tvc184

Note that (a) is about all illegal weapons (illegal knife, handgun, club) and (a-1) deals only with handguns. It is "an offense" under (a-1) if and it lists the crimes. So you reverse it to see what is legal if that makes sense. Such as... it is an offense if the handgun is (1) plain view. That means that it is "not a crime" if it is concealed. The law is kind of stated the opposite of the way people discuss it. The law doesn't say "it is legal if concealed, not committing a crime, etc. Laws generally say what the crimes is, not what is legal.    The reason I bring that up is that people are looking for what is "legal" and they skip down to (a-1) and simply see the words "plain view" and their mind is on the "what is legal?" question. I have had people argue with me that they read the law and saw it was legal IF in plain view. I have to point out that the law lists what is a crime, please reread.   Then (a-1)(2) goes into the parts about committing other crimes (like Boating While Intoxicated, Possession of Marijuana, etc.), being able to legally own the firearm to begin with and not a member of a criminal street gang.    § 46.02. UNLAWFUL CARRYING WEAPONS.   (a) A person commits an offense if the person intentionally, knowingly, or recklessly carries on or about his or her person a handgun, illegal knife, or club if the person is not: (1) on the person's own premises or premises under the person's control; or (2) inside of or directly en route to a motor vehicle or watercraft that is owned by the person or under the person's control.   (a-1) A person commits an offense if the person intentionally, knowingly, or recklessly carries on or about his or her person a handgun in a motor vehicle or watercraft that is owned by the person or under the person's control at any time in which: (1) the handgun is in plain view; or (2) the person is: (A) engaged in criminal activity, other than a Class C misdemeanor that is a violation of a law or ordinance regulating traffic or boating; (B ) prohibited by law from possessing a firearm; or (C) a member of a criminal street gang, as defined by Section 71.01.

A boat under a change in the law a couple of years ago is the same as a vehicle. No CHL needed. It must be concealed, you cannot be committing another crime (like BWI) and you must already have the right to possess the handgun (not convicted felon). Texas Penal Code 46.02 UCW

A terrorist is a criminal, period. It doesn't matter if he is in a group of people flying a plane into a building killing thousands of people or a lone person shooting a single person because of a political opinion.    Speeding and DWI are both traffic crimes and both can and do kill.    Things are not always the same however just because they are grouped together.    Honestly, how many people have been killed by people protesting abortions? Who is likely to be killed by such an attack?    Looking at Wikipedia as a source, in the last quarter of a century, 8 people have been murdered due to abortions. The attacks were targeted and not random people for the sake of terror. All of the victims worked at the abortion clinics.     In the last 33 years, an additional 11 people have been wounded or kidnapped. Let's see, in more than 3 decades we have not quite 20 known victims killed or wounded by abortion clinic attacks. That is an average of a single victim every year and a half.    None of them bombed a mall full of people in order to call attention to the cause. No one kidnapped planes and flew them into buildings. No one threw hand grenades into a bus full of random people. None of them took over a cruise ship and threw people in wheel chairs overboard.    When the abortion clinic attacks have happened, I have seen almost no one support the killings from the Christian religion. The abortion terrorists are an anomaly just like the Westboro Baptist Church. Yeah, they exist but they are minuscule in percentages and have no support in the mainstream. When an abortion doctor is killed you will not see Christians in this country taking to the streets and cheering like their team just won the Super Bowl. You will more likely see disgust and condemnation.    That is not the same as the Muslim terrorists that we have seen and will continue to seen. They are targeting people totally at random, killing many including women and children and no one is safe including people of their own religion. They kill for the sake of killing. They aren't killing an abortion clinic to doctor to save an unborn child's life.    When some of the more horrific Muslim terror attacks happen, you will see thousands of like minded people in the streets around the globe cheering the events. When I see such a response, it sure seems to be to be more than 0.01% of the religion. I have seen religious and national leaders in Muslim majority nations take the the podiums to cheer mass killings and to encourage others. I have yet to see that in an abortion clinic attack in this country.    Yes, they are all criminals. An 18 year old kid that steals a candy bar and a person that commits and armed robbery are both criminals that committed theft by various means. I would hardly call them the same.    Approximately (again Wikipedia) 75% of this nation is Christian or Jewish. Only 0.6% are Muslims. What are the odds of being killed in a terror attack from the less than 1% as compared to 75% based solely on religion? And remember that the people being targeted by abortion clinic attacks are likely attacking people of their own religion. They aren't attacking Muslim or Jewish doctors.    A terrorist is a criminal, period.  I think a lot of people in this country are wary of future attacks from Muslims and have some level of fear due to that threat. I doubt many people in this country walk  around being worried about being killed by a Christian terrorists for any reason. When a religion in this country has more than 220 million followers but the members of another religion with less than 1.8 million people can strike more fear in the hearts of the average person, there might be smoke where that fire is. For that reason I suspect that a majority of Americans have a hard time comparing them and seeing them as equal.   And for a comparison and a possible claim of it being just a different religion is why there is the distrust or hatred of Muslims, about as many people are Buddhists in this country as there are Muslims. I don't think many Christians or Jews (or even a single person) are worried about being attacked by Buddhist terrorists. 

