Washington Post tries to get a D.C. handgun permit
Recently, Washington Post reporter Christian Davenport tried to get a handgun permit from the District of Columbia. Mr. Davenport’s lengthy article outlines just how little the vaunted Heller decision really did for residents of the District of Columbia.
While the handgun ban was overturned by the Supreme Court, the scope of the decision was extremely narrow. That lack depth has allowed D.C. to create enough bureaucratic hurdles to make it as difficult as possible to get a handgun permit.
It took $833.69, a total of 15 hours 50 minutes, four trips to the Metropolitan Police Department, two background checks, a set of fingerprints, a five-hour class and a 20-question multiple-choice exam.
Oh, and the votes of five Supreme Court justices. They’re the ones who really made it possible for me, as a District resident, to own a handgun, a constitutional right as heavily debated and rigorously parsed as the freedoms of speech and religion.
Just more than a year ago, by a 5-to-4 decision, the court struck down the District’s three-decades-old outright ban on handguns — the most restrictive gun law in the country. In District of Columbia v. Heller, Justice Antonin Scalia, writing for the court, said the Second Amendment guarantees the right of an individual to bear arms, not just Americans in a “well regulated Militia”; the District’s prohibition was therefore unconstitutional.
Reluctantly, Mayor Adrian M. Fenty’s administration set up a process through which about 550 residents — now including yours truly — have acquired a handgun. But as my four trips to the police department attest, D.C. officials haven’t made it easy.
Which was exactly their intent. The day the Heller decision was announced, Council Chairman Vincent C. Gray (D) vowed that the city was still “going to have the strictest handgun laws the Constitution allows.” Fenty decried the ruling, saying that “more handguns in the District of Columbia will only lead to more handgun violence.”
Under threat of additional litigation, however, the city has already had to ease some of its initial restrictions by greatly expanding the range of gun models, including semiautomatic handguns, residents are allowed to own.
You can read Mr. Davenport’s whole story below the fold.
Meanwhile, the battle over the right to bear arms in the nation’s capital continues. The lawyer who won the Heller case recently filed a federal lawsuit attempting to overturn the District law that prohibits private citizens from packing heat in public. Earlier this year, Sen. John Ensign (R-Nev.) attempted to do away with the city’s gun registration requirements.
For now, the D.C. regulations are still in place. That meant that on my journey to gun ownership, I had to prove proficiency with a weapon on the range and in the classroom. I had to allow the District government to fire my gun before I did so its ballistics could be recorded. I had to vow that I was mentally sound and not under indictment.
In the end, I got my gun. But I keep it locked in a box in my dresser. Because despite the fact that my government trusts me to own a gun, I’m not sure how I feel about having a weapon that can send a piece of metal the size of a thimble hurtling through space with such speed that it could make someone’s head explode.
I’ve been surrounded my whole life by people who see guns as a cause of social ill, not a cure. But what if they’re wrong? I live in a dangerous part of a dangerous city. I’ve heard gunshots from my bedroom window clearly enough so there was no mistaking them for firecrackers. And then, about a month or so ago, my wife went out to her car and saw the glass on the ground and then the shattered window. Nothing can make you want a gun more than that sickening, helpless moment when you realize you are more vulnerable than you had thought.
* * *
If I lived in Virginia, I’d simply walk into a shop, show my ID, fill out forms and then wait while the store calls for my background check, which can take all of three minutes. If I pass, the gun is mine. Or I could buy a gun from a private citizen and forgo the background check. No safety course required (unless I’m applying for a concealed-handgun permit, which is not even an option in the District). No need to register the gun with the government (unless it’s a machine gun, which is, again, not an option in the District).
In Maryland, the process is more involved (though nothing close to what you have to go through in the District): There’s an application, a background check, a mandatory 45-minute safety video and then a seven-day waiting period.
But I live in the District, where the path to gun ownership, believed by some to be designed to intentionally thwart gun ownership, begins first with a trip to the police department to pick up the necessary paperwork. Then there’s a five-hour safety course (four hours in the classroom, one on the firing range) with one of about 30 instructors certified to teach the class.
For those experienced with guns, the class may seem unnecessary, even ridiculous. But I’m grateful for it. I’ve never fired a handgun. Can’t say I’ve ever even held one. My experience with firearms is limited to .22-caliber rifles at summer camp, and a brief dove hunting excursion in Texas in which I never fired my shotgun.
