Gun Digest's Concealed Carry Preparation & Aftermath eShort by Massad Ayoob

Author:Massad Ayoob [Ayoob, Massad]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 978-1-4402-3410-1
Publisher: F+W Media
Published: 2012-05-03T16:00:00+00:00

Once you’ve learned to do it, you can shoot with deadly accuracy at high speed with a good double-action revolver like this Taurus Tracker. There’s no good reason to rely on a defense gun with a “hair trigger,” opines the author.

Hardware Lessons

Be able to explain your choice of gun and ammunition, and even accessories. There are some who will be your adversaries in court who will make it appear that your having a gun with you at all was paranoid. Be able to articulate why you did choose to arm your home, your shop, or your person. Be able to explain why carrying sufficient ammunition is a practice recommended by responsible firearms professionals for very good reasons, and has nothing to do with any plan to massacre shoppers at the mall.

At this writing, I’m consulting on an amicus brief for an appellate case in the Northeast, Commonwealth v. Pepicelli. Amicus curae are “friend of the court” briefs, which explain in depth a certain issue in the case at bar. At his original trial, the armed citizen defendant was convicted of criminal homicide after fighting off men who had come after him and endangered others at a family cookout. Aware of a previous pattern of threats, Pepicelli was armed with a Glock pistol and carrying a spare magazine when the incident went down. The prosecution argued that only a man who intended to shoot someone would bring a loaded pistol to a family barbecue…that only a man who intended to shoot many people would carry a spare magazine…and that carrying a high-capacity semiautomatic pistol such as the Glock was somehow nefarious to begin with.

And they got away with that. The reason is, their argument went unchallenged by a defense lawyer who apparently was not well versed in these particular areas. Pepicelli was convicted and sentenced to prison. His appeal is now underway, under the able direction of Lisa Steele, one of the nation’s top appellate lawyers. The original trial lawyer had been wise enough to seek out an expert witness, and he chose Tom Aveni, who is a highly qualified instructor and researcher in the field, and very capable. Unfortunately, the judge refused to allow any testimony in the above areas. It is the exclusion of that testimony that is being challenged in the appeal, and in the various amicus briefs that are being submitted.

Ammunition can also be an issue. I have seen many cases where the prosecutors and plaintiff’s lawyers have argued that the use of hollow points constitutes malice. Their arguments generally come almost word for word from an article published some thirty years ago in the liberal magazine The Nation. This article was titled “The Vietnamization of Main Street.” The focus of its attack was the sweeping adoption of hollowpoint ammunition by America’s police. The thing reeks of BS and total misconception. It includes phrases such as “bullets shaped like the nacelles of jet engines” and “The bullet doesn’t explode, you do.”

There are several ways to defuse this attack.

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.