TEAM CSSA E-NEWS | July 6, 2018
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- Spratt: On gun violence, Jim Watson and John Tory shoot from the lip
- Fund to fight guns and gangs untouched despite surge in shootings
- Ten Dumbest Things I Heard About Guns At The United Nations
- CP24 Interview with Official Opposition Leader Andrew Scheer
- Gun Control Fails Again in Annapolis, Maryland Newspaper Attack
- Peter Khill not guilty in fatal shooting of unarmed First Nations man Jon Styres
- Oregon “Assault Weapons” Ban Initiative Defeated
- WFSA on Firearm Marking Requirements
- Self Defense Stories You Don’t See in the Mainstream News
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COMMENTARY
Trudeau Government is Long on Talk, Short on Action to Curb Gang Violence
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The summer of 2018 heats up and so does the gang violence in Canada’s major cities.
The brutal murder of two teenage boys in Surrey, British Columbia, sparked a June rally against gang violence at Surrey City Hall. Ten days after the rally, Paul Bennet, a minor hockey coach and father, was shot and killed outside his home. Police believe he was specifically targeted, although they do not know why.
In Toronto this week, police issued a press release seeking Tyrese Francis, 16, wanted in connection with a recent shooting in his own home. While playing with his illegal gun, he pulled the trigger and sent a bullet through the wall of his bedroom. It lodged in the mattress where his sibling lay in the next room.
Toronto Mayor John Tory, a strong supporter of Bill C-71, decried the gang violence plaguing his city.
"Who were the people that pulled the trigger on Queen Street? Were they the boy scouts? Who goes by in a car and fires a gun out the window at people on the sidewalk?"
Tory asked this week.
The disconnect is painful to watch.
Public Safety Minister Ralph Goodale refuses to explain how strengthening controls on licensed, law-abiding firearm owners via Bill C-71 will stop young criminals like Tyrese Francis or the drive-by thugs on Queen Street from getting their hands on guns.
While we can’t tell Mayor Tory who the criminals are, we can tell him who they are
NOT:
RCMP-vetted, federally licensed, law-abiding firearm owners.
The Prime Minister and Minister of Public Safety tout Bill C-71 as part of “a larger public safety package” to combat gang violence. They claim Bill C-71’s enhanced background checks are critical to combat gang violence, but very few reporters in the country have had the courage to ask how this is possible when background checks only apply to firearm licence holders and applicants.
Again, the disconnect is painful to watch.
The Minister of Public Safety continues to peddle his announcement of $327 million (or $370 million when speaking before committee) to partner with “provinces, law enforcement agencies, and municipalities on a broad range of initiatives to tackle the issue of violence caused by gangs including most particularly guns and gangs.”
There’s only one small problem. Not a single penny of that money has flowed to law enforcement, despite the Minister’s grand announcement last November (and its hollow re-announcement every chance he gets).
According to the Minister of Public Safety’s office, Ottawa and the provinces are still sorting out how to deliver the money.
Sadly, on crime, this government is all talk, no action.
Sources:
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Will strengthening controls on licensed law-abiding firearm owners really help combat crime?
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RESULTS FROM LAST WEEK'S QUESTION:
Do you think an early election call would be bad news for Canada's gun community?
YES: 51.3%
NO: 16.7%
NOT SURE: 32%
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Spratt: On gun violence, Jim Watson and John Tory shoot from the lip
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By Michael Spratt | ottawacitizen.com | July 5, 2018
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If a foolish consistency is the hobgoblin of small minds, it seems that the mayors of Ontario’s largest cities have been very, very consistent — at least when it comes to gun crime.
The problems in Toronto and Ottawa are similar: an increase in shootings. And like moths to a flame, John Tory and Jim Watson took to their bully pulpits recently to spitball solutions. Unfortunately, those solutions relied on the same tired trope that has failed our communities again and again: It’s time to get tough on crime.
Watson was responding to the release of the Ottawa police’s
2017 crime trends report
, which indicated violent crime was up a staggering 20 per cent in the nation’s capital.
All gun crime is serious but the statistics do little to make the case that Ottawa is a dangerous city. In fact, despite a small increase in “shootings” – which includes incidents regardless of whether someone is actually shot or not – Ottawa’s murder rate actually decreased in 2017. It appears most of the increase in violent crime was due to an almost doubling of uttering threat charges, not firearms offences.
It may be too much to expect statistical nuance from Watson. But we should insist that his proposed solutions have a basis in reality. So, the question is: Do more severe punishments actually deter crime? The answer is a resounding no.
In 2018, law professor and legal scholar Janine Benedet
testified before the House of Commons Justice Committee
that the biggest deterrence to criminal activity is the likelihood of apprehension, not the severity of punishment. This was not an earth-shattering revelation. Over a decade earlier, Canada’s pre-eminent criminologist, Dr. Anthony Doob,
testified before the same committee
, that “for more than 25 years, the overwhelming weight of evidence has been consistent with the conclusions that harsh sentences, in legislation or in practice, will not have any consistent or appreciable impact on levels of crime in the community.”