The course I choose costs $250 (group lessons are cheaper), and is taught in Temple Hills by Isaiah Abraham, a behemoth of a man who also works as a Department of Defense police sergeant assigned to the Naval Observatory. He walks me through the basics: Always treat a firearm as if it’s loaded; keep your finger off the trigger until you’re ready to fire; never point at anything you don’t intend to shoot. Then there’s this bit of instruction that makes me shudder because I live in a Mount Pleasant rowhouse with neighbors on either side: Know your target and what’s behind it because bullets can punch through doors and walls.
We go over the parts of the gun so I can identify the difference between the hammer and the firing pin. Soon I’m learning to load a .38-caliber revolver with dummy bullets.
From the moment I wrap my fingers around the grip, the gun feels uncomfortable, unwieldy and so surprisingly heavy that my entire arm dips a bit as Abraham hands it to me. A toy it is not. As I adjust my grip, the muzzle dances wildly around, pointing its deadly black eye all over the room.
Disapprovingly, he takes the gun to show me how to hold it properly, and in his experienced hands the weapon is immediately obedient. Then again, guns have long been a part of his life. Growing up in Southeast Washington, he saw one of his friends get shot in the head “for candy money” when he was in middle school. As an adult, he worked as a security guard in the projects, and later, as a D.C. cop, he patrolled some of the toughest neighborhoods when crack cocaine was driving up the homicide rate.
It’s a cruel, violent world, he says. Which is why, when we get to the range, he’s going to want me to shoot with my left hand as well. Why? I ask. “If you get shot in this arm,” he says pointing to my right, “I don’t want you to give up.”
If I get shot, I think, it’s game over. Instead, I just nod and realize that beyond the safety requirements, general gun knowledge and instructions on stance, grip and breathing, he’s also preparing me to shoot at another human being. Because, really, isn’t that what a handgun is for? It’s not for squirrel hunting — certainly not in the District, where the law prohibits me from taking the gun out of the house unless I’m going to a “lawful firearm-related activity” such as the shooting range.
That’s why Abraham tells me to always aim for the “center mass of your available target” and to “pick up your weapon as if ready to fire” because, as he warns, a gun battle typically lasts just a couple of seconds. That’s why the targets on the walls of his office are in the shape of torsos, some with faces on them, so you’re firing at something that’s looking back at you.
And that’s why at the range, he wants me to pick up the gun and fire three shots in four seconds. Which makes my palms sweat even more. My hands shake, which causes the gun to quiver and Abraham to say: “If I can just get you to relax. Loosen up.”
The first shots are an absolute shock, a full-body experience I feel in my shoulders, hips and knees. The gun doesn’t fire so much as explode, kicking back ferociously, releasing a hot whiff of air and a bright red flash from the muzzle. It’s louder, more violent and more cannonlike than I expected, and I realize that part of me is more than nervous. I’m a little scared.
But also thrilled. There is a rush, a blood-pumping high, which builds with each shot as the once foreign sensation becomes more familiar and evokes a basic, even primitive, emotion. Like Zeus throwing lightning bolts, I control that frightening explosion. I make the red flash. I make the smoke curl from the muzzle.
Plus, it turns out I’m a decent shot.
I get several in the bull’s-eye. I’m no expert, but with each round, the gun feels more comfortable. The test feels like a game — an adult version of pin-the-tail-on-the-donkey.
I completely forget that the gun I’m holding is a deadly weapon.
By the end, I find myself having so much fun that I ask for the target to be moved back. For my last test, I want to try shooting two to the body, one to the head, which is more difficult than going for the bull’s-eye in the middle of the target.
I hit the body twice, but miss the head.
Later, studying my target, Abraham says I pass, which is a huge relief. But he points to a bullet hole a few inches to the right of the head.
“That’s an innocent bystander,” he says.
* * *
It may be legal to own a gun in the District, but you still can’t buy one within the city limits. At least not in a gun store because there are none. Instead, you must make the purchase in one of the 50 states and have the weapon transferred into the custody of one man: Charles Sykes, who plays an odd role in the transaction.
As a licensed firearms dealer, he could, theoretically, sell guns. But he chooses not to because “I don’t want to have to carry an inventory,” he says. “Too much liability.” Instead, he’s the middleman, the only licensed dealer willing to help D.C. residents acquire handguns, a nice little side business for which he charges $125.
So I head out of the city to Maryland Small Arms in Upper Marlboro. After shopping around a bit, I settle on a used Taurus Model 85 .38-caliber revolver. I like it because it’s just like the one I used during my instruction, though smaller. And at $275, it was a relatively cheap beginner’s gun, even though the dealer tacks on a $35 fee for transferring it to Sykes.
