It seems that some municipalities, in order to avoid crowded jail situations and compensate for ‘blue flu’, are looking the other way when it comes to particular crimes and offenses. Things that might have gotten you a ride in the back of a Crown Vic and a trip to stand in front of the judge are now being adjudicated with warnings and/or citations…or just a stern talking to. (Essentially, British style policing.) Naturally, the media catches up on this and duly reports it..thereby basically telling everyone that it’s okay to commit minor crimes because we don’t have the resources to deal with you. Or, in other words, a low-level indie version of The Purge.
Problem is, low-level crime doesn’t always stay low-level. Shoplifting a 40 oz. from the Korean grocery is low-level…until mama-san catches you and starts screaming and hitting you with her pricing gun. And in his overwhelming desire to GTFO, our low level criminal busts her one across the jaw and runs. And junior sees mom get her bell rung, grabs a baseball but and runs out the door after our low-level criminal. What happens when the two meet is definitely no longer low-level. So, yeah, those ‘let em go’ low-level offenses and crimes can spin outta control pretty quickly. And its all fun and games until someone needs a chest seal.
So, otherwise reasonable people might cast a curious glance at the fella in Krogers with a Sig 226 tucked on his hip. It’s a virus, after all…not a race riot. Why the hardware? Because disasters always wind up bringing out the worst in some people. not all people, maybe not even the majority of people…but some people.
Remember the predicted paradigm of “when the government handouts stop there’ll be looting and burning in the streets?” I guarantee you that right now, in some major population centers, there are people who think they’re going to get checks from Uncle Sam for a couple thousand dollars over this ‘stimulus package’ nonsense. And if that doesn’t come to pass? Well..thats “my money” that I was “entitled to” and next thing you know you get crowds constructively expressing their dissatisfaction by breaking windows and burning cars.
Far fetched? Mmmmmaybe. But more likely the scum down the street in that crazy house are going to start rattling doorknobs at 3am and lock-checking parked cars since they know that people are going to be loading up on cash and other desirable items ‘just in case’. Garages that are unlocked will be visited at night. Items in your yard might start disappearing. And someone might be keeping an eye on your driveway to see when your car (and by extension, you) are and aren’t home. I suspect that the more rural your location the more likely that you might get the prepper-fiction-classic of strangers rolling up to your house and helping themselves.
Time to roll out the razor ribbon and sentry guns? I doubt it. But it is time to make sure that taking your pistol with you when you leave the house ‘most of the time’ becomes taking your pistol with you when you leave the house ‘every time’. Wanna take it a step further and keep a carbine and mags in the truck ‘just in case’? Nothing wrong with that, I suppose. Me, I keep it simple for now….G17 and a spare mag.
Rethinking the whole open carry concept. Maybe it’s better the bad guys don’t know if you are packing so they don’t plan around it by blind siding the person carrying.
My job has me in the mean streets after hours and things are getting crazy. Add to that a corporate policy that prohibits firearms and we are in quite the pickle. Got to stay in condition yellow and scan for threats.
Plan A: Retreat at speed
Plan B: 28oz claw hammer
I’m guessing that you’ve already considered ignoring company policy to stash heavier items in your personal lunchbox or similar?
My work has a no weapons policy. I’m considering violating that, something I haven’t done in many years, to go to a tuckable holster holding a single stack piece. As I don’t go back to work for a week I’ve got time to see how things are feeling at that point and make a final decision.
Steelheart
with all the tools on the work truck it would be pretty easy to zip a ‘clean’ .38 snubby up in an empty nylon voltmeter case and if discovered deny, deny, deny. ‘…this truck is frequently out of my control and custody, I don’t know where that came from, not mine…’
Sometimes those company policies are lawyer policies so they can deny liability if something goes wrong. Other times, they will use the policy to cull out employees that they don’t want any more.
I used to periodically have to go out in south Texas to the oilfields and it was company policy of ‘no guns’. I decided long ago that there isn’t a job in existence that is worth my life or serious bodily harm. I was always discrete and no one, not even family ever knew. I am certain that co-workers and bosses that knew me well, ‘knew’ I was packing, but I also ‘knew’ some of those bosses also carried regularly against policy.
Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell.
Guess we’re going to see a trial run on what happens when authority meets defiance since Italy just put the Lombard region, the epicenter of their outbreak, on martial law since so many residents were just openly flaunting the stay at home directive (sort of like our Spring Breakers). This should be a good way to see how things might unfold here. California will be interesting too when (not if) the state government has to resort to enforcement to get people off the streets there (wonder what they’re going to do with all those homeless?). Especially since that state’s population is the center of the “me and only me” universe. I give it no time at all till the screams of ” Government Thugs and Nazis” reverberate from the land of fruits and nuts…
Quiet in my neck of the woods, very little traffic since the schools are shut down. It’s gonna rain so the sidewalk project is on hold (who puts in sidewalks anymore?), and I’ve did all my yardwork yesterday. Guess I’ll just kickback and relax. Breakfast this morning is Bubble and Squeak using the leftover St Paddy’s day corned beef and cabbage, sunnyside up eggs, coffee, OJ, and toast.
