Quote:
Originally Posted by musigal
I actually agree with most of what Fared said. My own thoughts about the video are as follows:
*The police officer had no legal right to detain him without suspecting him of a crime, so why didn't he just A) say that he suspected him of carrying a loaded gun if that was illegal in his area or B) let him go? The police officer was not following protocol, and could therefore have acted better in this situation.
*That being said, the law student ALSO could have handled himself better in the situation. He was very obviously trying to make a point, which in-and-of-itself is ok, but he was being a dick about it. He could have been more civil in explaining his position to the police officer instead of shoving his face repeatedly into his failings.
TL;DR: There is no golden boy of the situation. They both kind of suck.
EDIT: HEY FARED, THEY'RE IN PORTLAND, OREGON (if you want to research local laws to make a more informed comment. I know I will!)
Open carry of long guns and handguns are both permitted in Oregon by anyone who is not prohibited (not a felon [like the police officer was trying to determine about the student], not convicted of a violent misdemeanor, not addicted to drugs or alcohol, and not involuntarily committed to a mental institution). Permits are only required for concealed carry of handguns (and MUST be issued if requirements of application are met, not issued on discretion). However Portland as a city has banned all loaded guns in public places, and the state law does not preempt in regard to unlicensed open carries. But guns may be carried openly if unloaded.
Analysis of new info: The police officer should have said that he suspected the man of carrying a loaded firearm in public (which would have been illegal in Portland, and therefore a legitimate reason to detain the student). Then the student should have shown him that the gun was not loaded, and then have been released as he had not broken any laws. Simple solution. Morons on both sides of the interaction.
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Well, my position does not change at all because my comment was
informed enough -_-. If you read what I wrote, you will see that the two states have almost identical laws in relation to this case's legal issues as the limited facts of the video present them to us.
1=Concealed firearms require permit.
2=Unloaded firearms do not require permit when openly carried.
3=Loaded firearms are illegal when openly carried.
All three key issues are the same here.
=The only difference which could be important here is the city/countryside area issue; however, as we do not have enough facts to ascertain if this is part of the main city or not, we cannot comment fairly there.
=As I said, the gun appears loaded, but even if it is not, he behaviour caused alarm which is enough for the Police to question him. Note carrying an unloaded gun in public is not illegal, bt carrying it in a manner which causes alarm
can be, therefore the officer has every right to question him.
I am actually one 100% on the side of tyler, the fact the guy had a camera and was walking around with his gun on display is 'strange'. I did not include this in my legal review of the case because it irrelevant to the legal facts and would have constituted hearsay at best, but him walking around with his gun and camera read, in my mind, shows this guy is ether paranoid or doing this purposefully, just to get stopped and challenged by the police, so he could
fight the man and show how much smarter than a cop he is. :P I suspect the latter because he went to the effort of memorising the name of any case he could find on google which vaguely linked to his point, as if that somehow made him a Queen's Counsel.
Yer, well, Mr Douche, I could ring off 1223 case-names for my final third year exams, that does not make me a legal expert. [
Note, to those who do not know, a Queen's Counsel is the highest rank of Barrister (Lawyer with rights of advocacy) in the UK and certain commonwealth countries. I know several QCs and they would have disgusted by his behaviour. ]
Furthermore, this guy's disrespectful and irresponsible behaviour only provides people like myself with more evidence that easy access to guns is not a good thing, which means he has done his own side no favours.
You should also know that a police-officer stopping you to talk is not a form of detention, so the officer did nothing wrong there. It is only detention if he acts to stop you in the belief you are, have, are going to or would otherwise have committed a crime. Notice, the officer, for his failings, was smart enough to show he was merely carrying out an investigation of a report of possible safety violation. He never accused this man or stopped him from walking away. In fact, he openly said he was free to leave. This is probably why he did not try to bring any crimes against the guy, he just wanted to confirm that the guy was just a douche with little-man symodrone and not a psycho (thus wanting to run his name). Furthermore, the student appears to have willingly and without duress handed over the gun, so the Police-officer did not de-facto detain him through duress of property. Moreover, the Police-officer was then within his rights to keep hold of the Gun if he felt a safety threat existed, which the antagonistic nature of the student could be seen to present.