Do more severe punishments actually deter crime? The answer is a resounding no.
So, if there is
no convincing evidence
to suggest harsher sentences prevent crime, why is Watson peddling misinformation?
Things were no better in Toronto where Tory released a statement decrying Toronto’s shootings. Tory’s solutions were just as simplistic as Watson’s. Tory wants to “toughen up bail guidelines” for gun crimes. Tory doubled down on his bail rhetoric, saying, “We can’t have people getting out on bail 20 minutes after they’re arrested for using a gun.”
I’ll let you in on a secret, no one accused of a gun crime is released on bail 20 minutes after their arrest – not unless the
accused is a police officer
. Tory’s strawman argument is the height of irresponsibility and only serves to baselessly decrease confidence in the justice system. Tory presented no evidence that the recent Toronto shootings were committed by suspects who had been released on bail. And it is a fact that bail for firearms is always subject to the strictest of conditions and monitoring.
Tory says that “the answers are easy if we work together to deploy more police and support the police to actually get these thugs behind bars and keep them there.”
These “easy answers” won’t work. History has shown that more police officers, reduced civil liberties, and harsher punishments won’t reduce gun violence. In reality, these easy answers are merely seductive political tripe to be fed to a scared public desperate for solutions.
Real solutions involve building relationships with communities. Heavy-handed and racially charged police investigations techniques, such as carding, have been shown to erode the public’s willingness to report crime or to cooperate with the police. Real solutions mean tackling the hopelessness and poverty that plague our cities. Real solutions can be found in progressive drug policies and robust addiction treatment.
But Watson and Tory did not talk about any of these real solutions. Explaining and justifying evidence-based approaches to complex social problems is never easy. And so, we are left with Watson’s and Tory’s foolish consistency, which might help them get re-elected this year but won’t come close to making our communities safer.
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Fund to fight guns and gangs untouched despite surge in shootings
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By Tim Naumetz | ipolitics.ca | July 4, 2018
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Despite a spike in handgun shootings, Public Safety Minister Ralph Goodale’s office has confirmed Ottawa and the provinces are still hashing out how to deploy $327 million the government set aside last March to combat gang violence.
On Wednesday, Goodale spoke with Surrey, B.C. Mayor Linda Hepner following two shooting deaths in her city last month, and with Toronto Mayor John Tory in the wake of 24 fatal shootings that have shocked the city over the first six months of 2018.
Ottawa has also experienced a recent spike in handgun shootings, which police have attributed to gang conflict.
Goodale is also scheduled to speak with Michael Tibollo, minister of community safety and correctional services in Ontario’s newly-elected Progressive Conservative government.
But a $327.6 million fund the government included in this year’s budget to fulfill 2015 election promises of “taking action against guns and gangs” is still in the development stages, a spokesman for Goodale confirmed.
“It is in the process of being designed in consultation with provinces and municipalities,” said Scott Bardsley, press secretary for the minister.
Meanwhile, a government call for new applications to access a separate government funding program dedicated to gang activity and violence —
the National Crime Prevention Strategy
— opened in June with a July 31 deadline for filing submissions.
Though the program is focused on guns and youth gangs, the amount available for communities and groups is capped at $10 million a year, with time limits for each program.
A Liberal firearm bill the government steered through the House of Commons before rising for the summer was criticized by both anti-firearm groups and firearm lobbyists as an insufficient attempt to address street gangs and handgun violence, while imposing new restrictions on owners of shotguns and rifles.
Bardsley included the legislation, Bill C-71, as one of the steps the government has taken against gun violence and firearm-related crime.
“When people do not feel safe, when they feel that random attacks can take the lives of innocents just walking down the streets, that’s obviously a deep concern,” Goodale said in a statement.
“Canada must have a more holistic approach. That is why our government is making major investments in social infrastructure…expanding access to meaningful work opportunities for young people at the start of their careers, making post-secondary education more affordable, increasing skills training, improving access to early learning and expanding affordable housing.
“These concrete steps will make our country less vulnerable to the scourge of gun violence.”
The $327 million set aside for action against gangs and guns was to be directed to Public Safety Canada programs, the Royal Canadian Mounted Police and the Canada Border Service Agency, as well as federal, provincial and territorial efforts to support community-level prevention and enforcement efforts while investing in border security and interdiction.
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Ten Dumbest Things I Heard About Guns At The United Nations
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By Ted R. Bromund | ammoland.com | July 3, 2018
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USA –
-(Ammoland.com)-
For the past two weeks, I’ve been attending the Third U.N. Conference to Review Progress Made in the Implementation of the Programme of Action to Prevent, Combat and Eradicate the Illicit Trade in Small Arms and Light Weapons in All Its Aspects — mercifully abbreviated as RevCon 3 for the PoA.
