns. He grew up with that whole culture and was granted access to guns, despite his Aspergers. The Daily Beast described the frightening amount of weaponry the shooter was armed with that day:

At the school, he emptied three magazines completely, leaving his 26 victims with as many as 11 gunshot wounds. Either because his weapon jammed or because he was overexcited, he ejected three more magazines when they still had 10, 11, and 13 rounds, respectively.

All told, he expended 154 rounds, killing 20 small children and 6 adults. The Bushmaster had one round in the chamber and 14 rounds in the magazine when he took his own life with one of two handguns he carried. A shotgun with two magazines containing 70 rounds was found in the black Honda he parked in the fire lane at the school entrance.

All that gore occurred in about five minutes. He could not have caused that many deaths in so little time with smaller magazines. How can Christie try to defend his veto with such illogical banter, to the parents of the victims of this shooting? Christie says it’s just a fundamental disagreement, though how his argument could be valid in any reality I do not understand. If the decision were up to you and you could choose between the hypothetical death of 15 children or 10 children, what would you do?

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Natasha Paulmeno (@natashapaulmeno) 

Featured image courtesy of [Eugene Smith via Flickr]

Natasha Paulmeno

Natasha Paulmeno is an aspiring PR professional studying at the University of Maryland. She is learning to speak Spanish fluently through travel, music, and school. In her spare time she enjoys Bachata music, playing with her dog, and exploring social media trends. Contact Natasha at staff@LawStreetMedia.com.

The post Thanks to Governor Christie the Gun Debate Just Reached a New Low appeared first on Law Street.

Hey y’all!

I hope everyone had a great Memorial Day weekend! For me it is always a low-key weekend that usually ends up in quality time with my family, celebrating the holiday honoring the men and women who have died serving in the armed forces protecting our freedom. This weekend also calls for a celebration of my birthday — my actual birthday is today.

Monday was like every other Memorial Day where a small group of my family members get together to have some sort of meal and talk about anything and everything. This time, no surprise, the subject matter of the young man who murdered six people and injured 13 before killing himself near Santa Barbara over the weekend was brought up. A tragedy that is hard to understand but something that has become increasingly normal in our society.

It’s no secret that I have conservative views, as do most of my family members. I was raised with guns around the house, unavoidable when your father is in the military and a gun enthusiast from the South. I was taught early on in life what guns can do, how to handle them but also how to respect them. Shooting a rifle in the backwoods of Mississippi was a summer pastime with my brother under the supervision of our father. I am not a member of the NRA but I certainly support the organization.

As my family and I sat down for lunch, my aunt brought up this news and the press conference where the father of one of the victims, Christopher Martinez, age 20, had made a statement blaming not only politicians but also the NRA for his son’s death.

I cannot imagine the pain that a parent goes through when losing a child to such a heinous act and I understand that with grief comes anger and the need to blame someone for the loss of his child. I have lost friends in the past to guns, either self-inflicted or at the hand of someone else, but never have I once needed to blame anyone except the person who pulled that trigger.

The NRA promotes safety, responsibility, respect, and education toward guns. The NRA did not put that gun into the hands of this obviously disturbed man. Not to mention that in later reports police have discovered that three people were stabbed to death by the same person. Who do we blame then? Victorinox Swiss Army? Spyderco Knives? How about Crate & Barrel for selling cutlery? A knife can be just as deadly as a gun. It is not the method being used but rather the person behind that tool that we should blame.

The scariest part of this whole tragedy is that in some way it could have been avoided. The shooter’s father even contacted police a month ago due to the disturbing YouTube videos his son was posting. Let’s take a step back and think about why the police were unable to do anything about it before all of this occurred. Hindsight is always 20/20 and we can always play the “what if” game, but there were warning signs and nothing was done about them. This is not the fault of the NRA or anyone who supports the Second Amendment. This is the fault of a disturbed young man who felt that he was dealt a bad hand in life and blamed everyone but himself.

With that said, we should all take a minute to pay our respects to those who lost their lives in this tragic event. They are the ones who deserve the attention from the media — not the soulless creature who took them from this earth.

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Allison Dawson (@AllyD528) Born in Germany, raised in Mississippi and Texas. Graduate of Texas Tech University and Arizona State University. Currently dedicating her life to studying for the LSAT. Twitter junkie. Conservative.

