Oh wow. I don't even know where to start here. Some article snippets:
In effect, it means that gun owners could walk free for brandishing their gun in a threatening manner or firing a shot indiscriminately to "warn" a potential assailant.
How do you determine a potential assailant and how do you legally justify it? If I man wearing a hoodie runs toward you in public, how do you know he's going to assault you or just trying to catch bus that's about to leave the stop right behind you?
Also - no mention is made about the 'victim' being responsible for where they shoot.
That also means gun owners would get blanket immunity from the state's "10-20-life" law, which mandates an automatic 10-year sentence for anyone accused of flashing or using a gun in the commission of a felony.
What does this have to do with anything? They are trying to defend themselves, which isn't a felony.
But, let's look at this another way. Let's say that the person thought they were attacked, shot the 'perp' but it turns out it was a choir boy running to catch the bus. Now they committed a felony manslaughter, so does the quote mean that they are protected from automatically getting 10 years for having unjustifiably shot a person and committed a felony? What??
"A person with a firearm is a citizen," Evers said in a recent committee hearing defending the warning shot bill. "A person without a firearm is a victim."
To some extent, I see what they mean by it. I'm a 2A supporter,
but this has
NO relevance or justification for firing a warning shot. That means nothing in and of itself. You don't have to fire a warning shot to effectively defend yourself with a firearm.
Other links I can't open now - blocked at work.
Closing thoughts.
I still can't get my mind around how they can justify warning shots. There's no way, no way that you can safely fire off a warning shot and always be able to say with 100% certainty that it won't hit anyone. One of the cardinal rules of handling firearms is "know your target and know what's behind it". You simply don't fire off a shot, even into the air. Granted, a falling ~180 grain average bullet won't kill anyone falling straight down, but if the arch is too low and it still carries forward momentum, it may.
It's going to take one dumbass shooting a passer by when he thought that the biker guy he was standing to was threatening him to cause massive issues.
If this passes (I don't think it will), it's going to quickly give all the responsible gun owners a bad name, when people will start brandishing guns around. The fallout from this will play into anti-gunner's field very nicely and it's going to be even more difficult to support 2A.
Frankly, I am so dumbfounded by the stupidity of the source of all this, that I can't even form a decent argument, because I'm baffled that someone would even consider proposing such nonsense.