But the only thing I can bring home is the receipt. Only Sykes can bring the gun into the District, which he does two days later. The following week, I meet him at his office in Anacostia, and we fill out the registration form. Then he hands me paperwork from the federal Department of Justice that asks, among other things, if I am a “fugitive from justice” or if I have ever “renounced” my U.S. citizenship.
Next, I have to go to the police station — my second visit — to get fingerprinted and pass a 20-question exam that covers D.C. gun laws, a hurdle neither Maryland nor Virginia requires. Then I have to wait 10 days — considerably longer than in Virginia or Maryland — while police run a criminal background check.
Only then will the gun be mine.
* * *
The assumption from the beginning was that I would never keep the gun. This was to be a solely journalistic exercise: See what it takes to get a gun in the city. My editor, who had to persuade higher-ups at The Post to allow a reporter to expense a handgun purchase, assumed I’d sell it back when I was done reporting. My colleagues assumed that as well. My wife insisted on it. (I believe her exact words were: “There’s no way you’re bringing that thing in the house.”)
Guns are dangerous, especially in an urban environment. I’ve read the horror stories, and even wrote one a few years ago about the 3-year-old son of a White House Secret Service agent who shot and critically wounded himself with his father’s .357 semiautomatic.
The chances of something bad happening with a gun in the house might very well outweigh the chances of using it effectively in that kill-or-be-killed situation. What’s more likely: a Plaxico Burress-esque accidental discharge or a wild-eyed murdering-rapist crack addict breaking into the house?
“Criminals prefer unarmed victims,” read a bumper sticker I saw at a gun show a few weeks ago in Chantilly while mulling whether to keep the gun. Better to have and not need than to need and not have, I was told again and again by gun owners.
While I’d love to believe I will never need, my wife and I have often seen drug dealers in our alley doing their business. To no avail, we have called the police. A couple of years ago, a neighbor was nearly abducted in front of her house. And then my wife’s car was broken into while parked directly behind our house. Which led to another of the should-we-move-to-the-burbs discussions that have become more frequent of late. Once again, we talked about better lighting and alarm systems.
But is that enough, I wonder. Even with the fastest of 911 responses, isn’t a gun the only real protection in a doomsday scenario?
Still, I’m torn. Say the murdering-rapist crack addict is charging up the stairs, coming to get us. Would I, as he raises his gun, be able to fire mine? The District can make me take a five-hour class and pass an exam. But none of that ensures that in the heat of the moment my hands won’t be shaking so badly that I send a bullet hurtling not into the center mass of my would-be assailant but instead into the bedroom of my neighbor’s teenage son.
All of which raises perhaps the most difficult question of all: Does the gun indeed provide a much-needed layer of security in a dangerous city, or does it merely provide the perception of security?
* * *
After the 10 days, my background check complete, I go back to the police station (Visit 3) to pick up my registration, now stamped “APPROVED” in red ink. But that’s only the first step in what becomes yet another series of gun-related errands that eat up three hours of my Monday. With my approved registration in hand, I have to go back to Sykes’s Anacostia office, where he then turns the gun over to me.
When I get to my car, I put the gun in the trunk because the law says it cannot be “accessible from the passenger compartment of the transporting vehicle.” I’m still not done. Next, it’s back to the police station (Visit 4), this time so they can fire the gun and put its ballistics on file, which will help them identify the firearm if it’s ever used in a crime.
Then, finally, I can take it home. Two weeks after it began, the journey to gun ownership is over.
Unloaded and locked in a box, into the dresser it goes, in between my jeans and sweaters, out of view but not out of mind.
The act of firing the gun is a genuine thrill, and the gun itself is, I realize, an alluring work of art. The metal is sleek and smooth, the trigger tight, the sight a precise, simple and altogether new way of looking at the world. I take the gun — my gun — out of the box and, knowing it’s unloaded, pull the trigger. I love that satisfying snap as the hammer drops and the cylinder clicks into place, ready to fire once again. The gun’s weight, once solely the cause of angst and discomfort, now feels impressive.
My wife is adamant that that thing can’t stay, and makes a compelling case that it’s more likely to cause harm than to save us from it. And the more I think about keeping it, the more I’m convinced that the range is where the gun belongs. Not here at home, where it feels out of place, an intruder that shakes our sense of peace more than bolstering it.