Featured image courtesy of [Ted Eytan via Flickr]

Allison Dawson

Allison Dawson was born in Germany and raised in Mississippi and Texas. A graduate of Texas Tech University and Arizona State University, she’s currently dedicating her life to studying for the LSAT. Twitter junkie. Conservative. Get in touch with Allison at staff@LawStreetMedia.com.

The post The Shooter Alone is to Blame for Santa Barbara Slayings appeared first on Law Street.

What do churches, schools, and bars all have in common? Once a new law is signed in Georgia, you have the potential to legally carry guns in all of them. It’s known as the “Safe Carry Protection Act,” and a lot of people are talking about what it allows.

Among other things, it allows people to bring guns into government buildings, churches (if the congregation wants them), airports (not past security), and bars (should the owner allow it). Governor Nathan Deal hasn’t signed the bill yet, but most people expect him to do so without issue.

It also allows for officials to designate teachers or administrators at public and private schools to have weapons within school safety zones. According to the bill, local school boards would be responsible for deciding who within their districts are allowed to carry guns. Not law enforcement, not the state legislature but the school boards. How does that make sense?

The debate between whether or not expanding where people can carry guns has gone on for years, and will continue after this bill. But will this vast expansion help encourage dialogue about the topic, or polarize people against each other further?

Americans for Responsible Solutions, founded by Gabrielle Giffords, put out a video condemning the bill for allowing “guns everywhere.”

And the sentiments of Giffords and other pro-gun control groups seem to be reflective of the people in the state. One poll by The Atlanta Journal-Constitution found 70% of voters disagreed with allowing guns on college campuses and in churches- two provisions some lawmakers hoped to include in this bill (lawmakers ultimately decided to not include guns on college campuses in the bill).

But politicians in Georgia obviously supported it. Governor Deal is up for re-election and has been endorsed by the NRA since 2010. As a Republican, maybe that isn’t so surprising. But consider the fact Deal’s Democratic opponent, Jason Carter (grandson of Jimmy), also voted for the bill. If the people of Georgia don’t agree with the ideas behind the bill, what’s the motivation?

Without being too cynical, the NRA, which lobbied for this specific bill to pass, and other pro-gun lobbies probably have a lot to do with it. There are also a lot of well-intentioned people who say that in the wakes of tragedies like Sandy Hook, we need more people with guns, not less. A consistent narrative relayed by pro-gun groups is that people who will register their guns and follow these laws aren’t the same people who shoot up schools.

But there is language in the bill that would restrict law enforcement for stopping people to check their gun permits: “A person carrying a weapon shall not be subject to detention for the sole purpose of investigating whether such person has a weapons carry license.”

So even if a police officer suspects someone has a weapon illegally, there’s no way to check in accordance with the law. Police will either have to pin an additional charge on the person they want to check, or just ignore the situation altogether. This seems to discount the argument that citizens shouldn’t worry since only law-abiding gun owners will carry them. If there isn’t a provision to discern between the two, how will anyone know the difference? What would stop someone from carrying a gun without a license  if they’re aware the police can’t check it anyone?

Creating legislation this broad in one fell swoop doesn’t seem like the best idea for pro-gun advocates. Often faced with criticisms of being too reactive and far-reaching, a bill like this doesn’t do much, if anything to change public sentiment on the issue. Just because the Georgia legislature had the votes to change all of these laws doesn’t mean that they should have. Instead, it could have started small, showing a dedication to ensuring the safest pro-gun options for the state rather than the broadest. Compromises and “baby steps” like this could have helped decrease the backlash the bill is now facing across the country.

[Bill Text] [NYT] [NRA] [Atlanta Journal-Constitution]

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Molly Hogan (@molly_hogan13)

Featured Image Courtesy of [Wikimedia]

Molly Hogan

Molly Hogan is a student at The George Washington University and formerly an intern at Law Street Media. Contact Molly at staff@LawStreetMedia.com.

The post Oh, Georgia: Potential Law Allows Guns [Almost] Everywhere appeared first on Law Street.

Until last year, there was only one state without a conceal carry law, and that state was Illinois. A Federal Appeals Court stated last winter that the ban on carrying concealed weapons was unconstitutional. The court required the Illinois legislature to draft a conceal carry law by July 9th, 2013, for implementation by January of 2014.

