Judge orders New Orleans police to stop seizing weapons

[Silverhair]

Law enforcement must return any guns confiscated.

ASSOCIATED PRESS
Saturday, September 24, 2005


Gun rights groups obtained a temporary restraining order Friday preventing police in New Orleans and a nearby parish from confiscating guns when seeking to evacuate residents.

U.S. District Judge Jay Zainey ordered the New Orleans police and St. Tammany Parish sheriff's officers to stop taking guns from law-abiding people and return any already taken.

In documents filed in federal court in Baton Rouge, La., New Orleans Mayor Ray Nagin, police Chief Eddie Compass and St. Tammany Sheriff Jack Strain deny ever ordering the confiscation of firearms.

But news reports quoted Compass as saying that only law enforcement officials would be allowed to have firearms and Deputy Chief Warren Riley as saying, "We are going to take all the weapons."

Wayne LaPierre, president of the National Rifle Association, said his group documented 30 to 40 cases of people having their weapons taken away after Katrina hit Aug. 29.

Allen Gottlieb, president of the Second Amendment Foundation, said that if residents who had their guns taken away can prove any financial losses, such as from looting, they might have a case to win compensation from the City of New Orleans.

This may be the start of a major court decision.

[rpannier]

1. Yeah let's just re-arm those yahoos.

Nice to see the judge is erring on the side of chaos.

[benEzra]

4. The "yahoos" you speak of are law-abiding New Orleans residents

not the perpetrators of violence who were terrorizing the city. And what the officers did to them was at LEAST a 10-year felony under Federal law, and violated too many state laws to count.

Whatever you believe about the desirability of civilians owning firearms, the fact that some low-level police officer (apparently not the chief) could suspend the entire bill of rights and send police/National Guard house-to-house without warrant to kick in the doors of innocent people and confiscate their personal property at gunpoint, without so much as a search warrant, is unspeakably wrong. Law-abiding homeowners who had done nothing wrong, handcuffed and sitting on the sidewalk while troops with machine guns ransacked their house without a search warrant...that's NOT the kind of America any of us are fighting for.

[ReadTomPaine]

5. When faced with such a situation...

does a citizen have the right to refuse an unlawful order or seizure by force? Or are they compelled to comply even if it's a rights infringement, a crime or a matter of survival?

[benEzra]

6. Most states treat a LEO committing a crime the same as any other criminal

meaning that if a police officer is, say, trying to rape or murder you, the law treats him no differently than anyone else trying to rape or murder you, and you are fully authorized not only to refuse to go along with it, but to use force in self-defense (up to and including deadly force).

As far as the N.O. cases go, the laws of many (most?) states might have allowed the use of force to defend against the illegal home invasions (I am not familiar enough with Louisiana law to say). HOWEVER, it should be said that this is probably not the wisest course of action if they are actual police and they aren't trying to kill you, particularly if a whole platoon is pointing machineguns at you and your family. Instead, them steal your property at gunpoint, but get badge numbers, and PROSECUTE them for felony theft, assault with a deadly weapon, felony home invasion, felony theft of a firearm, and civil rights violations. Then slap the department and the issuing officials with a monstrous civil suit for all of the above. That way, the offenders get justice served, and you get to buy lots and lots more guns with the department's civil settlement...

The officers involved in the illegal seizures were VERY lucky that the citizens they roughed up and stole from gave the officers the benefit of the doubt and chose to fight in court instead...lawsuits (and prosecutions, I sincerely hope) will follow...

[ReadTomPaine]

7. Thanks for this!

I was frankly quite surprised there wasn't more conflict on this issue, it seems cooler heads prevailed.

[rpannier]

10. Blah, Blah, Blah

I have friends and relatives who live in New Orleans and the areas surrounding New Orleans. Your huperactive defense of the "so-called" law abiding is very cute and rather uninspiring. As I recall, the National Guard has issued a "Martial Law Order" That gives them the right to kick in those doors and confiscate those weapons. In addition, one of my friends (he's from New Orleans) talked about being shot at by one of those Yahoos of which I mentioned.
Finally, why is it that some people feel the need to castigate the underfunded and poorly supported police and law enforcement officials, but are more than willing to give non-law enforcement people engaged in crimes a pass? Just curious.

[benEzra]

11. The people having their guns illegally confiscated

were in their own homes minding their own business, NOT people out in the streets shooting at rescuers. The people shooting at the rescuers were CRIMINALS, and the police can confiscate their guns all they want (just like police do everyday, in accordance with the law) with no complaint from anybody, and cheers from everybody.

The restraining order we are discussing applies to the ILLEGAL seizure of firearms from law-abiding homeowners, via ILLEGAL home invasions.