In theory, the purpose of the PoA — which is a political instrument, not a treaty — is to encourage cooperation on the illicit international trade in small arms. If the PoA stuck to this, it might be modestly useful. It can only be modestly useful because far too many nations at the U.N. don’t right now have the ability, or the desire, to do the basic things they have repeatedly committed to doing.
Unfortunately, the PoA doesn’t stick to the illicit international trade in small arms. And in the process of not allowing it to stick to its job, its supporters say a lot of stupid things. And yes, they do like to talk about gun control. Here are the ten dumbest things I’ve heard about guns at the United Nations over the past two weeks.
- Mexico’s proposal to include IEDs. Make no mistake, IEDs are a problem. But they’re not one the PoA can usefully address. Many types of IED are already illegal. Many of them are not trafficked internationally. And above all, they’re used almost exclusively by terrorists. Putting IEDs into the PoA amounts to implying that Al Qaeda should sign up to it.
- Europe’s invention of new kinds of guns. You’d think there would be just two kinds of guns: ones that can fire, and ones that can’t. If you want to make a gun that can fire into one that can’t, use a torch to cut the frame (or receiver) in half. Not so, according to Europe, which for some reason doesn’t like to cut guns in half. As a result, it doesn’t have a reliable way to deactivate guns, and so now recognizes five different kinds of guns: manufactured, downgraded, converted, deactivated, and reactivated firearms. And of course, it wants new rules for all of these, with numbers put in all the parts of every firearm. In theory, this will prevent terrorist attacks like the one in Paris in 2015, which used weapons that were supposedly deactivated. In practice, it will just create confusion. The simplest thing to do is to define and number a gun by its frame (or receiver), state that the way to deactivate a gun is to cut it in half, and move on.
- The worship of the U.N.’s Sustainable Development Goals. The Goals, known as the SDGs, are a tedious laundry list of 169 separate targets, most of which are in reality merely pious aspirations or politicized goals. One of these targets is “by 2030 [to] significantly reduce illicit financial and arms flows.” The PoA isn’t likely to make a major contribution to this target, but the fact that the target mentions illicit arms flows has become an excuse on the part of the Europeans and the Africans to lard the PoA with loads of references to the SDGs. The point of this is to turn the PoA into a human rights and development agreement, and, by the by, to transform it into politicized mush with no relevance to actually reducing the illicit arms trade.
- Mexico’s proposal to regulate “the end user.” For years, Mexico has argued that the PoA shouldn’t simply concern itself with the international illicit arms trade, but should reach inside national borders and regulate “end users.” In the U.S., that means individual purchasers of firearms, which is precisely why Mexico wants what it wants: it’s trying to use the PoA to mandate gun control in the U.S. Mexico’s proposal is part of the PoA’s curious tendency to forget that it’s supposed to be focusing solely on the international trade, and to wade off into regulating the “end user.” The highlight of this tendency is the proposal, made in 2016 by the U.N. Secretary-General and included in a PoA draft this year, to use RFID chips to “track and document which individual has used a specific weapon, when and for how long.”
- The demand to include ammunition. A lot of countries want the PoA to include ammunition. Right now, it doesn’t, and there’s a good reason for this: guns are durable, relatively easy to mark and trace, and don’t work without ammunition, whereas ammunition is consumable and is produced in enormous quantities that are impossibly burdensome to trace. The number of delegations here that can’t grasp this simple point is incredible. For the sake of the political thrill of including ammunition, they want to add an unworkable commitment to the PoA when most of the nations in the room aren’t fulfilling the much simpler ones they’ve failed to uphold for the past 17 years.
- Worrying about 3-D printing and modular or polymer firearms. Apart from including ammunition, this is the big demand of a lot of nations here. They argue that 3-D printed firearms and modular or plastic firearms are scary new problems, and so the PoA needs to be updated to mention them. As the U.S. has pointed out, there is no recorded instance of a crime being committed anywhere in the world with a 3-D printed gun, and in any case, it doesn’t matter how a firearm is made or what it’s made of. As long as there’s a proper legal definition of what a firearm is, it doesn’t matter if it’s made from metal or plastic, or if — as with modular firearms — parts of it can be replaced. But too many countries here can’t bring themselves to simply define a firearm by its frame (or receiver), and fall prey to the sentiment that not including new things (such as 3-D printing) every time the PoA meets means it’s failing. In reality, the best way to ensure the PoA keeps on failing is to bloat it up like a beached whale.
- Proclaiming the existence of unspecified synergies. One of the favorite talking points here is that the PoA has what are called “synergies” with a wide range of other international instruments, including the U.N. Firearms Protocol, the Convention against Transnational Organized Crime, the so-called International Small Arms Control Standards, and above all the Arms Trade Treaty (ATT). The point of referring to these “synergies” is, first, to cram a lot of things into the PoA that the U.S. doesn’t like and then, second, to cram so many references to the ATT into the PoA that the PoA becomes the agreed way to implement the legally binding ATT. In other words, it’s an effort to put all the U.N.’s small arms instruments into a pot, give them a big stir, and make them all legally binding and inseparable from each other.
