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Gun owner to be charged in shooting
Josey1
Member Posts: 9,598 ✭✭
Why is it when the EXACT same thing below happens to an LEO,charges are NEVER filed.Can you say two class society?
Gun owner to be charged in shooting
BY NATALIE P. McNEAL
nmcneal@herald.com
The father of a Coconut Creek teenager who accidentally shot a friend will be charged with negligence for leaving his semiautomatic gun unlocked.
George Matiska, 57, of 4410 NW 10th St., Coconut Creek, is expected to turn himself in to police today to be charged with culpable negligence, a third-degree felony.
Matiska's 15-year-old son shot his friend in the face Friday night with Matiska's Jennings .380, which had been left unlocked in his bedroom closet.
''The weapon was readily available to the juvenile,'' said Coconut Creek Police Detective Sgt. John Leonard. ``Regardless of what values we teach our children, we still have to secure our weapons.''
Culpable negligence is defined as consciously doing something that the defendant must have known, or reasonably should have known, was likely to cause death or great * injury. It carries a penalty of up to five years in prison.
Matiska was on a dinner cruise Friday night, and his son had two friends over to visit. Police said the three youths smoked marijuana and played the PlayStation game ``Grand Theft Auto.''
Police said Matiska's son got the gun from an unlocked black plastic case in his parents' bedroom, and waved it around to show it off. As he did so, he shot his 14-year-old friend in the left cheek. The friend was treated and released at Broward General Medical Center in Fort Lauderdale, but the bullet is still lodged in his face.
At a news conference Monday, police played the 911 tape from the teen's call.
''I don't know what happened,'' the youth told the operator. He said the friend he shot was ``bleeding like hell.''
The boy said the gun simply ``went boom.''
Matiska's son faces charges of improper display of a firearm, culpable negligence and a felony charge for possessing a drug similar to oxycontin.
A community police officer rode her bicycle around the neighborhood Monday afternoon and urged residents not to talk to reporters.
Neighbors seemed upset by the shooting but did not seem surprised that Matiska would face charges.
''With the right to carry guns comes the burden of responsibility,'' said David Satinover, who lives down the street from the Matiskas' residence. http://www.miami.com/mld/miami/news/local/3760335.htm
"If cowardly and dishonorable men sometimes shoot unarmed men with army pistols or guns, the evil must be prevented by the penitentiary and gallows, and not by a general deprivation of a constitutional privilege." - Arkansas Supreme Court, 1878
Gun owner to be charged in shooting
BY NATALIE P. McNEAL
nmcneal@herald.com
The father of a Coconut Creek teenager who accidentally shot a friend will be charged with negligence for leaving his semiautomatic gun unlocked.
George Matiska, 57, of 4410 NW 10th St., Coconut Creek, is expected to turn himself in to police today to be charged with culpable negligence, a third-degree felony.
Matiska's 15-year-old son shot his friend in the face Friday night with Matiska's Jennings .380, which had been left unlocked in his bedroom closet.
''The weapon was readily available to the juvenile,'' said Coconut Creek Police Detective Sgt. John Leonard. ``Regardless of what values we teach our children, we still have to secure our weapons.''
Culpable negligence is defined as consciously doing something that the defendant must have known, or reasonably should have known, was likely to cause death or great * injury. It carries a penalty of up to five years in prison.
Matiska was on a dinner cruise Friday night, and his son had two friends over to visit. Police said the three youths smoked marijuana and played the PlayStation game ``Grand Theft Auto.''
Police said Matiska's son got the gun from an unlocked black plastic case in his parents' bedroom, and waved it around to show it off. As he did so, he shot his 14-year-old friend in the left cheek. The friend was treated and released at Broward General Medical Center in Fort Lauderdale, but the bullet is still lodged in his face.
At a news conference Monday, police played the 911 tape from the teen's call.
''I don't know what happened,'' the youth told the operator. He said the friend he shot was ``bleeding like hell.''
The boy said the gun simply ``went boom.''
Matiska's son faces charges of improper display of a firearm, culpable negligence and a felony charge for possessing a drug similar to oxycontin.
A community police officer rode her bicycle around the neighborhood Monday afternoon and urged residents not to talk to reporters.
Neighbors seemed upset by the shooting but did not seem surprised that Matiska would face charges.
