Alaska:

Seward police say that a bystander was injured when they fatally shot a bear roaming through the town.

Police say that a shotgun round pierced the black bear Thursday night, but ricocheted and hit a bystander in the abdomen.

“I think it went through his ear and maybe out one side of his head. And then, like I say, it ricocheted off something and then hit the bystander,” City Manager Phillip Oates said.

Oates added the person was merely bruise

The bystander was about 125 feet from the bear at the time. Lucky.

Armed man fatally shot at Tennessee high school

BLOUNTVILLE, Tenn. — An armed man was fatally shot by deputies Monday at an east Tennessee high school after he went inside and pointed a gun at the principal’s head, a sheriff said.

Well done, deputies!

But there’s another interesting tidbit:

[The gun man] Cowan entered the school with a .380-caliber semiautomatic and a .25-caliber handgun in his back pocket, Anderson said. The sheriff said that after Cowan grabbed the principal, Melanie Riden, and pointed the semiautomatic at her head, student resource officer Carolyn Gudger pulled her gun on Cowan and moved the principal to safety. [emphasis Murdoc's]

What sounds like a bit of a standoff followed, and deputies shot Cowan after he pointed his gun at Gudger.

Not only did an armed individual prevent a school attack, but the deputies didn’t seem to have trouble knowing who the good guys and the bad guys were. We keep being told that armed people in schools won’t help and will just make it tougher for the authorities to do their jobs.

UPDATE: They tried again and the bill passed. Terrible news.

Great news: California Senate rejects open-carry gun ban

The California Senate rejected a bill Monday that would have made it illegal to carry unloaded guns in public, but lawmakers will give the vote one more try.

Monday’s 20-16 vote fell one short of the majority needed, but the Senate will reconsider the measure Tuesday.

The bill, AB1934, was introduced after a series of demonstrations by gun-rights organizations during which they encouraged participants to openly carry unloaded weapons. California law lets gun owners carry a rifle or handgun in a holster if it is not loaded.

Via Instapundit, who writes

Okay, it’s a small thing. But it’s California.

I actually don’t think it’s a “small thing” at all. Though I’m not what you’d call an “open carry advocate” I do believe that the right to carry guns legally is a crucial one. The problem with open carry in California is not that it’s allowed, it’s that the gun must be unloaded. Defeating this bill maintains a bad staus quo, but it makes the fight for the legal allowance to carry loaded guns a possibility in the future. That would have been far more difficult had the legal allowance to carry even unloaded guns been revoked.

The stated reasoning behind the bill was that too many people call the police whenever they see a gun in public, and since they cannot tell whether a gun is loaded or unloaded they somehow have a right to be concerned.

This is my issue with that: If people called police because they saw black people driving fast in a car and couldn’t tell whether or not they had just robbed a convenience store, they’d be bigots. If people called police because they saw some Hispanics gathered on a street corner and couldn’t tell whether or not they were in the country legally, they’d be bigots. If people saw some Muslims talking to each other quietly and called the police because they couldn’t tell whether or not they were terrorists, they’d be bigots.

So why is it when someone sees a gun owner and calls police because they can’t tell whether or not the gun is loaded that they have a right to be concerned?

People just calling 911 out of the blue just because they saw some black people driving fast in a car, just because they saw some Mexican-looking people gathered on a street, or just because they saw some Muslim-looking folks conversing in whispers do not deserve to be taken seriously and should be held accountable. The same goes for people who call in the cops just because they saw someone with a gun on their hip.

Bill A1810, which would have required registration of long guns, was also rejected.

There’s been a lot of new coverage of the 5-year anniversary of Hurricane Katrina and all the problems it caused in New Orleans. Like the original go-round, the plight of the areas where the hurricane actually hit got much less coverage. So go check out this post I wrote back at the time on Murdoc Online showing many photos of the effects of Katrina east of New Orleans.

Something else that must not be forgotten about Katrina and its aftermath was the eagerness with which the local New Orleans law enforcement agencies tried to confiscate legally-owned firearms. At a time when people were on their own more than ever, the police spent an awful lot of effort to disarm law-abiding citizens when they should have been protecting them.

If you have only a passing knowledge of those events, I heartily recommend reading The Great New Orleans Gun Grab by Gordon Hutchinson and Todd Masson.

Does Dressing Up as a Cop, Staging Fake Traffic Stops, Looking for Drugs, and then Keeping the Drugs Violate the Fourth Amendment?

