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Another finger gun gesture...

peter nap

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At some point the people have to stand up and go after those cops for "contempt of citizen." A few prosecutions would do the trick. Or, lots of noisy protests.

I couldn't agree more Citizen! If there is a law, Law Enforcement wil find a way to abuse it.

We're both old enough to remember penny loafers. Everyone would stick a penny in so you couldn't be arrested for vagrancy. Then the loitering laws, the separate washrooms between the races (Which was still on Virginia's Books in the mid 80's).

I think Skidmark's case made enough noise to stop the Locals from charging under the brandishing statute so now they're using Assault by Intimidation.
 
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Citizen

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I couldn't agree more Citizen! If there is a law, Law Enforcement wil find a way to abuse it.

We're both old enough to remember penny loafers. Everyone would stick a penny in so you couldn't be arrested for vagrancy. Then the loitering laws, the separate washrooms between the races (Which was still on Virginia's Books in the mid 80's).

I think Skidmark's case made enough noise to stop the Locals from charging under the brandishing statute so now they're using Assault by Intimidation.

Sez you! I am old enough to have relatives explain to me in my youth why penny loafers were called penny loafers, but thatz it.

I can't help it if you are old enough to co-author the zodiac. But don't go dragging me into your antiquity and getting me all dusty. :p:)
 

skidmark

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Ironically if he had used his middle finger as opposed to making a gun sign, he probably would have been arrested for soliciting for prostitution.

Several courts have said the upwardly extended middle finger is protected political speech - even when offered by schoolchildren much below the legal age of consent.

stay safe.
 

Wolf_shadow

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Grapeshot

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I guess I'm too young to understand this one... vagrancy is the crime of not having any money?

TFred

Vagrant - having neither gainful employment nor permanent home, therefore unacceptable, unsavory.

Shiny penny loafers were the outward sign of being acceptable, part of the "in group" - most often seen in the high school crowd who had no responsibility for either income or home. Penny loafers were the Air Jordan and Nike of their day.
 

Grapeshot

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--snip--

Yorkshire man faces an assault charge after a deputy said he made a gun gesture at him on April 6.

A Culpeper County Sheriff’s Office deputy was traveling on Ira Hoffman Road at 7 p.m. While at a stoplight at Rixeyville Road, the deputy saw the driver of a Nissan Altima behind him point his hand toward the patrol vehicle, Culpeper County Sheriff’s office spokeswoman Corey Byers said.

http://www2.insidenova.com/news/201...charged-making-gun-gesture-deputy-ar-1846598/


Massad Ayoob uses this gesture to demonstrate a response.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8x7Ro...layer_embedded

If the deputy truly felt threatened, one has to ask why he did not respond with a physical defensive reaction - drawing his handgun to protect himself from the serious danger to his person.
 

TFred

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Massad Ayoob uses this gesture to demonstrate a response.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8x7Ro...layer_embedded

If the deputy truly felt threatened, one has to ask why he did not respond with a physical defensive reaction - drawing his handgun to protect himself from the serious danger to his person.
Two thoughts...

On the video... no provision for the states where the driver is legally carrying without a permit.

On the finger pointing... yes, it would make for a very interesting line of questions by the "pointERS" defense attorney:

"Officer Pansee, when the defendant pointed his finger at you, did you draw your firearm?"

"No sir."

"Did you draw your mace, baton, any other weapon?

"No sir."

"Office Pansee, are you not trained to defend yourself when confronted with a dangerous situation?"

You see where this could go... :)

Almost like the urban legend, "Officer, how did you know the defendant was carrying a concealed handgun?" "I saw it." "Case dismissed!"

TFred
 

sawah

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Virginia
Two thoughts...

On the video... no provision for the states where the driver is legally carrying without a permit.

On the finger pointing... yes, it would make for a very interesting line of questions by the "pointERS" defense attorney:

"Officer Pansee, when the defendant pointed his finger at you, did you draw your firearm?"

"No sir."

How do you differentiate between a pointing finger and a hand configured like a pointed firearm. IMO in the both the index (pointing) finger is extended and the rest of the fingers are wrapped or folded on the palm. The hand and arm and direction of pointing is the same for a person indicating 'he went thataway' and 'I'm indicating shooting you in a comedic way'.

By the way the 'shooting someone with your finger' has to be considered humor even if 'black humor' because, after all, your finger can't project a projectile and harm anyone so you can't be serious.