''With the right to carry guns comes the burden of responsibility,'' said David Satinover, who lives down the street from the Matiskas' residence. http://www.miami.com/mld/miami/news/local/3760335.htm
"If cowardly and dishonorable men sometimes shoot unarmed men with army pistols or guns, the evil must be prevented by the penitentiary and gallows, and not by a general deprivation of a constitutional privilege." - Arkansas Supreme Court, 1878
Comments
Guns inside the courtroom
07/26/2002
A new Kentucky law went into effect last week allowing prosecutors the right to carry concealed weapons into the courtroom.
Although Sandy McLeod, the Assistant Attorney for the Commonwealth of Kentucky, hopes she would never have to use it, she's taking the necessary training required to carry a concealed weapon -- just in case she feels threatened by a defendant.
"We might feel concerned as to walking to our cars at night. Now, we're prosecutors. We're dealing with people who are violent offenders. You know, they'll kill you over a ham sandwich, if they have the opportunity," McLeod said.
Before the law went into effect July 15, only court bailiffs and other law enforcement officers were allowed to carry weapons into a courtroom.
Commonweath's Attorney Sandy McLeod training on a shooting range
However, some judges, who did not want to be identified, said they still have the authority to keep weapons out of their courtroom. They believe more guns mean more chances for the weapon to accidentally discharge or for a defendant to wrestle them away.
"So, the only person who you would have a fear of is the defendants taking your gun. And the sheriffs keep an eye on them. We've had a number of incidents in the last couple of years where a defendant would actually come into the courtroom and fashioned a knife jail or something while he was in jail, and had an opportunity to jump a victim or a defendant," McLeod said. "I would hope we wouldn't have to be the ones to have to draw our weapons."
Two years ago, Commonwealth's Attorney Fred Capps was murdered at his Burkesville home. He was scheduled to prosecute Eddie Vaughn on child sex abuse charges when Vaugh bursted into his home June 5, 2000, and shot him. Capps, also armed, returned fire and killed Vaughn before he died. The Cumberland County prosecutor's wife and two children were home at the time of the shootings. The murder prompted safety issues of prosecutors statewide.
"It's always in the back of your mind. When he died in a shootout really, with a defendant who he was set for trial for. It was a tragedy, but it's always something that is in the back of your mind. We're law enforcement officers, truly, and we're dealing with an element of society who doesn't obey the laws," McLeod said.
About a half dozen prosecutors in the Commonwealth Attorney's Office have taken the required training to carry a weapon inside the courtroom. According to the law, prosecutors won't be allowed to carry a weapon into the courtroom until they have had the proper training and have received their certification, which takes up to six weeks after completing the course. A similar law is already in effect in Indiana.
Web story rewritten by Victoria http://www.whas11.com/topstories/WHAS11_TOPSTORY_weapons_in_courtroom.2eefbc12.html
"If cowardly and dishonorable men sometimes shoot unarmed men with army pistols or guns, the evil must be prevented by the penitentiary and gallows, and not by a general deprivation of a constitutional privilege." - Arkansas Supreme Court, 1878
Kellie A. Wagner
The Connecticut Law Tribune
07-29-2002
John Lutters' "place of business" may be his taxicab. But just like the owner of a bricks-and-mortar company trying to foil a robbery attempt, he is exempt from felony charges of carrying a handgun without a permit, New Haven, Conn., Superior Court Judge Lubbie Harper Jr. ruled recently in a case of first impression.
In leading to the dismissal of a weapons charge lodged against Lutters after he shot and killed an armed passenger in an attempted robbery, Harper's decision is a good bet to survive on appeal, Lutters' defense counsel, Robert Berke, said last week.
"Judge Harper's decision didn't leave a lot of ends untied. I think it will be difficult for [the Appeals Court] to overturn it," said Berke, of Photos & Almodovar in Bridgeport, Conn.
'PROPRIETY INTEREST'
Prosecutors, however, plan to challenge the judge's interpretation of Connecticut General Statute ? 29-35(a), which they claim was never intended by state lawmakers to apply to motor vehicles. The exception makes it legal to carry a pistol or revolver without a license in a person's "dwelling house or place of business."
Travis Hazelwood was killed last year after cutting Lutters in the throat during an attempted robbery. Lutters, who leases the cab, turned himself into police a few hours after the incident. He was charged with carrying a handgun without a permit, after police determined he acted in self-defense in shooting Hazelwood.
In January, Berke filed a motion to dismiss, stating that Lutters was statutorily exempt from prosecution under the statute because his client's taxicab was considered a "place of business."
In his May decision, in which Harper extensively compared the law to related statutes and case law in other states, he ruled that the exception applies to Lutters because he had a "propriety interest" in his taxicab as a business.