- Misusing ATF statistics. One of the favorite talking points of the activists — embodied by the Center for American Progress — is that an enormous percentage of crime guns recovered and traced in Mexico (70 percent) and Canada (98.5 percent) are traced back to the U.S. On its face, this is ridiculous: the idea that 985 out of every 1000 crime guns in Canada come from the U.S. is too high to be plausible. The activists get these numbers because, though they correctly cite the relevant ATF reports, they use them to imply something that’s untrue. The figure of 98.5 percent, for example, refers only to guns sent to the U.S. for tracing. In other words, the Canadian police are 98.5 percent accurate in sending probable U.S.-origin guns to the U.S. to be traced, whereas their Mexican colleagues are only 70 percent accurate. These numbers say nothing about the overall share of U.S. guns in Canadian or Mexican crime.
- Whining about gender. Gender has absolutely no relevance whatsoever to the control of the illicit international trade in small arms . Nor do women have any special expertise in this area simply because they are women. Nor is it true that women are uniquely burdened by the results of this illicit trade — on the contrary, most of the victims are men. (Jamaica’s figures, for example, show that in 2017 male victims outnumbered female ones by over 6 to 1.) But yet the PoA has become a vehicle for talking about gender. There has been a lengthy debate over whether the PoA should promote the “full” or the “equal” (the latter mandating one woman for every man, regardless of their expertise) involvement of women. The highlight of the gender panic was probably a speech by a left-wing NGO on Tuesday which argued that “militarised masculinity is . . . the main impediment to disarmament, peace, and gender equality.” In other words, in order to address the illicit international trade in small arms, we need to rewrite all history, society, and culture from the perspective of the progressive left. A word of advice to people who think like this: the more you say stuff like this, the more anyone who doesn’t agree with you is likely to write off all the U.N. programs you say you support as a Trojan Horse for your own radicalism.
- Promoting gun control. Well, you knew it would come to this. In theory, the PoA is tightly limited to the international illicit trade. But the people who back it make no secret of their support for gun control. On Thursday, 17 nations, including Mexico, proposed including civilian possession in the PoA. Last Friday, we had a visit from Wear Orange, of Everytown for Gun Safety, financed by Michael Bloomberg. They clearly see the PoA as relevant to domestic gun control. The best illustration of why came on Wednesday, when in a side event on domestic gun control laws an Australian representative stated that “every gun shop that disappeared was a point from which guns could no longer be diverted.” In other words, according to the gun controllers, the way to control the illicit arms trade is to make sure there are no legal places to buy guns, which will ensure that no legal guns exist to become illegal. The Australian representative went on to point out that the most important source of crime guns in Australia is thefts from legal gun owners. That sums up their point of view nicely: legal gun owners should be deprived of their right to buy a gun so that, when a thief invades their house, they will not have a gun that can be stolen. Also, they will be defenseless. The problem, by this way of thinking, is not the thief: it is the law-abiding gun owner, who should be punished accordingly.
All of this isn’t just dumb. It’s pathetic. Illicit trafficking in small arms is an actual problem — not as big a problem as many problems out there, but a problem nonetheless. And there are sensible things that could be done about it, things that wouldn’t cure the problem, but which would make it better. If the PoA would just focus on these things, it might actually make a modest, but positive, contribution.
The illicit international trade in small arms basically comes down to two issues. First, there’s border control: if you don’t control your borders, it’s inevitable that a lot of guns are going to cross it. But here’s what CAP has to
say
about the Trump administration’s border policies in the gun control context:
The Trump administration’s protectionist, isolationist, nativist, and racist immigration policy is founded on the scurrilous notion that the United States needs to close the borders . . .
Well, if the borders are not going to be closed to illegal immigration going north, they are going to be open to illegal firearms moving south. It really is as simple as that. But try to find a progressive gun controller who admits it.
Indeed, when I asked Amb. Juan Sandoval, Deputy Permanent Representative of Mexico, whether he supported tight borders, he simply repeated that he was unhappy about Mexico’s murder rate. I’d be unhappy about it too, but blaming it all on the U.S. without expressing any willingness to control your own borders is totally unhelpful. In fact, it’s unfriendly.
Of course, no matter how good your border controls are, some arms are going to flow across your border illicitly. The second issue, therefore, is the need to mark firearms (both domestically-produced and imports), to maintain records of those markings, and to trace crime and other illicit weapons. This is a commitment that all nations participating in the PoA have already accepted.
But most of them don’t do it.
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CP24 Interview with Official Opposition Leader Andrew Scheer | July 5, 2018
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Federal Conservative Leader Andrew Scheer answers questions about the rise in gang-related gun violence and how the Liberal's gun bill, C-71, serves only to punish law-abiding gun owners.
