Posted on 06/19/2010 2:06:28 PM PDT by marktwain
From Mathew:
"On may 9th I had received a Armi-Jager AP-74( I have a pic of it with some of my other firearms on my facebook page) .22LR from a friend of mine that I worked for. It looks similar to the original Vietnam era M-16. On Monday I was walking to my friends house who lives in town to show him. I got stopped and questioned then told I was in a school zone. I said that I thought open carry was fine for transportation since I cant drive and I don't really have a case big enough to fit it. I was told from different officers that the school zone was 500ft, or 1500ft and that there was a distance around city buildings and churches(which there is not). they did not do anything about it since they had no clue what they were talking about, even though the DA came in and showed them on a map a few months ago and talked about school zones.
Then on May 17, I was going to go shoot the new .22 at a friends house a mile out of town. I had measured on Google Earth the 1000ft. With my measurements if I left through my neighbors drive way I would be out of the school zone once I hit public property. well I was on my return trip when some one naturally called me in to the cops. They stopped me checked me out, and asked me about the school zone. I told them what I had done and found, and they let me go. A few hours later, I was asked to stop down at the cop shop to talk about something. The officer was told by a superior to investigate the situation. He had measured out the 1000ft on a correctly surveyed city map, and according to that I was still inside of it no matter how I left the house. I told him that I had measured it and thought I was fine. He didn't seem to care and I was arrested.
I was in jail for 16 days and they had originally dropped the charges and the DA agreed to that but that is cause they wanted to amend more stuff to it. So it was refiled with the measurements of the driveways and a few other things, but it basically said the same thing, that I did not no I was still in the school zone and had not broke the law which states did knowingly or have reason to believe I was in a school zone. We went back to court for the second preliminary hearing on the second one and that got dropped by the judge cause there was no reason to believe a felony had been committed and since there is nothing else they could charge me with. So thats my end of the story. While I was in jail I saw one of the news stories on tv and was convinced that I was out riding around the school with an assault rife, in full camo( I was wearing a BDU top at the time) waiting to shoot some kids,lol. I have gotten my handgun back from the cops, and the rest of my guns back from my friend who was holding them while I was in court."
Here is a picture of Mathew:
http://www.facebook.com/?tid=454859146040&sk=messages#!/photo.php?pid=8372940&id=513910205
http://www.facebook.com/?tid=454859146040&sk=messages#!/photo.php?pid=8372940&id=513910205
The gun free school zone act is ridiculous in this case, but for the love of God, buy a case for the rifle.
A basic hard-sided rifle case is $15 at Gander Mountain. Protects the rifle and protects the owner from police-calling busybodies. An even better option is a softball gear bag, doesn’t say “gun” but provides room for a smaller rifle and range stuff.
Kinda useless if you don’t have a FaceBook account..
I don’t..
That link doesn’t work even if you have a Facebook account.
I will see if I can find a better way to post the picture.
This is an amazing story —16 DAYS...?!?!?!!?!
I agree that the law was intended to push guns out of urban and even suburban areas. So the way around the problem is to use the system to protect you from the system.
Start with an official city map provided by the city. The use a compass to indicate the legal radii from schools. Hopefully there will be a clear path in at least two directions, but there may not be.
Then get together a group of local gun owners to officially request a ruling from the city’s chief judge, indicate what routes can be taken, and what other rules must be followed, in writing. Then take the original and duplicates to the city attorney’s office and the police department, with plenty for all.
Each gun user should likewise have several copies of the ruling, that they carry around with their gun.
This is called an ounce of prevention, and beats the heck out of 16 days in jail.
I am not so sure even that would be a solution. 30 years ago I was told of a Milwaukee judge that ruled that a buck knive in the enclosed case that fits on your belt was a “concealed weapon” because it was concealed in the case. More recently, there was a case where a handgun in an case in a vehicle was ruled as a “concealed weapon” because it was readily available inside the vehicle. Wisconsin does not allow concealed weapons, so carrying a gun in a case on foot, especially if it were in a softball gear bag, could be ruled as carrying a concealed weapon.
I’ve been under the understanding that as long the weapon was unloaded, a cased firearm was not considered concealed, just cased. Unfortunately, in WI, unloaded means that there is not a loaded magazine with the weapon. The laws regarding cars are more restrictive, — i.e. it can’t be readily accessible or loaded, but there is no way to travel on foot without having the gun readily available, although a locked case should meet the legal definition.
It’s lawsuit time. He should bankrupt the town and everyone involved personally.
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