The law has been written, and is ready to take effect, but it has led to a lot of confusion in Illinois. There are a lot of places where it is still forbidden to carry a concealed weapon, and there were many caveats inserted into the brand new law. For example, one of these complications is that it is illegal to take a concealed gun to a large fair or parade. But you can have a gun on the street normally. So, if you happened to be walking home with your legal concealed gun, and run into the parade, your gun suddenly becomes illegal. This makes things very complicated, because if someone was arrested for having a gun in a public gathering, they could just claim they were walking home.

You can have a concealed gun on a bike path that goes through a park, but not in the park itself. You can’t bring a concealed gun into a post office, alright, but you also can’t bring it into a post office parking lot.

Now I think the fact that restrictions are put on where concealed firearms can be taken is a good thing. I live in the one single, solitary place in the United States where it is still illegal to carry a concealed weapon–Washington DC–and I am completely okay with that. But I have to admit that these laws in Illinois do seem unnecessarily confusing.

Colleen Lawson, who owns a gun training facility stated, “it’s like a Byzantine maze. It’s possible to get through it without breaking any laws, but it’s tricky.”

The confusing law seems to be the result of the short period of time that the Illinois Legislature had to cobble it together, as well as the conflicting lobbies fighting for their say, leading to weird contradictions and Catch-22s.

Charles Lawson, Colleen’s husband, gave an interesting example. He described,

a scenario in which an armed person goes to a restaurant for a meal and decides to take a CTA train home. In that case, the permit holder would have to unload the gun and put it in a purse, backpack or other encasement. But the trick is removing it from the holster and unloading it. That can’t be done in public view. You can’t even go to a restroom inside the station and do it. To do it legally, the carrier would have to find a place nearby that allows firearms and go there to unload and put away the gun.

It seems clear that this juxtaposition arises out of the combination of pro-gun groups lobbying to allow that man to carry a gun into the restaurant, but anti-gun groups lobbying to disallow him from carrying it onto the train.

Like I said, it’s hard for me to say that conceal carry laws should be looser, because personally I’m not a fan of conceal carry on principle. But I really do believe that if you’re going to make a law, it shouldn’t be full of such gaping contradictions and complications the way this new Illinois conceal carry law is. It will make patsies out of innocent people who didn’t realize they were breaking the law, and that’s just not right.

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Anneliese Mahoney (@AMahoney8672) is Lead Editor at Law Street and a Connecticut transplant to Washington D.C. She has a Bachelor’s degree in International Affairs from the George Washington University, and a passion for law, politics, and social issues. Contact Anneliese at amahoney@LawStreetMedia.com.

Featured image courtesy of [Brent Danley via Flickr]

Anneliese Mahoney

Anneliese Mahoney is Managing Editor at Law Street and a Connecticut transplant to Washington D.C. She has a Bachelor’s degree in International Affairs from the George Washington University, and a passion for law, politics, and social issues. Contact Anneliese at amahoney@LawStreetMedia.com.

The post Conceal Carry Mess in Illinois appeared first on Law Street.

The newest trend among small town sheriffs is a refusal to follow the laws of the land. What laws have caused such a visceral reaction from our law enforcement? One of the hottest topics in the American political sphere, of course. These sheriffs are refusing to follow newly enacted gun control laws.

The movement is especially popular in Colorado, although there have been issues in Florida, California, New York, and multiple other states as well. After the horrifying Aurora, Colo. and Newtown, Conn. shootings last year, state and federal leaders have attempted to put more gun control measures in place, but success has been varied.

Since the first whispers of proposed new gun laws began, there has been opposition among local sheriffs. One group, the Constitutional Sheriffs and Peace Officers Association, also known as CSPOA, has already announced that they would not enforce local, state, or federal gun control laws if they believe that the laws are unconstitutional. As of today, the CSPOA website lists 18 state sheriff organizations and many individual sheriffs. The founder, Richard Mack, is the former sheriff of Graham County, AZ. It also contains a section entitled “The Red Coat List,” presumably a Revolutionary War throwback reference to British soldiers who fought the newly formed United States armies. According to CSPOA, Red Coats are any individuals who try to undermine the the power of the sheriffs of CSPOA.

In March of this year, Colorado’s Governor John Hickenlooper signed new gun laws; they went into effect in July. They include universal background checks on gun purchases and a limit on the size of ammunition magazines, among other measures. The laws incited an incredibly reactionary response throughout the state. Two state senators who supported the laws were actually recalled just a few months later, and a third resigned to avoid a third vicious and expensive recall battle. So far, 55 of the 62 sheriffs in Colorado have stated that they will not follow these laws.