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Gun Control Fails Again in Annapolis, Maryland Newspaper Attack
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By Rob Morse | ammoland.com | July 2, 2018
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U.S.A.
-(Ammoland.com)-
A murderer attacked a newspaper office in Annapolis, Maryland. The murderer had stalked one of the newspaper staff. That staff member had to move several times and change her name. She slept with a gun next to the bed. She told the police the stalker was a nutcase and “he will be your next mass shooter.” He was, and five people died. She saw something and said something. The police didn’t stop the murderer. Maryland has very strict gun licensing and ownership regulations. Those laws didn’t stop the murderer but may have disarmed the victims.
Within minutes, the press doubled down on failure and said the solution was more gun regulations.
- Semi-automatic rifles are restricted, but that didn’t stop the murderer from using a shotgun on unarmed victims.
- The mandatory handgun purchase licence didn’t stop the murderer, but it may have kept the victims disarmed.
- Mandatory handgun registration didn’t stop the murderer either, but it may have disarmed more victims.
- Some business owners are allowed to carry to and from work, and at work. It is unlikely that these victims could have obtained permission from their employer to carry concealed on the job. They were disarmed at their place of business despite the known risk of a stalker. For the record, the murderer didn’t bother to ask if guns were allowed on the premises. Murderers are not stopped by gun regulations.
- The requirement that ordinary citizen demonstrate a “good and substantial reason” to obtain a concealed carry permit means that most Maryland applications for wear/carry permits are denied. If only the victims knew six months in advance that they would be attacked at work. Then they could have applied for a permit..and also not gone to the office that day. Few permits are issued in Maryland and fewer are issued to ordinary citizens living in Annapolis.
- Maryland has firearms magazine capacity restrictions in their laws. That could have put the defenders at a larger relative disadvantage as they fought someone with a shotgun. We will never know since the defenders were disarmed.
- Maryland does not recognize the permits issued by other states to ordinary citizens.
Here is a pro-tip for the media. Turning the murderer into a celebrity will invite more media-murders. Don’t do it.
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Chilliwack Gun Show
July 8, 2018
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At Evergreen Hall
9291 Corbould St
Chilliwack, BC V2P 4A6
Hours –
9 a.m. to 5p.m.
Admission –
General $5. Members FREE
Hosted by the Historical Arms Collectors Society of British Columbia
For more information, please contact Art Hoivik at 604-858-8039 or Ron Tyson at 604-522-3609. Or visit HACS of BC
HERE
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IN CASE YOU MISSED THIS...
Peter Khill not guilty in fatal shooting of unarmed First Nations man Jon Styres
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By Dan Taekema | cbc.ca | June 27, 2018
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Jury accepts argument of self defence; Indigenous leader shocked at verdict
A Hamilton jury has found Peter Khill not guilty of murdering Jon Styres, a First Nations man from Ohsweken, Ont., who was trying to steal his truck.
A 12-person jury reached its verdict Wednesday morning after deliberations started Tuesday afternoon. There were gasps from supporters on both sides of the trial, then tears, as the verdict was read.
The 28-year-old man previously admitted he fired the two, close-range shotgun blasts that killed 29-year-old Styres in Khill's suburban Hamilton driveway on the night of Feb. 4, 2016.
Khill pleaded not guilty to a charge of second-degree murder, based on self-defence, with his lawyer arguing the shooting was "justified" because he believed Styres had a gun and he feared for his life.
Is a truck worth more than a young man's life? Obviously it is
- Ava Hill, chief of the Six Nations of the Grand River
The Superior Court of Ontario heard Styres did not have a gun that night. He was carrying a knife, but it was closed and in his pocket.
The case was being watched by Indigenous community leaders, because it raises similar legal issues to the controversial case in Saskatchewan involving the death of Colten Boushie, an Indigenous man.
In that case, an apparently all-white jury acquitted Gerald Stanley of second-degree murder in Boushie's death.
Ava Hill, chief of the Six Nations of the Grand River, said she and her entire community were shocked and left in disbelief by Wednesday's verdict, which she sees as another example of Canadian courts failing Indigenous people.
She said it left Styres' entire family, especially the mother of his children, Lindsay Hill, a wreck.
"They're all in shock, they can't believe it. I can't believe it either. Is a truck worth more than a young man's life? Obviously it is."
Screened for bias
Prospective jurors were screened for possible racial bias and the jury included at least one non-white person.
Race was never raised in evidence during the trial. In his closing arguments, defence lawyer Jeffrey Manishen did touch on the race of the two men. In the pre-dawn pitch-dark there was no way Khill could have known Styres was First Nations, said the lawyer — Khill didn't see skin colour, he only saw a threat.
"Race cannot, it does not, play a role in the case," said Manishen.
But Hill did not agree, describing the verdict as "racism rearing its ugly head" again.
"The whole justice system needs to be redone. Look at the number of people we have in jails. It's not a hidden fact," she said. "We've been talking about the justice system and how people are getting trapped in there for years."