You'd have to say that the ONLY thing that's defines a finger as a firearm is if:
1. You extend your thumb to indicate a 'hammer'
2. You blow on the finger to indicate a wild-west gesture of blowing away the smoke if old style black powder was used
3. You simulated a recoil.

I seriously doubt that a LEO could prove that someone was doing a specific type of pointing in a serious attempt to intimidate them versus just pointing a finger at them (as in wagging one's finger like a mommy).

So how these LEOs get people arrested is pretty strange.
 

user

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What I want to know is, how are they going to prove that the cop was intimidated? What was it he was going to do, and felt restrained from doing, because of that gesture?
 

Grapeshot

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High definition TV

What I want to know is, how are they going to prove that the cop was intimidated? What was it he was going to do, and felt restrained from doing, because of that gesture?

His eyes "narrowed" and his field of vision became limited - it happens in moments of stress. All recorded by the street corner nanny cam. I know it happened because I saw it on an episode of Surry Cops. He was so intimidated/traumatized that he may need to seek another form of employment - doesn't that give him standing? Anyway, that's my story and I'm sticking with it.
 

sccrref

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If pointing a finger means you are shooting at the person, flipping them the bird will get you arrested for sexual assault as you are screwing them without their consent. If it is male on male or female on female, there are probably some other charges here in the common wealth. This is getting rediculous.
 
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Grapeshot

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If pointing a finger means you are shooting at the person, flipping them the bird will get you arrested for sexual assault as you are screwing them without their consent. If it is male on male or female on female, there are probably some other charges here in the common wealth. This is getting rediculous.

Not so - "flippin' the bird" would seem to be a protected right.

While targets of the gesture may find it impolite, insulting, offensive, vulgar, rude, or crude, the Supreme Court in Houston v. Hill eloquently stated that “the First Amendment recognizes, wisely we think, that a certain amount of expressive disorder not only is inevitable in a society committed to individual freedom, but must itself be protected if that freedom would survive.

”529 In other words, even if “[t]hese days, ‘the bird’ is flying “[t]he freedom of individuals verbally to oppose or challenge police action without thereby risking arrest is one of the principal characteristics by which we distinguish a free nation from a police state”); Rutzick, supra note 236, at 10 (“To close the door on the most vigorous political protest would seem to do far more harm in the long run
than the likelihood in the short run of violent reactive conduct [by a public authority figure] or harm to the ‘sensibilities.’”). 527 Authority figures theoretically are less likely to be provoked to a violent reaction or to suffer harmed sensibilities than private citizens. See Hill, 482 U.S. at 453, 461 (striking down city ordinance that proscribed “interrupt[ing] a police officer in the performance of his or her duties”);

see also Webster v. City of New York, 333 F.
Supp. 2d 184, 189-92, 201-02 (S.D.N.Y. 2004) (holding that partygoers’ comments toward police constituted protected criticism of officers’ actions where one “hysterical” partygoer was “screaming [her] head off,” and several of her companions loudly questioned whether police had authority to make any arrests during hostile encounter between police and citizens). Based on the nature of their work, authority figures — especially police officers — are expected to tolerate some potentially offensive speech activity.
See Lewis v. New Orleans, 408 U.S. 913, 913 (1972)

(Powell, J., concurring) (suggesting that fighting words exception to First Amendment may apply differently when words are addressed to police officer rather than to ordinary citizen, because officers are “trained to exercise a higher degree of restraint”); see also Rutzick, supra note 236, at 10 (“Whatever is assumed about the reaction of the average individual to offensive words, police are employed to keep the peace rather than breach it and are assumed to be trained to remain calm in the face of citizen anger . . . .”).

528 See Sullivan, 376 U.S. at 283 (holding that states may impose liability for libelous speech in limited circumstances); supra Part II.A (arguing that the middle finger gesture, when used alone, does not constitute fighting words); supra Part II.B (arguing that the middle finger gesture does not fall within scope of legal definition of obscenity).
529 Hill, 482 U.S. at 472.

http://volokh.com/2010/03/04/the-law-of-flipping-the-bird/

http://www.wired.com/images_blogs/threatlevel/2010/03/middlefinger.pdf
 

Sheriff

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And to think when the late Greene County Sheriff William Morris sued the estate of a man who shot him in the neck and almost killed him.... the judge tossed the suit out and claimed getting shot was part of the job.
 
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