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03Lightningrocks wrote:I am a little befuddled by the President of open Carry whatever not being smart enough to keep his nose clean. He won't be much use to them now. The media will make a monkey out of him.

This is the saddest part of the whole thing. Well, that and the cops screw up. I wonder if OCT is paying his legal bills? Glad I don't send any money their way.

EEllis wrote: He has to make the case that the suspension was reasonable TO HIM and if he does so it doesn't matter if it is to anyone else. He has to convince the judge that the RS was real and honest or the case gets kicked. So since I haven't heard anyone state what the RS was how or why should I assume the judge is wrong?

This is the problem I see with a lot of the latitude the LE has. RS can be so ambiguous and it cost the officer nothing to run you in for whatever and costs you thousands to prove he's wrong. In the end you might not prove it.

Also, why is it that it seems DA's will prosecute even the cases that have little merit just so that a person will cop a plea if they can't afford to fight the charges? They know that the charges have no merit yet they do it anyway. This to me makes them as guilty as any criminal.

This seems like a major problem with our current legal system.

So the questions are this.

1. Should you be nice to the officer and do as he says and if he's in the wrong take it up in court later?


OR

2. Be a jerk to the officer, piss him off and tell him everything he's doing is wrong, get arrested, go to court twice, get found guilty and have to appeal costing yourself tons of money?


There is always a right and wrong way to do things. The cop was wrong from everything we can see but bottom line is the guys' attitude went a long way in getting him where he is today. I've seen these guys in the open carry videos when there questioned and they are jerks. Even if you don't plan on answering them because you legally don't have to there is way to say it with out coming off as a jerk and rarely on the videos I've seen do they pull it off.

baldeagle wrote:SMH. I can't believe you guys are celebrating his conviction. You do realize that what the cops did was wrong and what the prosecutor did was worse? That the prosecutor is anti-gun and took this case personally and pursued it until he got what he wanted? That when you go to Temple the police will now think they were right and the citizen was wrong? Hate the man if you want, but celebrate a loss for the CHL community?

From the video I don't see anything he did wrong. He was carrying legally as far as I can tell. I will say that if he was a little more polite he might have gotten treated a little better. That goes for the officer as well. My point of view is that neither party acted the way they should have.

That being said. It's evident at least to me by the fact that this guy going to Austin and walking around at the capital with a toy gun while this case was going on that he is not of sound mind and judgement. I am for OC but I am not at all for the OC crowd that has been openly displaying fire arms and causing the gun community and in particular the CHL community that might want open carry at some point lots of grief. They are not furthering their or our cause.

So, I have to be honest and say I'm torn. He was tried and like it or not found guilty. Party of me want's the crazy OC'ers to see this and think twice about doing it but also part of me knows he really wasn't doing anything illegal and brought up on false charges.

Like it or not public opinion is what matter and if we don't start changing public opinion in a good way we might be in for a rude awaking some day. We can't shove OC down the public's throat.

SA-TX wrote:

Waco1959 wrote:

SA-TX wrote:I do have sympathy for the prosecutor's office in that there was no easy path for them once Grisham made it clear there would be no plea: proceed with a questionable case with a potentially sympathetic defendant or don't back up your PD (whose officers you'll be working with again) and expose them immediately to a civil suit. That said, the DA/CA is elected and has to make tough calls. Since his office only convinced 1 juror of 5, he'll now have another.

SA-TX

I was really surprised they didn't drop this at the last minute like the Metroplex Hospital case. I'm even more surprised they are bothering to retry the case after a 5/1 acquittal vote. I think I may start avoiding Bell County.

According to this source, MSG Grisham was found guilty during his 2nd trial yesterday.

http://www.kwtx.com/home/headlines/Sold ... 12011.html" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

I hope he has pro bono counsel since now he'll need to appeal and win to keep his CHL. Then there's his arrest at the capitol a few days ago. I haven't watched the YouTube video but he claims he was carrying a toy pistol openly and was told by DPS to leave. He didn't immediately leave and was arrested for trespassing.

I'm not a fan of these tactics, but I also don't like the thought of someone, especially a Texan, being told to leave the capitol grounds without a good reason. How much discretion do they have? After all, he was clearly there to exercise his 1A rights and I can't believe it is constitutional for the police to evict him based on the content of his speech / non-firearm prop. I guess we'll see if he fares any better in the Travis County courts.

SA-TX

I was rooting for him but now that I know he's an Open Carry proponent that doesn't care how he affects the gun community by openly carrying firearms in public then I now have no sympathy. I'm also now calling into question his mental and intellectual abilities knowing he had a pending case and decided to got Austin and antagonize people at the capital with a toy gun.

I now think he's an idiot. Something I'm beginning to think of all Open Carry people that think it's OK to strap on a long gun and waltz around in public just because it's legal thinking that brings good to the Open Carry cause.