Texas law is a bit different.
Remember the Texas pick-up truck driver who witnessed from a distance as a highway patrolman was shot by a motorist he’d pulled over? The pick-up truck driver got his deer rifle off the rack and blew the perpetrator to hell from 50 yards away. The police all just wished he’d gotten there a little earlier and didn’t even release his name to the press.[Unquote]
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Police are always more favorable toward the use of guns to protect themselves, than they are toward the use of guns by “civilians” to protect mere civilians. I am sorry, but that is how the brotherhood feels about fellow policemen.
I used to live in Texas, and was actually told by my lawyer that it was OK to shoot someone trying to steal a car. I would not enjoy doing that at all, but I do favor capturing car thieves, or scaring them away.
In some other constituencies it is illegal (assault) to point a gun at a human being, whether the gun is loaded or not. That means that if you are threatened and defend yourself, even with only a show of force, you must expect subsequently a long and uncertain legal problem, which could include jail time, a record, and loss of any gun rights you had enjoyed. I suppose protecting your life is worth it, but the law is really protecting criminals in such cases.
Many states (like NJ) ban even electrical defense weapons. In NJ, a sling-shot (which, for some unknown reason, they call a “slung shot”) is a prohibited weapon, in the same general category as an assault rifle.
Since these laws were promulgated, the rate of violent crimes and major property crimes has: a) dropped dramatically; b) stayed the same; c) increased. Which do you think?
In times past, a slung shot was a lead weight with an attached cord which was slung by holding the cord. It was completely different and much more deadly than a sling shot.
One of Abraham Lincoln's more famous cases as a lawyer was the defense of a man accused of killing another with a slung shot.