Do convicted felons have the constitutional right to defend themselves with a firearm? The answer to the question, in most U.S. states is a resounding no. Those who do, like Arkansas native Krissy Noble, face years in prison, all for choosing to protect their lives and the lives of their loved ones with a firearm.
Noble was cleared of all wrongdoing in the Dec. 7th shooting death of Dylan Stancoff, who attacked her in her own home. Noble was pregnant at the time of the shooting when Stancoff, calling himself Cameron White, stopped by her home and asked to speak to Noble’s husband who was not home at the time. Saying he was a friend from the military, Stancoff left but returned later, pushed himself into Noble’s home, attempted to cover her mouth to prevent her from screaming, and began to struggle with the mother-to-be.
Noble escaped briefly and retrieved a .40 caliber handgun, fired three shots, and killed her attacker. But because Noble pleaded guilty (before the shooting in 2017) to felony possession of marijuana, she now faces six years in prison, all for the crime of using her husband’s handgun, a gun she successfully used to defend herself and the life of her unborn baby.
The term "anarcho-tyranny" describes a situation where the Organs Of The State refuse to control criminals (hence, the anarchy) by puts strict controls on the law abiding (hence, the tyranny). Sure, it's hard to control criminals and easy to control the law abiding, but that's hardly a justification.
It's hard to think of a group with a stronger claim on society's protection than expecting mothers, and yet the police failed her. No doubt that is because the woman lived in a rural area, but her moral claim on protection stands. The State is making things worse - adding to their moral failure - by prosecuting her for using not her firearm, but her husband's firearm to defend herself and her unborn baby.
The State is effectively saying that not only do they have no moral duty to protect these two people, but that Mrs. Noble has no legal authority to protect herself and her baby - and that the state will imprison her for 5 years if she does.
Let that sink in.
All because she was busted with some pot once. What a miserable failure of the stupid War On Drugs. Future generations will judge us by our works, and the judging will be harsh. Fair, but harsh.
I met a traveller from an antique land
Who said: "Two vast and trunkless legs of stone
Stand in the desert. Near them on the sand,
Half sunk, a shattered visage lies, whose frown
And wrinkled lip and sneer of cold command
Tell that its sculptor well those passions read
Which yet survive, stamped on these lifeless things,
The hand that mocked them and the heart that fed.
And on the pedestal these words appear:
`My name is Ozymandias, King of Kings:
Look on my works, ye mighty, and despair!'
Nothing beside remains. Round the decay
Of that colossal wreck, boundless and bare,
The lone and level sands stretch far away".- Percy Bysshe Shelley, Ozymandias
14 comments:
Nice try, but no.
The state didn't strip her of her right to defend herself.
She was free to use anything other than a firearm.
And the lack of that right in her case wasn't the state's fault, any more than stop signs cause people to run them, or forks cause obesity.
She stripped herself of that right.
Then ignored the previous penalty, and gets punished again.
And if she commits another felony, she may be at risk for lifetime incarceration as a third strike.
The moral of the story isn't that either law is stupid.
It's that breaking one is.
And in her case, stupid is going to hurt. Twice.
Cry me a river.
(We'll overlook that felony marijuana possession in her case implies that she was a dope dealer, not someone just caught with a seed stuck in a roach clip.)
While you're up, I'm sure she was on her way to Sunday School and had turned her life around, and about to become a plaster saint too, like all ex-cons. Just ask them.
I believe that once you have served your time and your parole successfully, the temporary suspension of your second Amendment Rights should be over. Commit another crime and start the process all over again. Career criminals have no problem possessing and using firearms as convicted felons. The law traps potential victims like this. I carry in many places where it is forbidden by law, knowing full well the consequences I would face if I have to use it to defend my life.
You should always bury the body.
The state has no right to infringe on anyone's gun rights. That's the Constitutional agreement we are all working under. There's no clause in the 2nd Amendment that says "except for felons".
Shorter Aesop: Dura lex, sed lex. In other inscriptions from the ancient world, the strong do what they can and the weak suffer what they must. Both apply in this case. None of this changes the fact that this prosecution is so disproportionate to the "crime" as to make the law an ass. Which was pretty much my point.
ASM826, I think that this pre-dates our constitution, going back to English Common Law. Felons back (pretty sure it was way back in the Middle Ages) were disarmed as a matter of law. I'll have to dig that up but I'm pretty sure of it. Of course, this just means that it's a long standing injustice, rather than a recently coined one.
Several state and lower Fed courts have ruled that even if a person is a felon, they do have the right to self defense, even with a 'prohibited' weapon.
And, if she was charged and found guilty for Felony Possession, most states, even Arkansas, has the ability to restore rights if no other violations come along.
Example. Used to be, down the apartment block from me, was ex-meth mom. Possession of Meth with Intent to Distribute, Possession of Meth. She told me the whole story. How she just now because of FL Law changes has the ability to vote (she supports Bernie 2020, so.. well.. yes, she's an idiot.) And she's complaining about how her felonies still follow her, making it hard to get a loan or get an apartment. I chime up about talking to an attorney to get her record expunged and, oops, she can't because of the 4 times she violated with additional drug possession charges... OOOOOOOOPs. Sudden loss of interest in talking politics to her, as she proved to not learn Drugs BAD.
So, yes, this woman. 1 Arrest for Felony Possession. How many times did she violate? Has she applied to restore her rights? There is often far more to the story than what we get from the news.
It is a horrible story. But... what aren't they telling us. Is she truly on the side of the Angels now since she got out of prison, or has she been riding dirty and squeaked into the free world?
And, really, this is really on a prosecutor who saw a low-hanging fruit that was easy to get a win on his/her scorecard. That is the issue. Yes, cops charge, but Prosecutor has ability to drop charges. That right there, is the head prosecutor running for re-election and wants to show he/she/it is Hard On Crime?