Tears and shock
The verdict was met with sighs of relief and hugs among Khill's supporters in court, including his wife, Melinda Benko, who was with him on the night of the shooting and dissolved into tears, crying into the shoulder of a woman sitting next to her.
There were tears among Styres' supporters too. Hill began sobbing as the verdict was read and had to be held up by two women wearing T-shirts with the words #JusticeForJon printed on the front as she was walked out of the room.
Another man stormed out, angrily saying "This is f--king bullshit."
The emotional responses the gallery contrasted with Khill's, who remained largely expressionless as he learned of his acquittal.
"Mr. Khill, you're free to go," said Superior Court Justice Stephen Glithero.
"Thank you, your honour," he replied.
Two court officers stood between Khill and everyone else in the courtroom until it cleared.
Training kicked in
The jury reached its verdict after a trial that ran for just over two weeks. During that time the jury heard from Khill, a former reservist, that he and his girlfriend were woken up by two loud, banging noises and when they looked outside, realized the lights were on in his 15-year-old GMC pickup truck.
Prosecutors did not deny that Styres was trying to steal Khill's truck on the night of the shooting.
Khill told court that at the sight of those lights his military background kicked in and he grabbed a 12 gauge shotgun from his bedroom closet, loaded it with two shells and headed outside to "confront and detain" whoever was out there.
He ran through a breezeway between his house and garage, opened the door and came up behind Styres, who he testified was leaning over the passenger-side seat.
"Hey, hands up!" he shouted at Styres. Khill told a 911 operator that night that Styres had turned toward him with his hands sweeping up to "gun-height."
But experts during the two-week trial testified that the angle of the shots showed it was their opinion Styres was facing into the truck when he was hit in the chest and shoulder.
Call for appeal
The Crown's position was that Khill was not acting in self-defence and that instead of calling the police and staying safe in his home when he realized his truck was being broken into, he "took the law into his own hands."
Assistant Crown attorney Steve O'Brien cited testimony from Khill's superior officer with the reserves who said military training also includes gathering information and never "charging blindly" alone into danger.
"It is inexcusable that he did not call 911," said the Crown, in its closing statement, suggesting also it was Khill's shouted instructions that caused Styres to jump in surprise, which was enough motion for the man with the gun to feel frightened and open fire.
The Six Nations council issued a press release Wednesday calling on the Ministry of the Attorney General to appeal the verdict, citing "questionable moments" from the trial including the judge's decision to exclude video of a police interview with Khill in which he described shooting Styres, and "non-expert" evidence about the effect of Khill's military training.
When contacted by CBC News, the ministry declined to comment on the outcome of the trial and the possibility of an appeal.
After the verdict, Khill was led out the back of the courthouse.
Manishen said his client wanted to thank the jury for their verdict and his family and friends for their support.
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Oregon “Assault Weapons” Ban Initiative Defeated
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By John Crump | ammoland.com | June 29, 2018
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Salem, Oregon –
-(Ammoland.com)-
In a surprising turn of events, Ceasefire Oregon and other supporters of the anti-gun Initiative Petition 43 has called it quits.
Initiative Petition 43 would put a so-called “assault weapons” ban on the Oregon ballot in November 2018. The ban would outlaw the sale or transfer of any semi-automatic rifle or pistol that has a detachable magazine that can hold more than ten rounds. The supporters of the initiative would have needed to collect 88,164 verified signatures by July 6th, 2018.
Gun rights advocate Roger Beyer raised a legal challenge against Initiative Petition 43. In the suit, he claimed it, “uses the politically charged and emotionally laden words, ‘assault weapons,' and ‘large capacity magazines.'
The description is also misleading, argumentative, and deceptive because it implies the measure applies only to a limited and belligerent group of ‘assault weapons' gun owners.”
There is a law in Oregon that a ballot title cannot be misleading, argumentative, or deceptive. The courts were initially due to decide the case by June 30th. While the case was going on Ceasefire Oregon and other anti-gun front groups were busy training people to persuade other citizens to sign their names on the petitions.
The anti-gun groups were not allowed to start collecting the signatures until the courts decided the case, and they were preparing to do just that. These groups believed that they would be able to get the required number of signatures by getting church congregations to sign their names.
Pro-gun groups such as the
Oregon Outdoor Council
,
Oregon Firearms Federation
(OFF), the NRA spent countless dollars fighting the initiative in court. Their efforts paid off when the Oregon Supreme Court temporarily blocked IP 43. This temporary injunction would mean the earliest Ceasefire Oregon would be able to collect signatures would be July 6th, 2018 which is the day of the deadline.
Ceasefire Oregon, realizing that they would not be able to collect the number of signatures needed to make the ballot quietly pulled their petition rather than failing in gathering the signatures.
Ceasefire Oregon is refusing to admit the apparent court defeat.