  Yes but he turned himself in. 

Caught.

.....or lay off the bath salts.

Very true and profound statement.

It does seem to be quite a stretch….....

The suspect has been arrested. The point of the rioters in every case recently is the lack of (their claim) justice with no charges. While I think that in almost every instance they are full of crap, there at least is the correct claim of no charges of what they (wrongly) believe is an injustice and police "getting away with it". In the case of the officer where the case has been made, where can there be a claim of injustice or the guy got away with it?

Yes and no. Technically it is Att Capital Murder of a Peace Officer. That crime is a 1st degree or up to 99 years in prison. But we likely won't use that charge. Under Aggravated Assault (using deadly weapon) of a Peace Officer it is also a first degree felony but with no need to prove intent.

Medium complexion. Kfdm has a photo of him.

    Brandon Charles, I think 25 years old. It happened about 5 blocks from your old residence. 

Yeah. I was on scene pretty quickly trying to cut off the suspect.

    Yes, I was on scene.    Officer not hit.

Every police dept has polucy on prisoners. Ours is that if a person asks for medical treatment or if they appear to be seriously injured/ill, we bring them to the hospital or call EMS immediately. I was the supervisor on scene once after a foot chase of a guy with a bunch of crack on him. We called EMS to check him out after officers tackled him. They said that he was okay and clear to travel. The officers started to put him in the patrol unit and he said that he could not walk and was losing feeling in his legs. The officers started to drag him to the patrol unit, saying that he was faking it to try and keep from going to jail. That is not an uncommon occurrence to fake injury or illness. I stopped them and asked the guy if he was really having problems and he said that he was. I had EMS put him on the gurney and get him out of there and quickly. The officers insisted that he was faking it and I agreed that it was likely. I was not going to take a chance however. I had an officer ride in the back of the ambulance on the way to the hospital in case he tried to escape. Fortunately we were not far from the hospital as the guy's heart stopped before he arrived. Since he was already under medical care and got to the hospital a minute ir so later, they got his heart started again and he ended up living. He spent a good bit of time in ICU after he swallowed a bunch of crack while we were chasing him. The point is that our policy is to err on the side of caution. Even I believed that the guy was full of crap. I cannot tell you how ecstatic the two officers involved were after it was all over and I had the guy ride in the ambulance. They were going to roll the guy to jail and he would have died in the back of their police car. They made sure to thank me several times. I am sure that Baltimore has a similar policy. Did the guy ever ask for help during this incident or did he display obvious signs of serious injury? If so someone is responsible to some extent. Does that make all six officer is responsible in a murder? Not hardly. For all that we know, all six officers could have gotten together and conspired to beat this guy's butt and cover it up. If so that they are all culpable as part of the incident. If so then they all need to be held accountable. I have the feeling that the DA does not have that kind of evidence however. I have no problem at all with the officers being responsible. Just like everyone else though, there needs to be evidence of it and not just politics to keep people from writing and to appease voters. Look at the case of the Lamar student that was recently killed in Beaumont. Even after arrests had been made, it took several weeks to get the information to a grand jury to present the case to get a murder indictment which I think came out this week. In the case of these officers in Baltimore, six officers that we don't even know were all on the scene, were charged/indicted within hours of rioting breaking out and the DA publicly stating that this was for the protesters. I find that hard to believe as is the usual way that law-enforcement and criminal justice is done. Had a citizen been murdered at a local convenience store robbery in Baltimore and the police made an arrest with several witnesses, you would almost never have seen an indictment within a few hours. That is just not how things are done. In this case that makes me wonder if there is actually any evidence to charge all six.

The same thing as always. Looking at video, showing photos, interviewing possible witnesses, swabbing for DNA, talking to informants, etc.

Maybe the people of Beaumont will riot and have chants of.... Business owners lives matter.