And... it's Arkasas. Is it a rural area? Then is she of the wrong family? From the wrong side of the tracks?
Again, more info needed before I truly feel sympathy.
Hopefully the governor's office will weigh in, if, again I must stress, if all the facts of the case merit it.
For all we know, she may be running a low-level drug scheme and this is how the local LEOs are taking care of the problem, putting her in jail while they work on other charges.
Again, for the last time, we don't know all the facts. And that's the problem. WE the public don't know the facts.
She could be a 'good girl' in a hood sense. We don't know.
And, quite frankly, I don't trust anything out of the media unless it's past the 7 day mark and the true story starts surfacing.
I hope her well. I hope true justice comes through for her, and for her child's sake, I hope she is truly on the side of goodness. If she's dirty, well....
Yes, denying felons does go back to English Common Law, like so many of our laws and statutes do.
HAR HAR HAR!!! All rise! Judge Filthie presiding...!!!
Good grief boys - get a grip! What errant rot! Look, the laws were in place before this idiot ever lit up a blunt or reached for a gun, and she broke some of them knowing full well the potential consequences. This is not a case of eeeevil deep state tyrants ganging up on a hapless innocent citizen; it’s a case of a state enforcing it’s existing law. If you commit crimes, you can expect certain rights to be rescinded as part of your punishment. North American law is lenient; if there are grounds for leniency the courts will almost certainly rule in that regard.
Personally as a gunnie I applaud the courts going after criminals rather than law abiding gun owners. Like it or not, this woman committed the crimes she was accused of.
The bint gets 30 days for bagging a goblin without the required license! ASM and BP are hereby fined $5.00 each for irresponsible and reckless libertarianism, and Aesop gets a $50.00 fine for all the rotten things he’s said about me!
The rest a ya’s... mind your Ps and Qs! Filthie is watching you!
Court adjourned!!
Glen, you introduce the Judge in these here parts with OH YEZ OH YEZ ALL RISE!
LOL. You want to blow your mind go to Youtube and search for "All Rise With Julian Clearly". British comedy at its finest ...
But yeah, I'll pay your $5 (Canadian, which is what, $1.98?) or get you a beer when we get together (LaBatt's Blue or Schooner if they have it; Molson Brador if we want to go the getto malt liquor thing).
If the point of the exercise is to say, "The Law is an ass", you'll get no argument hereabouts on that premise.
If you want to see a far more proportionate prosecution, Google Ellie Nessler, IIRC.
Her son was apparently molested by a given waste of skin and oxygen.
The trial took place in NorCal, in a rather lax criminal court, then assembled in a local small-town strip mall out in the hinterboonies of the Sierras.
At some point in the proceedings, after hearing the description of depredations against her child, Ms. Nessler, the mother of said child, withdrew from her purse the pistol she had carried into court (that district being rather casual and rural, and the court being unfettered by things like metal detectors and such), and in open court in session, blew the offender to hell with her entire cylinder of rounds, scoring 6 out of 6 times, and sending him to Final Judgement in about 3 seconds' time. This, with the media, the assembled court attendees, the judge, jury, prosecution, and bailiff(s) all full witnesses.
My recollection is that they charged her with everything including the kitchen sink, this being Califrutopia, but she was tried by a jury of her peers, who after review of all the evidence and eyewitness testimony, returned a verdict of guilty on the sole count of discharging a firearm within city limits, acquitting her of all other crimes, and she did her six months in jail for that misdemeanor (I'm pretty sure her monetary fine was paid by passing the hat around town in about ten minutes' time), and she returned home to be the mother her son deserved, little the worse for legal wear and tear.
That's how you do it, at all levels.
Kindly bear in mind another old legal saw:
Bad cases make bad precedents.
"If you commit crimes, you can expect certain rights to be rescinded as part of your punishment."
If they can be rescinded, they are not rights. Rights are immutable. The State can infringe on them, and the State often does. That de-legitimizes the State.
The British government, followed by the United States Government, had laws that allowed slavery. The rights of the enslaved were trampled. People lived their lives and died as slaves. Both those governments, and the government of the short lived Confederacy, were all illegitimate because of those laws.
This did nothing for the enslaved, but it is still worth noting.
@Borepatch
Of course, English common law disarmed Catholics as well as felons. Or was that a royal decree.
The whole thing with normalized parole and reduction of rights is just so stupid.
Either you serve your time, or you don't.
Either you are a menace to society, or you aren't.
If you can be trusted to wander around unchaperoned, you're a free citizen. If you can't be trusted, well, that's what asylums, prisons and graveyards are for.
What McChuck said. Who cannot be trusted with arms cannot be trusted without a custodian (who then assumes at least some responsibility for their bodily safety).
General ignorance of ten centuries of English common law going back to before Magna Carta is no excuse. It still applies.
The US Constitution was not burped out whole ex nihilo when published, despite the shortcomings of anyone's Common Core education.
But if there's a problem here, it's that there's parole at all, and that prison is not, by default, the living embodiment of incarceration in the Chateau D'If at the height of French penology, with one being shoved into a hole, and meals slipped through a slot morning and evening until either conclusion of sentence, or a foul smell of decomposition emanating from within.
Anyone who does that kind of time deserves their full rights back upon release.
Anyone doing less than that takes what they get. Or do not.
Since we don't have that, nor do that, people who're convicted felons deserve, at all times and places, the full reward for committing their second strike, with all the trimmings.
When the subject of this exercise gets out this time, she'll have one more last chance to stop being a menace to society, and not screw up any more. Next time, she can use a machete or a tomahawk, and not run afoul of any statutes.
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