Reasons for refusal vary somewhat, but for the most part, these sheriffs claim that the laws are both unconstitutional and vague to the point of being ineffective. The sheriffs are almost all from rural areas–the few urban sheriffs who are following the news laws claim that they are absolutely enforceable. There are also some sheriffs who disagree with the law, but realize that it is part of their job description to comply, regardless of personal beliefs. These two types of officials are part of a minuscule minority in Colorado.

Acts of defiance are not the first steps that these Colorado sheriffs have taken. In May, a group filed a suit challenging the constitutionality of the laws in the State Court. US District Judge Martha Kreiger turned them down, stating that they didn’t have the legal authority or standing to file the case as sheriffs, although they could as a group of private citizens. There are other suits moving forward, and some of the sheriffs have signed on.

The problem with what’s happening in Colorado is that whether or not these laws are actually constitutional is a separate issue from the job for which these sheriffs have been elected. It is not a sheriff’s duty to make laws–that falls on the Legislature. Similarly, it is not a sheriff’s job to interpret a law–that falls on the Judicial system. A sheriff’s job is to enforce the laws that are enacted.

Now, what many sheriffs are doing is not focusing on the enforcement of these provisions and characterizing them as a very low priority, which is fine, and not entirely unexpected. Not all laws are enforced on the same level anywhere. I know for a fact that I have jaywalked dozens of times. Or, for a sillier example, let’s remember that in my home state of Connecticut, it’s technically illegal to dispose of a used razor. I can assure you, I have done so many times, and I’ve never had the police burst into my bathroom to arrest me. And if all these sheriffs were doing was characterizing these laws as a low priority, it would be bothersome, but in the grand scheme of things, alright.

But the sheriffs who have taken their crusade further worry me. They will face very few consequences–in some states, Governors can investigate sheriffs that don’t follow laws, but that provision is rarely enacted. Mostly, any challenge to these sheriffs will come from voters, but given that these sheriffs are almost exclusively in conservative rural areas, that’s unlikely.

Gun laws in this country will continue to be a grand debate, there’s no doubt about it. But when sheriffs, or former sheriffs, such as Mack, make statements such as, “every one of the sheriffs is going to follow the Constitution, not follow the president or the Supreme Court. The Supreme Court has already ruled twice for the Second Amendment. The federal government has no right to tell me how many magazines I can have, how many guns I can have and how much ammunition I can have,” we have a problem. Sheriffs should be focusing on counteracting the epidemic of gun violence in this country. If they don’t agree with the laws that are passed, that’s a well-deserved personal belief, but it’s still their job to enforce them. In order to make this country a safer place, we need to get on the same page. But right now, we’re not even reading the same book.

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Anneliese Mahoney (@AMahoney8672) is Lead Editor at Law Street and a Connecticut transplant to Washington D.C. She has a Bachelor’s degree in International Affairs from the George Washington University, and a passion for law, politics, and social issues. Contact Anneliese at amahoney@LawStreetMedia.com.

Featured image courtesy of [Inventorchris via Flickr]

Anneliese Mahoney

Anneliese Mahoney is Managing Editor at Law Street and a Connecticut transplant to Washington D.C. She has a Bachelor’s degree in International Affairs from the George Washington University, and a passion for law, politics, and social issues. Contact Anneliese at amahoney@LawStreetMedia.com.

The post Colorado Sheriffs Say “No Way” to New Laws appeared first on Law Street.

Robots are the future- and they are already here. Although, the average “joe” may not interact with these human replacements, military personnel, across seas, encounter robots on a daily basis.

 Today, there is a powerful shift in robotic technology for domestic use. In fact, just last Monday, Amazon strategically released their drone delivery concept. Robotic machinery is blending into the average citizens’ everyday life. So should we be worried?

Well that depends…

A company, Knightscope, in California has recently developed a robot called K5 Autonomous Data Machine (this machine is quite remarkable).

Within months of its debut, this security robot has already created quite a ruckus — “R2D2’s evil twin,” to be exact according to Marc Rotenberg, the director of the Electronic Privacy and Information Center, in Washington, DC.

What makes this robot truly evil? Well…

 The first point is obvious. This device is the NSA’s fantasy; a harmless looking device that collects images and records sound 24/7.