Maybe it’s the wrong decision, maybe I’ll later regret it, but the gun is going back. And so am I . . . to the range, where I’ll shoot rented firearms. I think I’ve found a new hobby.
I agree with Geo–”Why waste time idly talking over the Internet about ethereal “rights” that none of us truly have? The only rights anyone has ever had are the rights that they TAKE BY FORCE. Simply arm yourselves, network and congregate, then make a stand: it is time for a revolution, nothing less”.
It is getting REAL close to a Show-down America! We will Win!! And we Will protect the Constitution!
No, The Second Amendment does NOT give us the right to have firearms – it merely affirms our God-given right – and the right of every sovereign (when did we stop being a sovereign people?). I’ve been carrying concealed for about 58-years, in the US and abroad – since I was 12, and forced to recognize the need, being targeted by over a dozen youths. Didn’t think I could run that fast. It was embarrassing, but my only option at the time. Something apparently changed about my attitude with the addition of that little Armi Galesi in my pocket, as I have never been accosted since. Being judged by 12 seems far more preferable than being carried by six – given the option. When my state adopted shall issue CCW, I got mine, as I would rather avoid than invite any fight – physical or legal.
Governments requiring their citizenry to prove a need or competence should be called upon to show some evidence that their gun-laws will actually accomplish the stated goal – which would be in direct conflict with the CDC&P’s “First Reports Evaluating the Effectiveness of Strategies for Preventing Violence: Firearms Laws,” October 3, 2003, which found NO EVIDENCE that any of our gun-control laws accomplished the stated intent. Anti-gun lawmakers and enforcers need to be judged by “Raging Against Self Defense: A Psychiatrist Examines The Anti-Gun Mentality,” Sarah Thompson, M.D., PhD, 2000.
Mr. Davenport, congrats on being able to purchase and possess a hundgun in the District of Columbia. I enjoyed your article but must ask you to re-visit your statement about living in Virginia and being able to purchase a gun. You are correct that you can purchase a “long gun” from a private citizen without obtaining any paper work from state or federal authorites but is an entirely different matter if you want to purchase a handgun from a private citizen. All handgun purchases must go through a Federal Firearms Licensed dealer for the transfer. There may or may not be a waiting period depending on the state in which you do the transfer and their will be a federal 4473 filled out and a background check will be done. There are many in the media and elsewhere that think you can waltz into a gun show and buy guns without paper work. This is true if you are dealing with a private citizen and purchasing a long gun but you will be required to do the federal 4473 and the dealer will do a background check if you buy any firearm from him or her at a gun show or his store.
For the first time in quite a while. I am encouraged by the responses I’ve read in this blog! For the record. Regardless of whatever laws may be passed in this country. I will never WILLINGLY give up my weapons, for ANY reason! I too am prior service. The same as many of the people who responded here. Having been trained in the use of everything from the 45, M-16, M-60, 50 cal., hand grenades, and MLRS Rocket systems. It is truly gratifying to know that my fellow service members, feel the same way I do! God Bless America!!!
Mr. Davenport,
I read your article with interest. I noted the awakening you experienced to the pleasure of target shooting, a sport in which one can compete against himself, i.e., improving in capability, speed, etc. One can also compete against others to achieve higher scores.
I also noted your descriptions of llife in D.C., hearing gunfire from your own bedroom, drug deals in the alley behind your home. Have you ever heard of a gun battle erupting from a drug deal gone bad? Your wife walked out to your car and found shattered glass and a broken window. What if she had walked out and interrupted the perpetrator(s) in the process? Might she have been in danger? Might not one or more of the local drug addicts be short of money and in need of a fix? If he chooses to kick in your front door, terrorizing your wife, will you ask him to wait while you step into the bedroom, retrieve your lockbox from the dresser drawer, unlock the box, retrieve the ammunition from its hiding place, load the weapon, review in your mind what you were taught back in 2009 when you purchased the gun just so you could write an article for the paper…oh, DAMN! you returned the gun because the District authorities don’t really want you to have one and your wife is as frightened as you were before you learned a little something about how to handle one. And now, the way your day is going, this sucker’s buddies will probably carjack you on the way to your wife’s funeral!
But cheer up, Christian, you are not alone. You live in the Nation’s capital where no decent citizen would consider owning a gun. As you walk/drive around the city, do you ever get the feeling the “decent citizens” are in the minority? A defenseless minority at that! You certainly have an idea of the quantity of unlawful gun owners in the District. Do you think they went to the Police Dept. four times to get their weapons? Do they keep them unloaded and locked in the trunk when driving? How many of them get caught? What is the punishment when they do? Unless they are in the actual process of a crime, it ammounts to a slap on the wrist, right?