Harper didn't dismiss the case until last month. He initially found the motion to dismiss to be premature and afforded the state more time to prove that Lutters carried his gun outside of his taxicab without a permit. When the state could not do so, Harper granted Lutters' motion.
UNINTENDED CONSEQUENCES?
In his 22-page ruling in State v. John Lutters, Harper considered whether the Legislature had intended to include taxicabs as a "place of business" under the state law.
The state countered that the court should not consider taxicabs as a place of business, because the statute should be deciphered in conjunction with another state law that specifically bars any weapon, including a pistol or revolver from being transported in "any vehicle" without the possession of a permit.
Assistant State's Attorney John Doyle tried to persuade Harper that the Legislature specifically meant to make carrying weapons in a motor vehicle illegal and intended to treat vehicles differently from stationary places of business.
The judge disagreed. "The Connecticut legislature could have specified, as have a number of state legislatures, that persons carrying handguns in their fixed places of business are excepted from the requirements of the [statute], but it did not," Harper wrote.
Harper added the Legislature, although obviously concerned with the possession of handguns in vehicles, did not specify that the court should read a "motor vehicle exception" into the place of business. He said the "including of an exception for places of business" under the statutes in question indicated the legislative intent "that business owners should have the freedom to protect their property."
Doyle could not be reached for comment by the Law Tribune. But according to Executive Assistant State's Attorney Judith Rossi, he has filed an appeal. The case, she noted, will be assigned to appellate lawyers in the chief state's attorney's office.
Rossi said the state's gun law carries a mandatory maximum sentence and that Lutters would have faced a $1,000 fine and one to five years in jail.
"I couldn't imagine that we wouldn't want to get a higher court's view on the construction of the [statute]," Rossi added. "I think [prosecutors] are always concerned, especially in cases of first impression like this, which may have ramifications beyond this one case."
Harper cited three reasons why he found that a taxicab in this instance could be considered a place of business under the statute, including policy reasons researched under California and New York law. The court also "must construe the ambiguity created by the [state] statutes in favor of the defendant," he wrote.
In addition, the judge cited the recent Connecticut Supreme Court ruling in State v. Vickers, where the court affirmed that the place of business exception did not apply to an employee who has no ownership or proprietary interest in his/her place of work.
However, Harper noted, because Vickers was concerned with only a fixed place of business, it provided "some precedential value, but not a dispositive analytic framework for the issue in the present case."
"I was surprised that [Harper] provided a multi-state, jurisdictional analysis. I think it surprised everyone," Berke said of the decision. "You don't see many 22-page trial court decisions like this. Well, except maybe in Judge [Jon] Blue's court."
"Ultimately, there will be some [bearing] on a public policy argument -- that would be the only way it might be overturned," Berke said. "But that would be legislating from the bench."
http://www.law.com/jsp/article.jsp?id=1024079054719
"If cowardly and dishonorable men sometimes shoot unarmed men with army pistols or guns, the evil must be prevented by the penitentiary and gallows, and not by a general deprivation of a constitutional privilege." - Arkansas Supreme Court, 1878
Man Shot Dead over Heaven and Hell Argument
Tue Jul 30, 9:54 AM ET
GODLEY, Texas (Reuters) - An argument over who was going to heaven and who was going to hell ended with one Texas man shooting another to death with a shotgun, police said on Monday.
Johnny Joslin, 20 was allegedly shot by Clayton Frank Stoker, 21, on Sunday. The two had spent Saturday with two other men night bar hopping in Fort Worth, about 40 miles northeast of Godley.
Johnson County Sheriff Bob Alford said a witness who was the designated driver for the group told police the four men were sitting at a table outside a trailer park after their night on the town and entered into an argument about religion. The talk became heated when the subject turned to who would go to heaven and who would go to hell.
Stoker said he would settle the argument and went into a house and returned with a shotgun, which he loaded and placed in his mouth, Alford said the witness reported.
"The victim Joslin then took the gun out of Stokers mouth, saying, 'If you have to shoot somebody, shoot me,'" Alford said, citing the witness report.
The shotgun went off, hitting Joslin in the chest and killing him.
Stoker, a Johnson County corrections officer, has been arrested and charged with first-degree murder, Alford said.
http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story2&cid=573&ncid=573&e=2&u=/nm/20020730/od_nm/heaven_dc_3
"If cowardly and dishonorable men sometimes shoot unarmed men with army pistols or guns, the evil must be prevented by the penitentiary and gallows, and not by a general deprivation of a constitutional privilege." - Arkansas Supreme Court, 1878