Welcome to Virginia. "Sic Semper Tyrannis" ("Thus Always to Tyrants")
According to the cited article, Tyrants run rampant in Virginia. Consider the charges:
According to the complaints he received, Van Cleave said officers were dispatched to the homes of the prospective gun buyers to speak with family members, asking for example: "Gee, did you know your husband was going to a gun show today? Do you have his cell phone number? Did you know he was buying a gun?
"If people weren't home they, in some cases, went to neighbors" to ask the same questions, Van Cleave said.
I'm not going to beat this one to death, but it sounds as if this article describes a massive, uninvited (by any of the participants) and highly visible Police presence at a gun show for reasons which have not been satisfactorily explained. The article cites at least one attempt at intimidation of an attendee by what appeared to be a Federal agent. As a consequence of this show of force, the sponsor of the gun show lost money both by a reduced attendance (due to the intimidation?) and in subsequent expenses necessary to formally protest this police presence in post-show response.
Although I'm going to let you draw your own conclusions, allow me to describe a real-life scenario illustrative of the effects of significant police presence at a place of business:
Two weeks ago, I went to a "Sportsman's Warehouse" in Salem, Oregon, to buy some shotgun ammunition. As I pulled into the parking lot of the mall, I saw a police cruiser with its lights flashing; a four-wheel ATV with "SHERIFF" painted on it; a recreational vehicle (small motor home) with "Marion County Sheriff Department" emblazoned on its side, and a half-dozen uniformed Sheriff's deputies. All were surrounded by yellow ribbons proclaiming "Crime Scene: Do Not Enter". The Sheriff's deputies were outside this cordon, near the entrance to the store, and were seen to be talking to individual civilians.
I parked (not too near the cordon) and watched them for several minutes. My first impression was that this WAS a crime scene, and that the county sheriff had moved personnel and equipment to support an investigation. Was it a bomb threat? Were terrorists involved? Had someone been murdered? Any plausible explanation for the presence of all this equipment and personnel raced through my mind, and I was loath to get out of the car, let alone approach the scene.
After I had watched for a couple of minutes, I realized that there was no sense of urgency in the people involved. When I did leave my car and approach the store, I saw that this was some sort of "Support Your Local Sheriff" campaign, and there was actually no danger involved.
People were entering and leaving the store at will, and the deputies were handing out brochures to the civilians as they moved about.
My experience happened the weekend BEFORE the incident at Richmond, but I can attest to the intimidation factor of a conspicuous police presence. And these guys were all very friendly; not at all like the ATF people at Richmond.
In my personal opinion, the Richmond incident sounds very much as it was originally portrayed by the Gun Show sponsor ... an attempt (and a successful one, by all accounts!) on the part of a governmental Law Enforcement Agency to intimidate the prospective attendees of a legal gun show, for no better purpose than to discourage attendance.
I don't know what laws were broken, or how much it cost the independent sponsor. You do the math. But what I DO know is that the display of Police Power is likely to have been very successful in the supposed goal to make gun shows fiscally infeasible.
It's not enough to pass laws against abuse of police powers, or even a constitutional amendment. In order to prevent the continuance of this kind of unlawful activity, our government needs to provide some sort of oversight which will punish its authors and disallow further such displays.
After all, isn't this sort of overwhelming governmental intrusion into lawful commerce the very model of Tyranny?
4 comments:
Did you check to see if the law was invited there by the store or the mall (property) owner?
No, I didn't find any other articles about the incident at all . . . although I did find hundreds of references to it, they all cited the same article. There is no confirming source readily available on the internet.
However, I assume that the "mall owner" (it wasn't a store, it was the Richmond International Raceway and Fairground
Complex)had rented the facilities for the gun show knowing full well what kind of security (off-duty Richmond PD) would be hired by the sponsor. The owner of the property didn't lose money; the sponsor did.
I find it difficult to believe that the complex manager would deliberately torpedo a customer.
While the lack of confirming follow-up articles is unsettling, neither did I find any denials from the ATF, the Richmond Police Department, the Virginia State Police, the Henrico County Police or the 'Richmond International Raceway and Fairground Complex'.
Also, I can't find any announcements that anyone was arrested for illegal firearms possession or purchase during the gun show at BATFE's "what's new" webpage
http://www.atf.treas.gov/whatsnew.htm
I meant at the Salem Sportsman's Warehouse.
Yo Hobo!
Sorry for the confusion, your question wasn't clear.
No, I didn't even ask. It appeared that store personnel were not at all upset by the large police presence, and I just assumed that they were doing their civic duty in the "Support Your Local Sheriff" mode. My fretfulness was merely a feature of Geek Paranoia Mode, and I have no reason to believe that it was shared by locals. (The store is in Salem, I live in Corvallis ... nobody tells us NOTHIN' in Corvallis and I'm sure there's a good reason for that.)
Also, my apologies for allowing your comment/question to just sit and hang for several days. I've spent much of last week madly making ammo in preparation for the 2005 Croc Dundee Banzaii Ballistic match, and the entire Labor Day weekend either participating in, or recovering from, the sheer enthusiasm of eight IPSC stages requiring a minimum of 50 shots to complete. (The biggest stage was 62 rounds, and I got plumb turned around to the point where I actually walked right by one of the targets because I though I had already shot at it.)
So here's a question in return: While your shooting buddies were dumping 450 to 500 rounds each into the gravel during this lost-brass match, where were YOU? You were missed. We wondered if you were disinterested in a match where you weren't ALLOWED to pick up brass. [G]
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