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SeaTac apartment residents meet to discuss gun laws while open carrying

Manu

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http://www.king5.com/localnews/stories/NW_032809WAB-guns-apartments-KS.7e6c358d.html?rss?npc

SeaTac apartment residents meet to discuss gun laws

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04:51 PM PDT on Saturday, March 28, 2009
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[size=-1]By CHRIS DANIELS KING 5 News[/size]



SEATAC, Wash. - Some SeaTac apartment residents have a hard time forgetting the shooting which injured two people last month.

"It was a little unnerving," says James Beal, "I heard six shots."

Beal was home when a 17-year-old opened fire on a group of people. He's now trying to rally his neighbors together, while making a pitch about how he protects himself.

"I carry a weapon for personal protection as most people here do, and we feel it our option under the Second Amendment,” he said.

Beal helped sponsor a gathering Saturday at the Willow Lake Apartments, which he says was designed as a way to bring people together, to organize neighborhood "block watches” and talk about gun laws.

"I'm not advising it,” Beal said. “I'm just making sure people are aware they have the option.”

Roughly 40 people were there about mid-day, and a vast majority of them were carrying weapons.

Kristen Comer, of Operation Ceasefire, approves of Beal's effort to bring together the community to discuss the issues. But she says neighbors should ask themselves how comfortable they'd be with several apartment dwellers carrying guns.

"For the vast majority of residents in this area, is that what they want?” she said. “Do they want their neighbors walking around with the sidearms on their persons at all times?"

She believes organizers should be more focused on curbing access to guns on the secondary market.

King County Sheriff's Department Sergeant John Urquhart says anyone buying a gun should think long and hard about it.

"It's legal under state and federal law," Urquhart said. "But if you use your gun to scare or intimidate, that's violating another law, so be very careful."


Here is Video Link

http://www.king5.com/video/news-index.html?nvid=346642
 

Citizen

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Manu quoted:
SNIP King County Sheriff's Department Sergeant John Urquhart says anyone buying a gun should think long and hard about it.

"It's legal under state and federal law," Urquhart said. "But if you use your gun to scare or intimidate, that's violating another law, so be very careful."

What a load of arrogant manure. It seems apparent the Sergeant considers people too stupid to receive training.

I wonder when the day will come when we see police saying, "Great! We can't be everywhere at once. Our department will try to assist with range time. We recommend contacting a firearms instructor. Perhaps the community can get a group discount on classes."
 

Machoduck

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Alas, this is a typical police response; some way to make everybody wrong, as if we're all just a bunch of recalcitrant first graders whose affairs aren't worth anyone's time to judge. Not to mention that the police are always right; just ask them.

But yes, arrogant manure.

MD
 

bugly

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King County Sheriff's Department Sergeant John Urquhart is a Jack-knob, IMHO, I have had issues with him personally in the past (I have never been in legal trouble), and he is the least helpful and most misinformed officer I have ever had the displeasure of meeting face-to-face.
I apologize if he is a friend of anyone out there, but he is one of the officers that makes the rest look bad.
Again, this is MY opinion, your results may vary.
 

Bookman

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The KING 5 reporter twisted some things, and took others out of context. He had one of the residents saying it was like the wild west and making it look like he was referring to us when this resident, in fact, supports us and was talking about the gangs in the area, likes that we were there, and is planning to buy a gun of his own. Manu talked to him and his wife at length to inform them of what they could and need to do.

Also, DEROS spoke to the reporter for some time, emphasizing safety and responsibility. That part was totally cut.

All in all DEROS and Manu did an excellent job of putting this event together. It received a great deal of support from area businesses, and all of the residents I heard and spoke to said "I feel safer knowing he's around", referring to DEROS. I've heard ZERO negative comments from apartment residents there, and I visit DEROS fairly often.

The KIRO 7 report, while extremely short, was at least accurate.
 

DEROS72

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Thank youall so much for coming.Its all of us together that will present the strongest image in support of our rights.A really big thanks to Manu and bookman for assisting me in setting this set up.And thanks guys for the donations which really helped in covering cost. Also trigr doc great salsa I took alittle home to clean the oven.:lol:Thanks Gunr for bringing the roof.Now all we need to do is keep the momentum up.Igoing up to the Starbucks tomorrow to say thanks and tell the Safeway management how well things went .If any of you have pics you could post so I could show them that would be awesome.
 

deanf

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What a load of arrogant manure. It seems apparent the Sergeant considers people too stupid to receive training.

Specifically, what in Sergeant Urquhart's quote wasn't factual? I assume if you have a quarrel with what he said, there must be some factual dispute. Don't assign any inferences from the news story to his actual quote.
 

No1

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Which part of "shall not be infringed" isn't clear? Training is a slippery-slope to expensive training.
 

DEROS72

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They have run our story twice this morning.In a more positive light.
 

deanf

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I thought KING 5 did a pretty good job. I was amazed that there was no shrill objection from the Cease Fire woman.

There was, as always, a sort of raised eyebrow undertone from the anchors and reporters.
 

kparker

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Deanf,

I t think we're having an argument (i.e. we and Sergeant Urquhart) about policies and preferences, not facts, so asking us for facts is irrelevant.

What I find objectionable in this:

"It's legal under state and federal law," Urquhart said. "But if you use your gun to scare or intimidate, that's violating another law, so be very careful." [emphasis added]
... is the way that he glosses over justifiable use of force (which is yet another law, Sergeant, though perhaps you are not aware of that) so that if a person uses a firearm to "scare or intimidate" an assailant (i.e. the person drawing the gun had a reasonable fear that his attacker was intending to kill him or do him great bodily injury, and did not himself initiate the incident) it's justifiable in exactly the same way that actually shooting an assailant might be.