Now, some may say this is awfully Orwellian. Yes, that may be so, but the intentions are good. William Santana Li,  co-founder of the technology company that created K5 Autonomous Data Machine claims that they created this robot “after what happened at Sandy Hook”, based on their assertion that “[we] are never going to have an armed officer in every school”.

School shootings have become more prevalent in the United States over the past few years. There have been 34 shooting events in 1990’s contrasting with 86 shooting events between 2000-2013, according to the American Center for Disease Control and Prevention. Consequently, K5 Autonomous Data Machine was developed to ensure the safety and security of schools, and possibly an alternative to human guards.

But did you catch that second detriment? No? Human Security will be rendered pointless. Is our world becoming so efficient that it is destroying the working middle class?

Yeah, robots are efficient. Yeah, it’s cheap. Yeah, it’s cool and futuristic, and it feels like you are living on Tatooine.

 But this could drastically hurt our economy, on such a large economic scale proving esteemed economist, David Author, from Massachusetts Institute of Technology’s theory that technology decimates the working class.

In the United States, the Federal minimum wage in $7.25 an hour, while the implementation of K5 would short the American middle class by an entire dollar at a mere $6.25 an hour reported by the Department of Labor.

This also brings up the recurring argument of privacy vs. security. How much is the common citizen going to compromise in order to procure their safety?

However, I am less worried about security than I am more concerned about the dying off of the middle class. At what point do you draw the line? Case and point, robots don’t need to worry about feeding a family.

 At the end of the day, people are going to complain about both sides. Either, there is not enough protection, or it is too invasive. Myself personally? I’m conflicted. As of now, I want to see more of Evil R2D2.

[NY Times]

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Featured image courtesy of [littlelostrobot via Flickr]

Zachary Schneider

Zach Schneider is a student at American University and formerly an intern at Law Street Media. Contact Zach at staff@LawStreetMedia.com.

The post Where Inventions, Privacy, and Economics Intersect: R2D2’s Evil Twin appeared first on Law Street.

The popular picture-sharing social network Instagram has definitely cornered the market on sharing brunch memories and beach photos. But now there’s a new, surprising, industry developing from the network that originally made a name for itself with teenage and college-aged girls. Instagram has now become a forum to sell guns.

Gun regulations vary state by state, but many states do not have laws in place governing online sales. While companies and official sellers have laws that they must follow, individual private sellers are not necessarily held to the same constraints. For the most part, the ATF does not get involved in occasional private sales. They encourage sellers to go to a licensed dealer and get a background check for the people to whom they are selling; however, it’s not really enforced. This market, which is at least superficially anonymous, is almost completely unregulated. On Instagram, you can find everything from small handguns to assault rifles.

Sam Hoover from the Law Center to Prevent Gun Violence, in a statement to the Daily Beast stated, “private sales to in-state buyers are almost completely unregulated by federal law. No background check and no record of sale are required unless state law fills this gap.” That is the venue through which most of these sales are made. Essentially, private sellers are selling firearms almost completely anonymously to people within their state who have no need to pass a background check or anything of the sort.

Online sites that are created for the purpose of sales—for example Craigslist or Ebay—have rules that prohibit the casual selling of firearms. But a site like Instagram, which has no innate sales function, does not have any rules of those sorts.

The issue isn’t that these types of sales are by any means illegal—the issue is that the vast majority of them are. Technology allows a forum for sales that laws never thought to outlaw. Before the Internet, if someone wanted to buy a gun privately, they would have to hear about the sale from a friend, or possibly go to some sort of semi-black marketplace. Laws weren’t created to prevent these kinds of sales, because they were relatively sparse. Now, with the Internet, these sales are incredibly easy to complete. Just searching Instagram for the keywords, or tags, that indicate sales, yields the ability to purchase firearms.

The actual magnitude of this marketplace is unknown—the Daily Beast reported as though there were many sales happening each week, while a Slate article disagreed and estimated that only a few sales happened in a given week. Regardless of who’s right, these sales do appear to happen. And if they happen on Instagram, a site that is a social network and by no means created for sales, there’s every possibility that they could be happening on other forums.

There have been a few select cases of legal action being pursued against sellers on Instagram. A few months ago, a rapper and DJ in Brooklyn, NY, talked about selling guns on Instagram and Youtube. Authorities went forward with a gun bust that resulted in a net raid of 254 guns. Because these were not simply occasional sales made between individuals, charges could be pressed. Unfortunately, that will not be the case with most of these gun sales.

