Posted on 03/02/2014 4:34:45 PM PST by Darren McCarty
GRAND RAPIDS, MI If you were in the vicinity of Michigan Street and Fuller Avenue NE on Sunday around noon, chances are good you saw lots of people walking down the sidewalk carrying pistols strapped to their hips.
That was the point, say a vocal group of gun owners who marched with openly visible pistols though Northeast Grand Rapids on Sunday, March 2, a year after a man who is now suing the city was detained by police for doing something similar.
Were trying to take concealed weapons out of the closet and into the open, said Ryan Adams, a regional coordinator from Spring Lake for the group Michigan Open Carry, which is at odds with Grand Rapids leaders over the practice.
Were trying to desensitize the public, and show them that everyday normal law-abiding people carry guns to protect themselves, he said. Thats all it is. Nobody is trying to intimidate anybody or be a bully or be frightening.
Adams was one of roughly 80 open-carry advocates who marched from Fuller Park to the corner of Lakeside Drive and Michigan Street NE, where Johann Deffert was detained on March 3, 2013, by Grand Rapids police after residents in the area called 911 to report a man walking down the sidewalk with a holstered pistol.
Deffert has filed a federal lawsuit against the city and the officers who stopped him.
(Excerpt) Read more at mlive.com ...
I don't open carry, but I hope Deffert bankrupts the police department there.
Ping
“We’re not bad people and neither were the people standing on Lexington Green or at the bridge in Concorde. However the people that live there now I’m not so sure about.
Safest place in town!
Here is some backstory on it:
MI:Grand Rapids Open Carry Lawsuit Unedited Video: No evidence of “Talking to Nobody”
http://gunwatch.blogspot.com/2014/01/migrand-rapids-open-carry-lawsuit.html
I believe Michigan is the only state that has a gun on the state flag.
Three mottos are shown on the coat of arms: E Pluribus Unum (From many, one), Tuebor (I will defend), and Si Quaeris Peninsulam Amoenam Circumspice (If you seek a pleasant peninsula, look about you). These mottos are reflected in the coat of arms pictorially. E Pluribus Unum, also our national motto, aligns with the depiction of the Bald Eagle. Tuebor is represented in the arrows clasped in the eagle's talons and the gun held in the man's left hand. Si Quaeris Peninsulam Amoenam Circumspice is supported by the warmth of the sun, the man's friendly greeting from the peninsula and the olive branches held by the Bald Eagle.
The mayor of this town is an F’n Socialist if not a Commie.
I’m a little surprised the left hasn’t had the man on the flag disarmed. I have seen descriptions for children that call it a “walking stick”.
walking stick
LOL (while shaking my head).
That’s what we can tell people who whine about open carry.
Its a walking stick.
Thanks for the warning.
I was there. 70 plus were carrying out of a total of 83.
I showed up with the Flag. I hadn’t been marching in the snow with that large of a group of armed men since back in the USMC.
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