Regards
Flouting, not flaunting.
My autospell stand corrected! 😀
Also: https://www.al.com/news/2020/03/mad-rush-alabama-gun-ammo-sales-surge-amid-uncertainty-of-coronavirus.html
Too late folks…
Not only are they not arresting, they’re letting them out in my state.
https://www.clickorlando.com/news/local/2020/03/19/hillsborough-county-to-free-non-violent-inmates-in-effort-to-prevent-covid-19-spread/
“According to officials, low-level, nonviolent offenders in the Orient Road Jail and the Falkenburg Road Jail were released from custody.”
These officials are stuck between a rock and a hard place. I pray they make the best choice available to them. Unfortunately none of us can play out all scenarios and then pick the least bad one. Will be serious fall out from this if one of these “nonviolent” offenders gets into a situation that escalates like CZ described.
Hopefully when this mess is all over we realize we locked up a bunch of people who didnt need locked up. If youre non violent and especially if you non convicted you dont belong in jail except for a few exceptions
Im actualy more interested in how all these jobs and calsses that were “You cant do it from home” suddenly turned out to be you can do it from home. Why pay for school dorms and tuition when you can get the same classes online from the same institution.
You can get free education online that is just as good as the paid for education online. Only difference is one counts toward a diploma.
G 41 wit 2 extra mags
With most all crimes being plea-bargained down to a lesser offense, the term “non-violent” is meaningless.
If youve seen the system at work, you know that countless felonies are committed by just about every criminal (I’m not counting the nonpayment of child support offenders that fill out our jails) before they ever get a conviction of any kind that stays on their record. And even then, its mostly the dumbest or those using the public defenders that catch convictions that are more than probation only anyway.
The system is a joke and its taking the hilarity to new levels with every excuse that comes along.
Central Califoria (Prius-stan)
• SIGINT: LEO dispatcher “..negative CoVid 19..” to officer dispatched to a residence. I cannot confirm this as an “all clear” to the officer, and have only heard this once at my QTH. I continue to monitor, as this would suggest and interesting change in comm protocol. Will continue to monitor and update.
• HUMINT: Growing less reliable, going to secondary-vetting protocols.
Mustang0268 sends
My wife is a dispacher, they use a code word.
I have heard no other traffic specific to those words. As such I am assuming that I misheard. I would imagine that they do have specific “open frequency” terms, thanks for pointing that out.
Simple. Went from 1 magazine to 2 as back up. Escalating as needed. Wife is in the same state of mind. Going to get interesting real quick.
We’ve already had some folks get shot or stabbed in stores here over goods they were trying to buy. The ol model 29 rides anywhere i do along with several speed loaders.
Have a friend who works at the local gun counter. He’s had to turn down several
hundred customers in the past couple weeks because they don’t have a FOID (Illinois) card. Most had no clue about laws, they just thought they could walk in and buy a gun.
G17 and 2 spare mags…and a G43 with spare mag…people are stupid and unpredictable…
Yep. Where are they going to get the trillions of dollars in handouts they are talking about now? US.gov already spends more than they bring in and the Chicoms could cut off the loan spigot at any time. When the dollar crashes it could be the real SHTF scenario.
IMHO They have completely given up on any idea of fiscal issues because they know it’s to late to worry.. No way the virus justifies the amount of stuff we are doing. We have lost 500 times as many people to flu, the past year. They know that the financial issues have been popped by the virus and want the epidemic to seem horrible and take all the blame. Forget your 2″ snubbies, Load you Browning’s, get your extra Mags and clean your AR’s an M-1’S. Etc.
Please don’t leave guns and ammo unsecured in a vehicle. It’s bad medicine to arm the opposition.
The money comes from the Fed who create it out of thin air. That is what our economy is based on. Research it if you don’t believe it. The miracle is that it has lasted so long and has worked so well.
Anecdotally I’ve seen more open carry in western WA in the last 3 days than in the proceeding 9 months combined.
Open Carry now means stay far the hell away from me. CC might get you the closed fist up side the head when you’re not looking.
OC might get you a bullet in the head verses a fist!!! I’m LE, while OC is legal in Texas, I CC and don’t OC off-duty. Just not tactically sound. I want to be the gray man unknown threat to the wolf!!! Not a ammo resupply mule!
Open carry for “teams” (2+), CC by yourself.
G22 with one reload here in bayou country.
I work in a Gun free business too – but a Ruger snubbie in a barsony pocket holster goes right into a cargo pants pocket, and is pretty much invisible.
Somebody comes to shoot us up, I plan to stop them.
If they fire me for it, at least we will still be alive.
I say we take off and nuke the entire site from orbit. It’s the only way to be sure…