From: Ryan Gill (rmgill@mindspring.com)
Date: Sun Dec 01 2002 - 15:04:24 PST
At 4:37 PM -0600 12/1/02, Everette wrote:
>Ryan
>
>There was a post a several months back -- maybe over a year -- that some
>fellows in a north eastern state were handcuffed, jailed, fined, weapons
>confiscated, among which were rubber Garands, other non functional guns
>also. If my memory serves it cost several thousands of dollars to get this
>settled and I think they finally got all the "guns" back.
Not surprising. There's a reason I choose to remain living in Georgia
and not New Jersey or what ever other state there is up in New
England. The police down here have an entirely different attitude
towards firearms and the people they are protecting and serving than
some of those up north.
My attitude towards firearms has become more solid and reassured
based on living in Georgia and interacting with cops who all most
assuredly assert that they prefer the civilians to be armed and able
to defend themselves. Some have even asserted that they feel safer
with armed civilians around.
One fellow in the GaMVPA had issues with his local police responding
to calls with him driving around in his Willys w/ a Dummy .30 cal
mounted. After being stopped three or four times he wrote a letter to
the chief asking that they either figure something out to charge him
with or leave him alone. They left him alone after that letter and
have become used to the idea.
I've taken every chance I have to speak to cops about the vehicle and
most have had very positive things to say about it. I think the
realization that I'm likely less of a hazard to traffic in my 4 ton
armored vehicle than the soccer mom in her 3 ton SUV helps.
Due to all of this, I think that's why I've had such a complete lack
of bad feelings from cops with regards to the Ferret. Only two have
expressed any significant unhappiness about it. One was at a
Dave&Busters who asserted to a friend that I shouldn't have the
vehicle. When asked why he couldn't articulate a reason. By the end
of the evening, he was asking questions about it and seemed to be
warming to it. The other instance involved a cop who was responding
to a rather under-(or over depending on view)imaginative call about a
terrorist driving a tank around. When he saw the Ferret was tagged,
he pretty much backed off and realized he didn't have a leg to stand
on. All others have been pretty tickled by the whole idea and even
found humor in fellow cops surprise at first seeing it.
After adding the dummy gun to the Ferret, I've driven it through down
town Atlanta, parked it in bookstore parking lots, had it shown off
in a movie theatre parking lot (for the Bond movie premier night) and
a number of other occasions of driving around. I'm quite of the
opinion that there's not likely to be a problem as long as I don't
point the gun at someone.
The advantage with Georgia is that firearms are pretty much legal
anywhere aside from government buildings and bars. So there's less of
an issue with them on a vehicle in plain view.
--
Ryan Gill rmgill@SPAMmindspring.com
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'60 Daimler Ferret '42 Daimler Dingo '42 Humber MkIV (1/3)
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