If you want to be legal, you have already purchased the gun through proper channels. If you read the laws carefully, you will most likely see that it is unlawful to be CAUGHT carrying a concealed firearm. If you don’t do anything to cause the police to search you, what is the chance you will be caught carrying a concealed weapon.
The Supreme Court decision was a major first step. You can help your fellow law-abiding citizens by becoming an advocate for reform/repeal of restrictive gun laws. Check out the crime statistics where gun ownership is less restricted. Compare it to crime statistics in D.C., Illinois, New York and Massachusetts. Look also at the statistics of gun violence occurences among those who possess CCWs. Once you have done your homework and drawn your own conclusions about the wisdom or foolishness of gun ownership I would challenge you to in good conscience write a column decrying the gun-nuts who threaten the safety of the American populace. I am confident you will conclude the only threat posed by legal gun owners and CCWs is to the criminal element in our society.
At the age of 68 and a Vietnam Era veteran, facing up to the reality that we could soon lose our beloved country, I wonder how many of us will find ourselves falling out in the streets armed to the teeth – to take it back by virtue of our second amendment right to take down “a tyrannical and oppresive government.” I know we all dread such happening, but I am an old man, have lived a good life, and damn well have no intention backing down or away from that fight should it come. Although I would be honored to have our younger men alongside, I would rather us old guys be the first wave – leaving those with young wives and children to protect thier homes if we the first wave fall.
Now, that said, should evil men appear to confiscate my weapons, I shall deliver them outside my front door – with the barrels pointed forward streaming hot lead in a cloud of smoke and fire – a demonstration of thier purpose. But I have confidence that the majority of Ameicans are seeing and hearing well what is happening, and are likewise as fully prepared as I. I am encouraged to believe they shall fail before it starts.
Question: How many of our young people in our military, our cops on the streets and our COUNTY SHERIFFS – would even consider violating thier oath to preserve and protect our constitution, by obeying any Presidential or Federal Order to descend upon their fellow American Citizens, for the purpose of disarming them by confiscation of arms, and directive to shoot to kill any who resist. I tell you NONE – IF they know that the decent patriotic citizens of thier COUNTIES back them 100% in enforcement of our good laws, and will back them (not necessairly as an “organized militia”, but…) as a “well regulated militia” under his authority. Are we – and all our SHERIFFS – aware that SHERIFFS were the ultimate authority of thier domain with the ultimate power to protect and defend their people – long before our Constitution was written. The formation of our government has a double wall of protection. The SHERIFF to this day is endowed with the power to tell the Federal Government or even the President to get out of our COUNTY and stay out. The President cannot tell our Sheriffs what to do inside HIS county, and the Sheriff cannot tell the President what to do outside HIS county. If you listen closely, SHERIFFS say things like “MY JAIL”, “MY COUNTY”, “MY PEOPLE”.
Lastly, on these things I encourage you to read three things which will refresh, remind, and re-educate us. Look at these items closely to clearly confirm where our current problems originated long ago, who started it, who carries it on. “It” being the destruction of this nation from within, and at what point it will be too far and too late to reverse it. I am limited on computer skills so follow closely where we go here.
I “search” mostly on Yahoo. On your search, type in the following three sites and read.
american communist education – or go to http://giovanniworld.wordpress.com/2008/11/17/
a laymans look at the communist manifesto – or http://www.lewrockwell.com/orig/keller5.html
no sheriff left behind – or http://www.sheriffmack.com (book by title “No Sheriff Left Behind”)
If your local Sheriff doesnt have a copy, buy two, keep one, give him one.
You can order any of his other four books there – directly on line, but I think you must call to order this book, or click on the donate button to make a small donation and specify where you want the books sent. May God keep us strong to reclaim HIS nation.
Without a free America, there is no free world. The 2nd amendment to the constitution is the very last line of defense for a free America. Those of you who would attempt to abolish the right of the people to keep and bear arms will do so at your own peril. Thank GOD I live in Pennsylvania where I can pick out the gun I want, fill out the form, wait 30 seconds for a quick check call, and walk out with my gun. ( no wait, no fingerprint ) I had to wait about 30 days for my CC permit, only because of the fact that there we so many citizens ( read that patriots ) were preparing themselves for the last presidential inaugeration. By owning a gun legally, committing to protect yourself and your family, you are in fact being patriotic for exercising your constitutional rights. When asked why I needed a gun, I simply replied, ” because I still can “. NEVER give up your gun, ever.
