TexasCHLforum.com

alpmc wrote:For this scenario, let's say I'm for absolute gun control and I don't think citizens should be armed! (I'm not even going to discuss the drinking!)

I'm sitting in Chili's and I hear this guy verbally disclose that he is armed. I call the Police and they arrive on scene. They ask me who has a gun and I point the guy out. Sure enough, they discover he has a gun.

I'm sitting in Chili's and I see this guy has a gun because he shows it to his friend. I call the Police and they arrive on scene. They ask me who has a gun and I point the guy out. Sure enough, they discover he has a gun.

I'm sitting in Chili's and I see this guy showing his CH License to his friend (or to a possible adversary in a threatening manner), I assume he may be armed. I call the Police and they arrive on scene. They ask me who has a gun and I point the guy out. Sure enough, they discover he has a gun.

If I'm just a bystander and I can point you out to Law Enforcement as being in possession of a firearm, then you have effectively "Failed to conceal"!

The facts concerning each individual situation listed above now becomes an issue of interpretation of the Law by Police and maybe later by Lawyers!

Concealed means Concealed! Strap it on.........cover it up.............and SHUT UP!!!!!

That's just not true. There's no more legal "interpretation" involved in the difference between showing a CHL and showing a gun than there is in saying the neighborhood kids playing ball in the street after school were casing your house for a robbery compared to two men dressed in black creeping around your back yard at night are casing your house for a robbery. While some crazy person can always call in a crazy complaint and some crazy cop can always incorrectly place a person under arrest when he's done nothing wrong, there is no more need to be concerned that this situation will befall you than there is reason to be concerned that planting an oak tree will get you hauled to jail on suspicion of growing marijuana.

Yes, it can and has happened. The CHL holder being taken in for printing, I mean. I don't know about the oak tree because I made that illustration up. Therefore it is imprudent (meaning not wise) to do the things you listed in public, especially since firearms ownership and use is a controversial topic and you don't know how those around you will respond. I agree completely with that warning. Saying that talking about CHLs is a gray area of law that is up to subjective interpretation is simply not true, though. Even in Handog's case (the poster here who was arrested for printing), the CA and judge realized just how bogus the entire thing was and justice, though slow, was served.

I state again that I would not want to be the one dealing with the frustration or fallout of facing the police and courts, even though I'd be confidant the law was on my side, and that's why I fully support the idea of not talking about it publicly from a standpoint of prudence. It is solely the conflation of prudence with legality that I am addressing and taking issue with.

Embalmo wrote:I'm using the phrase "Verbally show" to mean verbally indicating one's carry status as armed; to tell someone that there is a gun in your pocket. To raise ones shirt to reveal the gun shaped bulge in one's bicycle shorts would be to physically show.

I agree that it doesn't say anything in the book about telling someone in friendly conversation that you're armed (where others may hear you), but I do think that it's a little gray when you consider that bicycle pants and loose lips yield the same results; that you gotta' gun in your pants. And you've also, naturally, got to be careful in places where LEOs and shopkeepers may not get the concept of non-compliant signs.

Embalmo

While imprudent, it is not illegal. Is that what you mean by calling it a gray area? That you might be legally OK, but that it might not be worth the potential hassle, fallout, or fright to do so?

Here's what the statutes say concerning "concealed means concealed."

"Concealed handgun" means a handgun, the presence of which is not openly discernible to the ordinary observation of a reasonable person.

An ordinary person (not those specifically trained in firearms) using ordinary observation (not scrutiny) should not be able to discern that that's a gun you've got there. Ordinary printing is not illegal. Wearing a skin-tight leotard and tucking a very large handgun into the belly area might be, though, if the ordinary person walking by you would realize you have a gun there. Talking about it is not illegal. Pulling up your shirt to illustrate your point would be, though.