Pennsylvania appeals court rules finger-gun pointing is a crime

Discussion in 'Gun Control' started by kazenatsu, Oct 2, 2019.

  1. kazenatsu

    kazenatsu Well-Known Member Past Donor

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    A Pennsylvania state appeals court upheld a misdemeanor offense Tuesday against a man who pointed his finger as if it were a gun at his neighbors and pretended to shoot them for creating "a hazardous condition." Stephen Kirchner made the gesture at his neighbor, Josh Klingseisen, as he walked by his yard in Manor Township, in June 2018. He raised his arm, pointed his finger like a gun and "made a recoil motion as if to suggest he had shot him," the Pennsylvania superior court said in a Tuesday decision.​

    https://thehill.com/blogs/blog-brie...mxLOl2WsDdU1dOnh4bjldNiHaeLdEgjS_2O-_mJHkWWAE

    These crazies are so anti-gun that they feel even symbols of guns are threatening. It's spread into the court system, apparently.
     
    Last edited: Oct 2, 2019
  2. Well Bonded

    Well Bonded Well-Known Member Past Donor

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    That's just nuts.
     
  3. Tim15856

    Tim15856 Well-Known Member

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    Good God, snowflakes are taking over. I wonder if a finger across the neck would get you arrested since a make believe gun must be considered more dangerous than a make believe knife?
     
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  4. Nightmare515

    Nightmare515 Ragin' Cajun Staff Member Past Donor

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    This sort of thing makes me wonder how we ever survived as children growing up. We used to play cops and robbers, play Army, etc. Grab fatigues from someones parents, build forts in the woods and run around with super soakers and nerf guns. The local cops who used to patrol the neighborhood would routinely play with us whenever they saw us running around outside. Some of them used to keep nerf guns in their patrol cars and would roll up and pretend to chase those of us with our moms stockings on our heads lol. They would even "die" when we shot them and play the whole role and jokingly toss us in the back of the squad car if we got caught.

    Those were the "tame" years. Modern society would have a royal fit if they saw us as young teenagers who graduated from playing cops and robbers with nerf guns to BB and paintball guns....(which I will admit was pretty dangerous, still have a scar on my leg to this day).

    Fast forward to 2019 and it's a violet threat if you point your finger and thumb at somebody lol.....I love society...
     
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  5. Well Bonded

    Well Bonded Well-Known Member Past Donor

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    As a pre-teen my friends and I bought somewhat realistic looking revolvers, about the size of a .22 rim fire, the ammo was not strip like what was used in a cap gun but looked like a plastic small primer and made a nice loud bang.

    We would ride our bikes all over downtown shooting at each other and other some dirty looks, mostly from older ladies no one was threatened by us, including the Fort Lauderdale Police, other than once in a while a officer would make the finger gun and shoot at us, which would cause us to stop the bike and play dead.

    For some reason we never considered pointing our toy guns at an officer, they where our friends, run over a broken bottle or hit a curb too hard and ruin a tire tube and instead of walking home with it, a FLPD officer if he noticed it and had the time would put the bike in the trunk of the cruiser and drive me home, many times turning on the siren in front of the house to get my mothers attention.

    Officers where fun people and also understood we might see something they would like to know about, it was truly community policing.

    When I hit thirteen, I became eligible to ride shotgun with FLPD officers while on patrol, a program they called Police Youth Auxiliary, that was an experience that taught, matured me and really gave me a serious dose of reality at a very early age.

    I was raised in a middle class white neighborhood where everything was supposed to just peachy nice, riding on patrol four to midnight weekly, until I was 18 taught me that was total B.S., I was exposed to the reality and the dark side of that "Leave It To Beaver" non-reality, which none of our parents talked about.
     