Tell me…
How many states demanded ‘permits’ back in 1776?
We simply just play THEIR GAME by THEIR RULES!
We’ve ALREADY lost these ‘rights’…
Another sad commentary on how the public is so disconnected from the principal that they are responsible for their own wellbeing – not the police, not the federal marshall, not the airport security guard, but the individual. It is amazing to me that this man doesn’t have sufficient manhood to embrace the concept of self protection, and is more convinced of the legend of big brother as their protector. Worse yet that he won’t be someone who watches out for his fellow man (or his family) in the face of danger, but seemingly runs just as far and as fast as he can to get away from it – even after noting that repeated calls to the police department are totally ineffective.
A criminal will choose a 275 lb. Viking linebacker as a victim before he chooses my 110 lb. daughter with a .45 in her hand. The wife needs to shake the fear of a gun and start worrying about not having one when she needs one.
If the time comes you don’t get a second chance. Dog or no dog. The dog will go down as the first threat. She will be next. Carry. Be master of your own destiny. Not opine to the will of a villain.
There is only one chance. Make it work. You can’t if you are not trained and prepared. DC or small town Minnesota. Makes no difference. Bad guys are bad guys wherever you are. Save your rotweiler, he knows enough to save you.
When are people finally going to realize that “police protection” is barely a consideration when you live in a “inner city” or way out “in the country”? Where I am, the local sheriff’s office is about 9 miles from me and they normally have maximum of 2 cars on patrol for a long slender county. The chances of a car being within 20 miles is slim. Who you ganna call? Ghostbusters? That makes about as much sense as being unprepared does.
My first response is to protect my wife and my life. If you want in here, there will be a price to pay. Your sorry ass will be paying the price for your stupidity.
Several years ago I had a knock at the door at 2am on Halloween night. I turned on an outside light and looked. I didn’t recognize anyone out there. The next sound they heard was a round going into the chamber of my .45. And they knew what that sound was. The next thing I heard was “(my name)! DON’T SHOOT! It’s me. (her name) But it was Halloween and she was in a costume that changed her looks. She had a black wig that covered her normal blonde hair. And she also had a new boyfriend that I didn’t know. As it turned out she was a relative of mine and they had been to a party and ran out of gas on the way home.
Once ID was made, the gun was unloaded and put back in its place. I got gas for them and drove them back to their car and got them on their way again. And it took just 2 days (From 2 am on Sunday morning to Tuesday) for word to go all around the neighborhood and back to me that “He answered the door with a gun”. I really don’t have a problem with the neighborhood knowing that.
This just goes to show that you can’t really count on law enforcement to be there to protect you in times of need. “When seconds count, the police are just minutes away.” But you can relax in the fact that they will be there in time to try to hang you for using unjustifiable force or some other trumped charge against you to save face for the bad guys. After all, the bad guys have more rights than you do. The best thing you can do is make sure that there won’t be any testimony from the bad guy. If he was doing his best to earn a living with a job instead of a criminal career he wouldn’t be breaking into your house, would he?
To get back to the original story about owning a gun in DC – Does someone say you have to live there? Freedom isn’t really an affordable option there yet, is it? Good luck.
The problem is the targeting of people because of their “Political Speech” manifested in the form of bumper stickers AND the good mayor’s opinion that your rights are “Suspended” when stopped by one of his officers. You can send the mayor an e-mail at Cedric.Glover@shreveportla.gov
In the first year after the Supreme Court voted down D.C.’s gun laws, violent crime dropped 25%. Coincidence? I think not. I live in Va and I own rifles, pistols and a shotgun. But, break in after dark and you are safe from them. It’s the 6″ of cold steel you need to be fear. I know the house better than you. I already have a plan for any entry you choose. I will bleed you out. Thank you Marine Corps.
Mr. Davenport needs to think about this one scenario. How will he feel if his wife or child is killed by an intruder and he could have stopped it, EXCEPT for the fact that he returned the gun because he didn’ want it in his house.
My family is always safe when they are with me, because I am always armed. I shoot about 1,000 rds a month practicing for an event I sincerely hope never happens. A criminal would be safer attacking Mike Tyson than my family.
A person with a gun is a citizen. A person without a gun is a peasant.
[...] where are prospective citizens to go to satisfy your bureaucracy? Oh that's right out of the city costing them more money and time, and also requiring the probable precursor of private transportation. If you want this restriction, [...]