(And now that I've written this, I might need to retract my opening statement: Det Urquhart comes very close to lying by omission here, so maybe it is a factual matter after all.)

I have further problems with his overall tone, but before I discuss that I should issue this disclaimer: I fully realize it might just be an artifact of the reporting and editing process; I have no confidence that the news people are being any more accurate with his statements than they are with ours. That being said, I do want to respond to what was reported, and if that turns out to be a gross misstatement of what he actually said then it's his duty to raise a fuss about that (not mine to be silent just in case he wasn't portrayed accurately.)

So my second issue is this:

King County Sheriff's Department Sergeant John Urquhart says anyone buying a gun should think long and hard about it.... "... so be very careful."

All well and good, but where's the parallel advice to criminals? Why isn't he also saying, "That being said, I'd also like to remind anyone planning to commit a crime that Washington law allows almost everyone (but not you!) to carry a loaded handgun, and to legally resist an attack on their person with force, including lethal force if needed. So I'd recommend that all you burglars, muggers, and armed robbers out there consider another line of work."

I'm pretty sure Joe Arpayo or Reuben Greenberg would say something like that--what's wrong with our LE folks?
 

joeroket

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deanf wrote:
I thought KING 5 did a pretty good job. I was amazed that there was no shrill objection from the Cease Fire woman.

There was, as always, a sort of raised eyebrow undertone from the anchors and reporters.
I was also pretty shocked the Kristen Comer was not as objectionable as she usually is. Although I did not care for her comment that they should be focusing on keeping the firearms from the youths. It is not us giving the kids the guns and I think all of us here agree that those types of people should not have them anyway. Her other comment about asking yourself if your neighbors want you carrying a firearm on your person at all times was fairly stupid. What does my neighbors concern of me carrying a firearm mean? Nothing at all other than the fact that they might be uneducated and possibly have an unfounded fear of firearms.

As far as Urquhart's comment, I don't think he was lying. I don't care for the way he worded himself but it is fairly clear that he was talking about .270 which is what does not restrict OC but rather the manner you can use a firearm in. All in all it was not a factually incorrect statement in anyway.

I think this is a big bonus to us as it is now out there in the press that simply walking around with a pistol in plain view is not illegal. This information has just made it way to Hundreds of thousands of people.

All in all it looks like it went very well. Good job guys.
 

sv_libertarian

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Good work on the publicity!

As far as the Sgt. goes, what he said was factually correct, and I also fail to see the problem with suggesting people think hard about making a major decision as purchasing and carrying a gun. I'll bet a lot of people here have made similar suggestions.

Perhaps the problem is the cop didn't say what was wanted how it was wanted?

Really it looks like he was trying to toe a line, and may have even been told beforehand what to say. He didn't say not to buy and carry a gun, merely gave sound advice about buying and carrying guns. I think we have a long way to go before all cops are getting up and singing the hallelujah chorus with us.
 

Dave Workman

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Well, "citizen" and "Machoduck" and "bugly,"
John Urquhart is a friend of mine, and what he said is factually correct under 270 and even under State v. Spencer.

If you find what he said disagreeable, well... too bad.

Until we can repeal that onerous section of .270, we're stuck with it and bad behavior doesn't get any slack. And it shouldn't, particularly from us.

State v. Casad provides wider latitude on OC and narrows the "alarm" parameters, but doesn't completely erase them

Now, regarding "what part of shall not be infringed" that does or doesn't apply, well, none of it applies. The Second Amendment and language therein has not been incorporated yet to the states. It is a limit on the federal government.

Our state constitution applies. It says "shall not be impaired."

But that doesn't cover bad behavior with firearms, so you best get over it. If we encounter some twerp strolling around, packing visible iron and sort of visibly shoving that up under everyone's nose, that's bad behavior that reflects on everybody who carries.

The constitution does not give anyone the right to be a jerkweed with a gun.

The KING report, even with Kristen Comer's remarks, was straightforward, it presented Beal & Co. in a positive light, and seems to have presented the issue fairly. Nothing wrong with that.


;)
 

No1

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kparker wrote:
I'm pretty sure Joe Arpayo or Reuben Greenberg would say something like that--what's wrong with our LE folks?
Thanks for the mention of Chief Greenberg! My Chief Roddy Perry from neighboring Mount Pleasant had some issues with Reuben, but none the less, Ch. Greenburg was a good Chief and a good neighbor.
 

sudden valley gunner

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The spin could have been worse. The comment from the gentleman about 'wild west around here' was about gangs not us there and they edited it to look like he was talking about us at the gathering. I would like to see that clarified, to coincide with his later comment.
 

Dave Workman

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sudden valley gunner wrote:
The spin could have been worse. The comment from the gentleman about 'wild west around here' was about gangs not us there and they edited it to look like he was talking about us at the gathering. I would like to see that clarified, to coincide with his later comment.

I didn't draw that conclusion.
Seemed to me he was talking about the scumbags in the neighborhood who seem to have been carrying on without much law and order.
 

sudden valley gunner

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I am glad you didn't draw that conclusion, but when we watched it as a group it seemed that way, and many others might draw that same conclusion. Thats why I wished they would have not took his comment out of context but had his statementplayed in whole without being interrupted.

I also believe it was good though because it has reached thousands of news watchers in the Northwest,and many will view it in a positive light, and realize they are not alone in wanting to excercise their rights.
 

deanf

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I consider us fortunate to have KCSO and Urquhart . They could be quite hostile to gun ownership as a department policy, yet they are not. Compare theirs with SPDs official attitude about gun ownership and their (former) chief's activist nature. Two large police departments with concurrent jurisdictions.
 
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