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  6. An Taibhse

    An Taibhse Well-Known Member

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    I have at times questioned folks about their early experiences growing up in the US often wondering on the differences from where I was raised. On the one hand, by the age of 5 or so, after getting my first two wheel bike, my friends and I would often take off roaming the neighborhoods of the friendly sectarian persuasion or heading to the adjacent rural areas (with fishing pools). We usually rode our bikes to school for post school activities. Somewhere around age 7 many of us acquired Red Rider BB guns where we’d form teams, each wearing swimming goggles, and play war til we ran out of BBs. We didn’t range too close to patrolled areas because the police (the RUC) seemed to delight in scaring and abusing us... part of the game was peppering their cars or checkpoints with BBs (hitting one of them a bonus) and then scattering through the neighborhood that we knew intimately (it was rare to get pinched) by them. The bigger danger was avoiding roving groups (gangs) from other, unfriendly neighborhoods. Most at that age carried pocket knives, so situations could turn rapidly if you were down the numbers...though rarely deadly. That changed about age 8 or so, when we were introduced to zip guns and an occasional real gun though there were pretty specific long agreed rules on when they could be used in conflicts between youth groups. However, during some of the riots in the late 60’s, their use, along with other weapons became more prevalent and far more risky since children of that age could be viewed as justified combatants by the security forces and fair game. The game was still played, but the consequences and risks changed dramatically. Just getting to/from school posed risk and living in the constant state of danger became the normal... and being armed, or having access to arms along with joining groups (think gangs) for the safety of numbers became an adaptive strategy the still exists today. It was a perpetual ‘us vs them’, and for me and mine, the ‘them’ was backed by the security forces of the government government.
     
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  7. Nightmare515

    Nightmare515 Ragin' Cajun Staff Member Past Donor

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    Your story is why one of the exact reasons why I have the upmost respect for Law Enforcement. As well as my experiences with them from my younger years to today. You were a child living in what you believed to be a peaceful picturesque world, and it was/is Law Enforcement who mostly spend their time doing the best they can to keep your fantasy a reality. Of course as folks age they understand that the world is not exactly a nice place, and I'm sure you would have easily figured that out even if you hadn't rode shotgun with the Officers as a teen. But at least childhood you was able to believe in that.

    As with any group of people there are always bad apples, but the war on Law Enforcement that I see today absolutely disgusts me to the core.
     
  8. Political Master

    Political Master Newly Registered

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    So do I need to register my finger?
     
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  9. kazenatsu

    kazenatsu Well-Known Member Past Donor

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    12-Year-Old Kansas Girl Arrested for Pointing "Finger Gun" at Classmates

    The Kansas City Star reports:
    (article by Mará Rose Williams, October 09, 2019)

    Police hauled her out of school in handcuffs, arrested her and charged the child with a felony for threatening.

    Shawnee Mission school officials said they could not discuss the case, citing privacy laws, but did say it wasn't the district that arrested the child.

    "We don't do that," said spokesman David Smith. "That is not our job." He said the role of the district police is "not to enforce the law but to keep kids and adults safe."
    "We're sure that every teacher, student and parent of the Shawnee Mission School District will sleep better knowing that this real and present danger has been removed from Westridge Middle School."

    According to the powers that be in her school, the girl allegedly "communicated a threat to commit violence."
    A person familiar with a more detailed incident report spoke to The Star on condition of anonymity. The person said that during a class discussion, another student asked the girl, if she could kill five people in the class, who would they be? In response, the girl allegedly pointed her "finger pistol" like the ones many children use playing cops and robbers.

    Because of that gesture, The Star was told, the girl was sent to Principal Jeremy McDonnell's office, and the other students involved were also talked to. The school resource officer recommended that she be arrested, the source said. She was detained by police and later released to her mother. A hearing in the Juvenile Division of the District Court of Johnson County is set for Tuesday.
    You can attribute this kind of zero tolerance idiocy to a post-Parkland climate in which any normal childish behavior will dealt with in the strictest, most severe manner possible so as to avoid any possible future second-guessing of administrators, resource officers or security staff.
    Shawnee Mission's policies define intimidation as "any intentional written, verbal, electronic, or physical act or threat which is severe, persistent and pervasive enough that it may be expected to: Harm a student or damage a student's property. Create fear of harm to a student or fear of damage to a student's property. Interferes with a student's education or participation in a school-sponsored activity or event. Create an intimidating or threatening educational environment."
    Since the student is a juvenile and the district refuses to discuss the matter, it isn't possible to know whether the unidentified girl has any prior history of behavior problems, bullying, abuse, or other "red flags" that would warrant any kind of discipline, let alone an arrest and felony charge.​

    Insanity.
    And this isn't just an isolated incident. related thread:
    Police coming into schools, arresting children for misbehavior
     
    Last edited: Oct 10, 2019
  10. An Taibhse

    An Taibhse Well-Known Member

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  11. Shook

    Shook Well-Known Member

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    They probably want to eventually force you to not look at them in your abject submission to their arrogance and authority. Keep your head bowed and your eyes down.

    They are demonstrably that evil.
     
  12. spiritgide

    spiritgide Well-Known Member Past Donor

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    Very soon, we can expect to see the classic third finger salute becoming a sex-crime. That would seem parallel, wouldn't it?
     

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