Really? Who is "they"? Six officers killed this guy? Let's say that six young black males were walking across the parking lot. The police show up on patrol and someone tosses down a bag of heroin that can get the person responsible 20 years in prison. We aren't sure who did it and there is a chance that some or maybe all of the others had no clue that a felony was even being committed, much less being criminally responsible for it. Let's say that one of them is Big Girl's son. Maybe the DA in Jefferson County should just charge every one if them. After all, they were all in the same parking lot. At least one of them is guilty. Let the others prove their innocence. Isn't that the way it works? No proof beyond a reasonable doubt, let's make them prove that they were not involved or face 20 years in prison. Sounds fair right? I am sure that BG would be satisfied with guilt by association for her son, even if that association was just being there and a member of the same demographics. Well that is exactly what is being done to the officers. Let's charge them all. I suspect that if the shoe was on the other foot as my example, there would be outrage at the criminal charges. We know that a man is dead, we are not sure how it was dome and not sure who did it but at least six officers at some point had contact with bim so they all must be guilty of some form of homicide or other crime. Just like BG's son woukd be guilty of selling heroin because he was walking across the same parking lot. If not, let him prove otherwise. When the prosecutor without a grand jury indicts six people and it appears to be merely guilt by associationand then makes the statement, this is for the protesters ..... not a witch hunt? Not a rush to judgment? Right......

    Bail is only to assure that a person returns for trial. I think there is little chance that the officers are going to flee.    From what I have seen in thousands of cases, people with no standing in the community or little to lose will not show up in court and there are probably hundreds (if not thousands) of warrants in currently in Jefferson County from people skipping trial or arraignment. 

  This is the most politically charge arrest that I have ever seen. It is even worse than the Zimmerman case.    Both the mayor and prosecutor made statements that should take them both out of the process. When the prosecutor goes public and says this is for the protesters around the country, she showed that she is a political idiot. She is supposed to be upholding the law because of facts, not to quell riots.    Maybe the facts are there and maybe they aren't (nothing made public says that there is any evidence) but just like the Zimmerman case, the DA chose not to go to a grand jury and almost immediately indict merely on her signature alone. There is a reason that Texas and I think the federal governments require a grand jury to review a case and issue an indictment.    Hopefully these officer's attorneys can get a change of venue and slow down the witch hunt. 

I believe that three of the six officers charged are black including a female.   So much for the claim that diversification will end the run ins between the police and black youths.    Maybe in Baltimore it is female officers and black officers that have the problem since that seems to be what police uses of force are based on in debates. 

  Pretty much. I have never heard these terms after so many years and so many defense classes.  It sounds like someone putting their own description of events like they were bending him over. The only kinds of bending or folding that I know is bending over to tie your boots and folding the flag. I have never heard an officer even behind the scenes and off the record saying something like we folded, bent, used a folding move, etc. 

  That is what I am talking about in the wording of the law and it being specific.   Robbery is a crime of violence. It is someone pulling a gun or knife on you and demanding money or causing you injury. That is not a property crime such a burglary (called breaking and entering in some states) and theft which is just stealing something.    TX law allows the use of deadly force to stop a robbery.    Did someone steal something from you (theft), enter into a home or business (burglary) or pull a weapon on you and demand money?

Under TX law, if someone enters your business without consent with the intent to commit theft, it is burglary. TX law allows the use of deadly force to defend against burglary IF (as determined by a grand jury and if indicted, a criminal jury) it was reasonable that a person in your position could not protect the property by other means or that to do so would expose you to serious bodily injury. If a single unarmed person comes in and is not visibly armed, I think you might have a hard time shooting someone and claiming it was reasonably necessary. If the person is obviously larger, more physically fit, armed or there is more than one, I think a TX grand jury or criminal jury would be very sympathetic to your claim of necessary force. In my opinion.

The last stats I saw on the issue showed that blacks were underrepresented on death row. Look at the known offenders by race and blacks committed slighly more than half of all murders yet are less than half of death row inmates. Even given for slight fluctuations from year to year (slightly over or under 50%) the results are roughly that blacks are on death row at similar rates to the known homicides based on race. I am not sure where a statement of three times more likely to get the death sentence comes from. If blacks commit about half of all murders and are 3 times as likely to be on death row, are they 150% of death row? I read an article on this topic a few years ago. From the stats I read back then, a black was more likley to have the death penalty sought if the victim was white. That doesn't change the numbers as far as death row inmates but it is not (theoretical) justice for black victims. In other words, one race commits about half the murders and occupies about half of death row. That half is mainly for white victims however. The injustice is not how many blacks are on death row but how many black victims of murder will not have the ultimate sentence carried out on their behalf. Maybe that is where the 3 times more likely comes from. The death sentence might be 3 times more likely sought if the victim is white. Of course then you have to toss in the stats that whites are way more likely to be the victim of a murder by blacks that the opposite of blacks being the victim of murder by whites.