At the Volokk Conspiracy:

In United States v. Torres-Sobrado, — F.Supp.2d –, 2010 WL 3290958 (D. Puerto Rico 2010), handed down last week, twelve defendants allegedly dressed up as police officers and pulled over motorists for traffic violations. One of the twelve was an actual police officer, but apparently the rest were not. They would then look for drugs, and when they found drugs they would keep the drugs and later sell them.

At least one man was killed during the, um, operations. Among the charges against them was an accusation that they violated the Fourth Amendment:

The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no Warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by Oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized.

But

In last week’s decision, the defendants moved to dismiss this count of the indictment as a matter of law. They made two arguments. First, the defendants argued that they are not real police officers, and therefore are not state actors under Fourth Amendment law. Second, they argued that even if they were state actors, they did not violate the Fourth Amendment because their stop and seizure complied with Fourth Amendment standards. The stop was based on probable cause, the drugs were in plain view, etc.

One commenter writes:

I certainly think it’s just for those that pretend to be state actors to suffer the same consequences of their actions as if they were in fact state actors. If we are going to enhance the punishment for a cop that uses his badge and uniform to assist him in carrying out a crime, why would we not want to treat an impostor in the same way?

That makes me wonder about places with minimum sentences for using a gun during a crime. Does that minimum sentence apply if the defendant uses a fake gun which the victims believe to be real? How about “assault with a deadly weapon” if the “deadly weapon” is not real?

Another commenter:

I think that the civil rights violation is the least of their problems.

Agreed. And I guess I sort of wonder why that charge was made in the first place. But all I know of the case is what I quickly read today, so there is certainly a lot of detail that I am ignorant of.

Via Instapundit.

James writes about something that I’ve always thought sounded a little too much like an urban legend but is apparently true.

Over at True Detective Stories:

In the five years that I have been posting true detective stories, I have come across some real winners – or losers, depending upon your point of view…I can say without hyperbole that this is far and away the best story of them all.

Go check it out.

If they’ve got the discretion to give you a concealed carry permit they’ve got the discretion to turn you down.

Md. crime victim sues over denial to renew permit to carry concealed handgun

On a snowy Christmas Eve a few years ago, Raymond E. Woollard was watching television with his family when he heard someone tapping at the windows of his Baltimore County farmhouse.

It was not Santa.

An intruder entered, the Woollard went for a shotgun, and a struggle ensued. Fortunately, the homeowner and his son came out on top because the son had a second shotgun. Police arrived an hour later, delayed by icy roads.

As a result of the incident, Woollard was issued a concealed carry permit. However, his request to renew it has been declined.

Police denied his request last year to renew the permit, saying they thought the danger to his life had passed.

The agency said it was “because I hadn’t been attacked” again, Woollard said in an interview. “They said, ‘If you have any problems, you let us know.’ ”

Yeah. Maybe they’ll be there in less than an hour next time.

The intruder, who is Woollard’s son-in-law, has a history of trouble and is now out of prison. He lives only three miles from Woollard.

Cop’s Gun Goes Off In Squad Car

A Dallas Police Officer faces questioning over an incident that happened in a squad car overnight near Gaston and Abrams in the Lakewood area. The officer apparently called a fellow officer to come pick her up because she said she’d been drinking. During the ride, the officer’s gun went off in the squad car, so more officer were called in. No one was struck by the bullet, and police are now interviewing the officer.

Emphasis Murdoc’s.

NRA-ILA :: Michigan: Legislation to Repeal “Permit-to-Purchase” to be Heard on Tuesday, June 8:

House Bill 5972, sponsored by State Representative Kim Meltzer (R-33), and House Bill 5973, authored by State Representative Joel Sheltrown (D-103), would eliminate this bureaucratic obstacle, which has been obsolete since the national instant check system went into effect in 1998. Under the current system, gun buyers must apply with their local law enforcement agency and pass a written test before being authorized to buy a handgun. The “permit” is good for only one gun and it expires after 10 days.

This permit is pain the axe, though those with Concealed Pistol Licenses do not need to get one. You basically need to go down to the police, get a permit for one gun, and then use it within 10 days. Some jurisdictions require that you return unused permits to purchase within the 10 days. Ridiculous.

Making it even worse is that many jurisdictions do NOT keep their firearms desk open during all normal business hours, with only limited hours on certain days. This despite a state law requiring the desk to be open and manned during all hours that they’re open for business.