Point of fact--martial law was NOT declared in New Orleans, as Louisiana does not have a martial law statute. A "Public Health Emergency" was declared, which is similar, but Louisiana law does NOT allow an official to prohibit the possession of firearms in your own home under ANY level of emergency declaration. And the transport of firearms outside the home can be *regulated* under a PHE declaration, but not *prohibited*, and such a regulatory order requires the governor to jump through long series of legal hoops (which was not done), must be promulgated in accordance with state regulations (no such order was promulgated), and property must be returned after five days. THIS WAS NOT DONE, so there was not even a shadow of legal justification for what was done, and all the officers/troops involved in the door-to-door confiscations committed at least 10-year felonies by doing so.

[NorthernSpy]

14. WHO was "shooting at rescuers"?

Hate to break it to you, but those hysterical stories about rapemurdermayhem have been revealed as bogus (as some of us have maintained all along):

Lurid reports of rape, murder in Katrina’s aftermath exposed as frauds
By Joseph Kay
30 September 2005

(...)

Now that officials have been forced to admit that they had little or no evidence of armed thugs roaming the devastated city and mugging, raping and killing tourists and stranded residents, they and their media accomplices are seeking to explain away the disinformation campaign as the inadvertent result of confusion, fear and the breakdown in communications in New Orleans.

(...)

“People would be shooting at us, and we couldn’t shoot because of the families,” Compass told Chris Elsberry of the Connecticut Post as late as September 19. “All we could do is rush toward the flash.”

But Jeff Winn, the leader of the SWAT unit that Compass said had seized 30 weapons in this way, denied that anything of the sort happened. According to the Times-Picayune, Winn “said his unit saw muzzle flashes and heard gunshots only one time. Despite aggressively frisking a number of suspects, the team recovered no weapons.”

I strongly recommend reading the rest of it.


And from ZNet:

They way the media covered the first few days still stings. This headline from today's New Orleans Times-Picayune says it all: "Rumors of deaths greatly exaggerated - Widely reported attacks false or unsubstantiated." The article goes on to state, "Four weeks after the storm, few of the widely reported atrocities have been backed with evidence. The piles of bodies never materialized, and soldiers, police officers and rescue personnel on the front lines say that although anarchy reigned at times and people suffered unimaginable indignities, most of the worst crimes reported at the time never happened." The one national guard soldier who was shot turned out to have shot himself. Between the Convention Center and Superdome, there were ten bodies found. Despite the reports of mass killings, only one of the deaths appears to be a homicide. However, it was these rumors that were used to demonize the people of New Orleans, and since most of the media has offered no correction, the representation still stands.

http://www.zmag.org/content/showarticle.cfm?SectionID=72&ItemID=8852


By now, you'll have noticed that all that slanderous false news played a critical role in justifying the attempts at gun-grabbing, among other abuses of authority. Kind of reminds me of Waco, where rumors of child sexual abuse among the Branch Davidians created a public hysteria that made it possible for the government to act in ways that we would not ordinarily accept.

[Silverhair]

12. No Martial Law declared.

You are very badly informed. Last Martial Law in the US was after the civil war in the South.

[jody]

15. I agree on the U.S. but, wasn't Hawaii under martial law during WWII? n/t

[Silverhair]

17. Yes. I was in error.

It was full martial law. Everyone over 6 was fingerprinted, and civilians were tried before military courts. The local constitution was suspended.

[Burley1]

13. National Guard cannot make law.

As I recall, the National Guard has issued a "Martial Law Order" That gives them the right to kick in those doors

Wow, I didnt think you could pack so many misconceptions in one sentence!

Ntl. guard does not and cannot issue these orders.

[jody]

16. IMO, your comments are among the most uninformed ever posted in this forum

:thumbsdown:

[Redneck Socialist]

18. Wow

Now that's really saying something. ;-)

[Name removed]

20. Deleted message

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[Name removed]

19. Deleted message

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[lcordero2]

2. The people who were disarmed should sue the city of NO for

reckless endangerment.

[Lazpash]

21. Amen! (no text)

[ReadTomPaine]

3. I was surprised this happened in the first place.

It seemed a blatant rights violation of a particularly hot button issue, during the worst possible time for such an action be taken. When a person elects to keep a firearm for self defense, this is often the precise sort of situation they are envisioning.

[Subliminal]

8. Lawsuits and Criminal Charges

I hope more lawsuits and criminal charges follow.

[Macman44]

9. About

damned time!!!

[Leftist_Warrior]

22. I don't think it was Constitutional for them to make that move

...and I'm glad the courts acted to stop the disarming of citizens. There weren't enough police to go around, so it was up to the citizen to defend their homes and businesses.

I thought Bushco was strong on gun rights, but they sat silent while this crap went down. Gee, thanks Bushco - you even screwed up defending your claimed pet issue.

I hope the gun owners throw these idiots out on their ears in 08.