“We are planning to move forward,” Penny Okamoto, director of Ceasefire Oregon told the Mail Tribune. “If not through IP43 then through another way.”
Okamoto pointed to the possibility of getting a measure on the ballot in 2019 or 2020. She also looked to the chance of getting some action passed through the Oregon Legislature. She also blamed the defeat on court delays hinting that pro-gun groups used these delays as a weapon to push back against their anti-gun initiatives.
With the failure of Initiative Petition 43, Anti-gun groups also pulled IP 44 citing the amount of time it would take to rewrite the initiative to comply with the Oregon law and avoid a court challenge. These anti-gun groups said that the time spent fixing the effort wouldn't allow them enough time to collect the required amount of signatures.
Initiative Petition 44 would have regulated how gun owners stored their firearms. Firearms owners would be liable for any misuse of their guns even in cases where criminals stole their guns.
Even though pro-gun groups defeated these two initiatives, Ceasefire Oregon has vowed to keep fighting to push their anti-gun agenda ahead.
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WANSTALLS RANGE DAY
July 15, 2018
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Alrighty everyone, Range Day tickets are live and for sale. Make sure you pay attention to the time you select! Stay tuned for a giveaway for a pair of tickets! Fire the 1919 machine gun with all proceeds going to the Canadian Shooting Sports Association!
Click
HERE
to buy your tickets!
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WFSA on Firearm Marking Requirements ––
Third Review Conference on the Programme of Action
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Speech by Torbjörn Lindskog, President | World Forum on Shooting Activities | June 20, 2018
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Mr. Chairman, my name is Torbjörn Lindskog, and I am the President of the World Forum on Shooting Activities (WFSA), a UN EcoSoc NGO.
The WFSA is composed of over 50 associations throughout the world, many of which represent the firearms industry. This makes us unique, in that we are in a position to present the global perspective of both firearms users and industry experts on many of the topics that will be discussed at this conference.
One of the issues we believe we can both assist with and educate this body on are firearm marking requirements. At the preparatory meeting to this conference we took note of speeches and side-events purporting to represent best practices and opinions from all of industry; however, many of the sentiments expressed were not truly in line with those of the global firearms community.
Specifically, we witnessed calls for all parts and components of a firearm to be marked, but while making these appeals rarely did we note a proper understanding of what a firearm is or how it works. Notably, many failed to identify the one and only truly essential part of every firearm, the part that is not interchangeable and remains true no matter what the configuration of a firearm is; its frame or receiver.
A firearm’s frame or receiver provides housing for the hammer, bolt or breechblock, and firing mechanism of a firearm. It is usually threaded at its forward portion to receive the firearms barrel. In plain English, a “[frame or] receiver is similar to the chassis of a car. It houses the operational parts that make a gun fire, much like the chassis houses the engine, transmission and other mechanisms necessary to make an automobile operate.”
[1]
All firearms contain a multitude of parts and components, many of which require replacement over time. These parts can range from a simple spring to a completely new barrel. But for all the parts and components required to manufacture and maintain a firearm, the only part that cannot be changed or removed without creating an entirely new firearm is its frame or receiver. In other words, just like the chassis of a car, the frame or receiver of a firearm is the one part that all others require to be fully functional. It is for this reason that States, such as the U.S., have determined that a frame or receiver alone, even without any parts or components attached, is itself considered a firearm which must be marked.
[2]
Properly marking a firearm’s frame or receiver provides an easily identifiable component that law enforcement can reference to quickly trace an illicit firearm. It is simple, straightforward, and effective, providing all the information necessary to perform a proper tracing request. Accordingly, requiring the marking of more than the frame or receiver is foolhardy.
There are countless thousands of models and variants of firearms in the world, some of which have life spans of over 100 years. While many have had parts changed out over the years, all maintain their original frame or receiver. No new part or component can ever change the origin of a firearm, but new parts and components with additional markings can and do cause confusion to law enforcement, often leading to misreported tracing requests and inaccurate or false reporting results. In other words, calls for more marking only serve to make for good sound bites.
We would also be remiss if we did not take this opportunity to briefly address calls for the marking of ammunition. Removing from the equation law abiding citizens who reload their own cartridges, American manufacturers alone produce 8 billion of rounds of ammunition each year, while only a handful of rounds are used to commit a crime. Not only has ammunition marking technology been proven ineffective, but burdening manufactures with the requirement to implement technology capable of marking each round, let alone requiring the maintenance of those records, is unrealistic.
Other technology, such as the micro stamping of a firing pin, has been proven unsuccessful. A firing pin can be altered or destroyed with a simple file, and any criminal intent on committing a crime can easily pick up expended shell casings at a sporting range and deposit a handful of spent shells at a crime scene to completely alter the course of an investigation or simply manufacture their own rounds. Included in the printed copy of this speech is a link to the research of Dr. C. Rodney James, an outside expert who supports this position and discusses it in far greater detail..