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Anneliese Mahoney (@AMahoney8672) is Lead Editor at Law Street and a Connecticut transplant to Washington D.C. She has a Bachelor’s degree in International Affairs from the George Washington University, and a passion for law, politics, and social issues. Contact Anneliese at amahoney@LawStreetMedia.com.

Featured image courtesy of [Brent Danley via Flickr]

Anneliese Mahoney

Anneliese Mahoney is Managing Editor at Law Street and a Connecticut transplant to Washington D.C. She has a Bachelor’s degree in International Affairs from the George Washington University, and a passion for law, politics, and social issues. Contact Anneliese at amahoney@LawStreetMedia.com.

The post Follow Your Friends…And Arms Dealers on Instagram appeared first on Law Street.

On Monday, September 16, 2013, I woke up to news that a mass shooting was taking place at the Washington Navy Yard, ten miles from my house.  It had been nine months since the last devastating mass shooting had taken place, in December 2012, and I came to the realization that I literally was unable to delve into the minutiae of this attack.  My heart couldn’t take the stress.  And for the first time in a long time, I stayed away from the news.  For three days, I neither watched nor read the papers, and knew nothing of the Navy Yard Shooting (because these events always get whittled down to two or three word titles: Columbine. Virginia Tech.  Tucson.  Aurora.  Sandy Hook.  Navy Yard. ________.  (This last example is for the inevitable next shooting that I end up writing about, since our members of Congress respect the NRA’s dollars more than they do our lives).

Today, Thursday September 19, 2013, I felt ignorant for not knowing the facts around this tragedy.  Here is an event that happened in the city where I was born and raised, in an area where many of my friends live, and I did not know the facts.  So today, I sat down and I read them.  Now I’m angry.

Today I learned that the shooter visited two Veterans Affairs Hospitals in two cities seeking help for mental distress.  Each time he sought assistance, he was told that there was not a problem that warranted official concern. For the record, this is absolutely not a condemnation of the mental health professionals who treated the shooter.  They likely followed the protocols to the letter, and were under constraints due to the restrictions Veterans Affairs’ Hospitals typically encounter.  I also learned that the shooter was given a clearance and entered the building using a properly-issued badge.  I learned that the same vetting company cleared both this shooter and the Fort Good gunman.  I learned that he entered the building with a backpack, went into a restroom, came out with a shotgun, and began firing.

I have a suggestion: a uniform procedure for entering government buildings.  There are some government buildings where a the presentation of a badge is the sole security measure.  In others, though, employees and visitors alike go through the same screening precautions.  Indeed, in the summer of 2011, I interned for the U.S. Attorney in Manhattan.  To get into the building, employees had to pass through the metal detector, even with our badges.  Similarly, when entering the U.S. District Court for the District of Maryland, my bag passed through a security machine every time I entered the building, whether for the first time that day or for lunch. Finally, when I interned for the White House, the security was as tight as one could imagine, no matter what type of badge you possessed.

Was it annoying? Sure.  Realistically, though, it always took less than five minutes.  I don’t know about you, but five minutes is worth my time.  Five minutes is certainly worth my life. If enhanced security is necessary for some government buildings, shouldn’t it be necessary for all?

I also watched a video from the Washington Post where a former Marine told viewers how to react in the event of a mass shooting.  At first I thought, “I will never need to watch this,” but then I realized that it’s probably more beneficial than not.  As a society, we have seen various former safe havens lose their place in our hearts, and come to the realization that we’re not safe anywhere: not in high school, not in college, not in super markets, not in parking lots, not in movie theaters, not in kindergarten, and now not at work.

So I took seven minutes out of my day (less than the time it would take to properly secure all government buildings) and I watched this video.  I felt like I owed it to myself, because every few months we have our sense of safety eroded.  I wanted to learn how to protect myself in the event of danger.

Our workplaces are dangerous.  Our schools are dangerous.  Supermarkets are dangerous and movie theaters are dangers.  What’s left?

Don’t worry, though: the minute news broke that there was a shooter at the Navy Yard, security was increased at the Capitol, and all House and Senate buildings were locked down.

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Featured image courtesy of [Tim Evanson via Flickr]

Peter Davidson II

Peter Davidson is a recent law school graduate who rants about news & politics and raves over the ups & downs of FUNemployment in the current legal economy. Contact Peter at staff@LawStreetMedia.com.

The post Now It’s the Navy Yard – What’s Next? appeared first on Law Street.