[Madcritter]

Biker or bike rider/enthusiast?
Biker has such a neg. connotation .:wink:

I've never heard of them either.:001_huh:

Well, let's see I own 3, work on my on bikes, from paint to bearings. Ride one to work most every day (all year). I ride it to the store rather than the truck or Impala. Go to bike rallies (and don't trailer it to the mountains I ride it there). Do rolling thunder and Patriot Guard. What am I ?

 

[madisongunnut]

You my friend are a true biker...some dont understand. Support your Local 81 and all is well.

 

[Madcritter]

Oh and I forgot long time member of the Blue Knights

 

[GTM1]

Cool you love your bikes but when one hears the term biker one still thinks of the not so law abiding sort instead of the bike riding loving sort.

 

[mekender]

what is supposed to be the WMD?

Could be anything from a tinfoil and acid bomb to a nuke.

 

[bahamadave]

There's a bunch of HA running around NC, especially in the Winston/Greensboro/High Point/ Durham areas. Red Devils popped on our radar a couple of years ago as allies to the HA or possibly feeding their membership ranks, mainly to combat a nationally growing Outlaws gang. All of them will be nice, usually, until it's time not to be nice.

 

[gabepossenti]

I don't get the relevance of the guns to this case, since there are no firearm charges pending. (Whatever the WMD is, I can't imagine it's a gun!) Why are the guns the lead thing mentioned in the article? Why are there pictures of the guns in the article? As far as I can gather from this article, the guns were all legally owned....if they hadn't been, surely that would have been mentioned. So what's the deal? It's completely repugnant that the sheriff and the media are playing up the guns when the guns were legal.

 

[Joe30045]

Yes, the WMD could be a gun, pursuant to NC Statutes. Since they don't list all of the weapons and the corresponding lengths of said weapons, it is hard to tell which subsection the charge would fall under, but I would bet that 6-10 is a good place to start.

North Carolina General Statute § 14-288.8 provides that it is unlawful for any person
to manufacture, assemble, possess, store, transport, sell, offer to sell, purchase, offer to
purchase, deliver, give to another, or acquire any weapon of mass death and destruction.

A weapon of mass death and destruction includes:

1.bombs of all sorts;
2.grenades;
3.rockets having a propellant charge of more than four (4) ounces;
4.a missile having an explosive or incendiary charge of more than one-quarter (1/4) ounce;
mines;
5.any type of weapon (other than a shotgun or a shotgun shell of a type particularly suitable for sporting purposes) which will expel a projectile using an explosive, or other propellant, and which has a barrel with a bore of more than one-half (1/2) inch in diameter;
6.any firearm capable of fully automatic fire;
7.any shotgun with a barrel length less than eighteen (18) inches or an overall length of less than twenty-six (26) inches;
8.a rifle with a barrel length of less than sixteen (16) inches or an overall length of less than twenty-six (26) inches;
9.any muffler or silencer for any firearm, whether or not such firearm is included within this definition; and
10.any combination of parts either designed or intended for use in converting a device into any weapon described above, and from which a weapon of mass death and destruction may readily be assembled.

 

[gabepossenti]

Fair enough. Possibly this guy had a shotgun with the barrel too short, or whatever, and that counts, under NC's generally asinine gun laws, as having a WMD. Still, there's only one count of possessing a WMD, which sugests that 49 of the guns were legal. And so I ask: why are the guns the lead line of the story? The problem isn't that the guy has 49 legal guns. The problem (or part of it) is that he's got one WMD, plus some cocaine and weed he's planning to sell. Seems like your standard media demonization of guns to me. That's what I'm getting at.

 

[mekender]

A short barrel shotgun is a WMD in NC

 

[HellTeeOne]

I would imagine it doesn't matter here what the WMD was and that charge will probably be the first to get eliminated or pleaded down in court, seeing as this is not a federal case.

Not saying they neccesarily deserve what they may get in my opinion, but anyone keeping illicit drugs and a gun collection under the same roof is foolish indeed, whether they are a decent person or not.

 

[gabepossenti]

...anyone keeping illicit drugs ... is foolish indeed, whether they are a decent person or not.

Don't need to add the guns to the equation to get foolishness here, IMHO.

 

[FlatFender]

I was on my mountain bike a while back and instinctively tossed out the harley wave at a group of HA guys. They all smiled as they gave me the middle finger...lol.

 

[WNC Seabee]

Fair enough. Possibly this guy had a shotgun with the barrel too short, or whatever, and that counts, under NC's generally asinine gun laws, as having a WMD. Still, there's only one count of possessing a WMD, which sugests that 49 of the guns were legal. And so I ask: why are the guns the lead line of the story? The problem isn't that the guy has 49 legal guns. The problem (or part of it) is that he's got one WMD, plus some cocaine and weed he's planning to sell. Seems like your standard media demonization of guns to me. That's what I'm getting at.

ummmm.....how about the moment the guns and drugs came together? That my friend is when the guns became illegally possessed (allegedly, of course). Distributing coke is a felony...possession of guns by a felon is illegal, ergo, the guns are illegally possessed.

Not that hard of a concept really, and not a law that I have any trouble with.

 

[madisongunnut]

I was on my mountain bike a while back and instinctively tossed out the harley wave at a group of HA guys. They all smiled as they gave me the middle finger...lol.

How did you know they were 81.LOL The bird deal don't sound like them. They respond with a wave or no acknowledgement at all.

 

[gabepossenti]

ummmm.....how about the moment the guns and drugs came together? That my friend is when the guns became illegally possessed (allegedly, of course). Distributing coke is a felony...possession of guns by a felon is illegal, ergo, the guns are illegally possessed.

Well, I'm not a lawyer, but istm that the coke salesman is not considered a felon until he's convicted of a felony. To the best of my knowledge, it's not a retroactive thing, so that if you commit a felony on March 1, and possess guns between then and June 1, at which point you're arrested, they'll charge you for having had the guns during the interim period. Sure, they'll take the guns away when you're arrested, and if you're convicted you won't get them back (I understand you may not get them back even if you're not convicted in some cases). But that's a different thing.

At any rate, my point here isn't that I think it's a great thing for drug dealers to have guns. My point is that the media is all excited to have guns to display to us, showing us that the sheriff is doing wonderful work keeping the streets safe. But those guns weren't part of the problem here, as far as I can tell from the story. They were legal guns. It's like putting the guy's silverware on display. "Hey, he had a knife!" Who cares?

 

[gabepossenti]

In case I'm not making my point clearly enough, I'll say it a different way. My worry is that the guns are being played up, even though they're legal, for the following obvious reason. People are supposed to get outraged that this drug dealer had guns. The fact that he had them legally is part of the problem. It shows we need tougher gun laws!!! People like that shouldn't be able to get guns in the first place!!! This, it seems to me, is standard media fare.

But, see, that's a line of thinking I object to very strenuously. It's not that I think drug dealers should have guns, of course. I sincerely wish they wouldn't. Indeed, I wish even more devoutly that they'd stop selling drugs altogether and start living wholly upstanding lives. But I don't want to make it ever harder and harder for decent people to get ahold of guns and ammunition, so that perhaps that might make it slightly harder (or, more likely, just slightly more expensive) for drug dealers to get ahold of them.