We sincerely hope that you consider our collective expertise on these issues as discussions continue over the course of this conference. Thank you Mr. President.
[1]
U.S. v 1,100 Machine Gun Receivers, 73 F.Supp.2d 1289, 1291 (D.Utah 1999)
[2]
18 U.S.C.A. §§ 921(a)(3) & 923(i)
To learn more about the World Forum on Shooting Activities, visit
HERE.
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Keith Beasley is on an exciting 'do-it-your-self' mountain hunt in British
Columbia with friend Jim Glaicar. They jet boat into the mountain ranges and
hike on foot and camp in the wilderness as they hunt for everything from moose to elk.
FIND THE CITR SCHEDULE
HERE
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BUGLING BULLS OF THE ROCKIES
Airing July 8, 2018
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Looking for upcoming gun shows and matches?
Visit our
WEBSITE
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NORTH AMERICAN DEER HUNTER
Magazine
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The
Summer 2018
edition of North American Deer Hunter is here!
This digital magazine is
created for and dedicated to North America's Deer hunting community.
Subscribe for FREE
HERE
today!
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Self Defense Stories You Don’t See in the Mainstream News
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By Rob
Morse | ammoland.com | July 3, 2018
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Louisiana
(Ammoland.com)-
Here is some news you won't find in the mainstream media. Again this week, responsible gun owners defend themselves and the people they love.
Self-defense instructor David Cole joins the
Self Defense Gun Stories Podcast
to look at three new examples. Were these gun owners lucky, or were they trained and prepared? What can we learn from their experience? Listen and find out. (13-minute audio)
All three victims survived lethal attacks because they had a gun.
You’ve finished the dishes and are cleaning up when you hear a woman scream from the front of your home. You walk outside and see three teenagers beating a pregnant woman on the sidewalk in front of your house. One of the teens is hitting the pregnant woman with a handgun. You draw your firearm and point it at the attacker. “Stop! Drop the gun or I’ll drop you,” you shout. The attacker drops the gun and all three teens run away.
The victim was a Dominos Pizza delivery driver. The three teenage attackers lured her to the house next door where they waited to rob her of her money and her car. EMTs took the victim to the hospital for observation. Police arrested and charged the teenagers, two boys and a girl, all 16 years old.
It is the afternoon when you hear someone trying to break into your basement door. You get your gun. The intruder walks up onto your back porch and tries to open your back door. The door is locked. You shout for the stranger to go away and that you are armed. The man picks up a retaining wall stone and breaks the glass of your back door. Then he reaches inside to unlock the door. Your two daughters are inside behind you. You shoot your invader. Now he runs and you call police.
EMTs take him to the hospital. Police report that the intruder met your daughter online and he lives in another country.
It is early in the morning. You pull into a convenience store for gas and a cup of coffee. You’re walking to the register when you see the reaction on the clerk’s face. You turn around and see a man wearing a hoodie and a black mask over his face. He has a gun in his hand. The clerk runs out the back of the store.
You draw your gun and step to the side. The thief turns around and runs. He’d robbed another store a half hour earlier.
See the full story and hear the podcast
HERE
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HOW CAN GUN OWNERS PROTECT THEMSELVES FROM UNFAIR CHARGES? ... WITH FIREARM LEGAL DEFENCE INSURANCE.
We pay legal fees, court costs and time off work to attend court; up to $150,000 per occurrence (recently increased 50% for no additional cost!) and $500,000 total per policy year. Plus get unlimited legal advice through our toll-free Legal Advice Helpline.
What price for peace of mind?
The price is just $95 per year and
CSSA members are eligible for a $10 discount – click on “Buy Now” and enter the following exclusive club code to access your savings: CSSA001.
You are not required to disclose any information about firearms in your possession.
Firearm Legal Defence
insurance covers:
- Defence from prosecution should you be charged with an offence arising out of the use, storage, display, transportation or handling of a firearm;
- cases where a firearm is used in self defence, the defence of a person under your protection or the defence of your property;
- appealing an event where a licensing, regulatory or judicial authority refuses to renew, suspends, revokes, cancels or alters the terms of your firearms license. Note that this provision does not apply to new license applications.
It will pay for:
- The cost of retaining a lawyer or other appointed representative, including court fees, experts’ fees, police reports and medical reports;
- costs awarded by the court to opponents in civil cases if the insured person has been ordered to pay them, or pays them with the agreement of the insurance company;
- lost salary or wages for the time the insured is off work to attend court or any other hearing at the request of the appointed representative, up to a maximum of $500 per day, and $10,000 in total.
NOTE - FirearmLegalDefence is not a CSSA product but is highly recommended by the association and is used by our staff and directors. - Tony B.
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CSSA Home and Auto Insurance
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Team CSSA has partnered with our long-time broker, ThinkInsure Ltd., to offer you Group Automobile and Homeowners insurance through Novex.
You can save 12% off your automobile insurance premiums and 10% off your property insurance premiums.
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