But it is an unassailable fact that virtually everything Heather Martens has ever <\/em>written about guns, gun laws, gun owners and the Second Amendment is wrong; it seems improbable that she’s unaware of how much of her oeuvre <\/em>is just plain not so.<\/p>\n Yesterday, Minnesota Public Radio ran a “commentary” column by Martens<\/a> (entitled, I kid you not, “Bill would encourage citizens to shoot first, even when they could walk away instead”) that may be the richest single trove of concentrated untruth in one place since Baghdad Bob strode the stage.<\/p>\n Lie #1: HF1467 Legalizes Murder!<\/strong><\/p>\n [Rep. Tony Cornish, R-Good Thunder] wants to legalize a kind of murder.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n It’s hard to count the number of ways this statement screams “stupid”.<\/p>\n Either Martens is trying to scare people into submission, or she’s an idiot.<\/p>\n Reading this next bit, I could easily go both ways (emphasis added).<\/p>\n Lie #2: HF1467 Will Legalize Shooting People For No Reason!<\/strong><\/p>\n I’ve read Martens’ piece at least half a dozen time as this is written. And every time I think “This is the most cynical lie of the bunch”, I remember some other part of the article that’s even worse.<\/p>\n But this one may be the dumbest – or most craven – lie of them all:<\/p>\n House File 1467,<\/a> which ought to be called “Shoot First,” (sic)<\/p><\/blockquote>\n [But it’s not. \u00a0Which doesn’t stop Martens from calling it “Shoot First” for the rest of the article. \u00a0I get it – rhetoric is rhetoric. \u00a0But it leads her down a factual dark alley later on – Ed<\/em>]<\/p>\n will be heard in the House Public Safety Committee this Thursday. It would allow the killing of anyone who enters another’s yard, even when the person is unarmed and posing no threat<\/strong>; and it would allow the killing of anyone in a public place who seems threatening <\/strong>— again, even if the person is unarmed, and even if walking or driving away is a safe option.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n Cornish’s law “allows” no such thing.\u00a0 Self-defense with lethal force in Minnesota will still rest on four links in a chain; you…<\/p>\n And the fact<\/em> is that if your case is missing any <\/em>of those four elements, you are screwed.\u00a0 And should be. And Cornish’s bill doesn’t change that<\/em>; as I pointed out Wednesday, it merely removes some ambiguity from current law.<\/p>\n Martens should know this; she’s been getting her head handed to her on this subject for a solid decade.\u00a0 That means she’s lying.<\/p>\n Lie #3: The Out Of State Rabble Will Kill Us!<\/strong><\/p>\n Martens tries to address some of Cornish’s proposal’s technicalities<\/p>\n Also buried in this bill is a loosening of concealed-carry permit laws to recognize all other state’s pistol permits in Minnesota, even states with lax background checks that issue permits valid for life.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n “Lax Background checks?”\u00a0 All states use the same federal government system<\/em>.<\/p>\n Notwithstanding that, it is a fact that there has never been any empirical link between\u00a0 a state’s acceptance criteria and their carry permittees likelihood to commit crimes.\u00a0 None.<\/p>\n Lie #4: It’ll Be Easier To Buy Guns!<\/strong><\/p>\n Martens claims..:<\/p>\n It also makes it harder for local law enforcement to prevent prohibited purchasers from getting permits to buy guns,<\/p><\/blockquote>\n On this Martens is 180 degrees removed from reality. \u00a0While Cornish would make a “permit to purchase” a handgun expire after five years, rather than one – it would also require them to be reviewed and if necessary rescinded for cause <\/em>during those five years.<\/p>\n Current has no such provision<\/em>.<\/p>\n Cornish’s<\/p>\n Lie #5: It’ll Hurt WomenandChildren!<\/strong><\/p>\n Martens claims that Cornish’s bill…:<\/p>\n …limits law enforcement’s ability to confiscate weapons in domestic violence situations.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n This is just face-palmingly dumb.<\/p>\n The bill bans confiscations after disasters<\/em>, and establishes consequences if government oversteps its authority.<\/p>\n Domestic Violence is never mentioned <\/em>in HF1467.<\/p>\n Not only that, but the bill requires the state to provide more data to the Federal database against which background checks are run<\/em> …<\/p>\n (a) When a court places a person, including a person under the jurisdiction of the juvenile court, who is charged with committing a crime of violence, into a pretrial diversion program before disposition, the court must ensure that information regarding the person’s placement in that program and the ordered expiration date of that placement is transmitted as soon as practicable to the National Instant Criminal Background Check System. When a person\u00a0 successfully completes or discontinues the program, the court must also report that fact as soon as practicable to the National Instant Criminal Background Check System.<\/p>\n 2.19(b) The court must report the conviction and duration of the firearms disqualification imposed as soon as practicable to the National Instant Criminal Background Check System when a person is convicted of a gross misdemeanor that disqualifies the person from possessing firearms under the following sections:<\/p><\/blockquote>\n …meaning that “Domestic violence” convictions, among others,\u00a0 will be more <\/em>likely to turn up on Carry or Purchase Permit applications than under current law.<\/p>\n Lie #6: Everything You Do Is Deadly!<\/strong><\/p>\n Martens’ selective cognition is especially on display in this next lie:<\/p>\n The Shoot First bill (sic)\u00a0includes the words “self-defense,” but it uses obscure legalese and a bizarre redefinition of the common word “domicile” to make the bill apply to much more than self-defense. “Domicile” is redefined to include not just a person’s home, but also the “curtilage” (fenced yard), “appurtenances” (outbuildings or garages), and even occupied cars (or conveyances).<\/p><\/blockquote>\n OK, that was actually factual; it may have been the first fully factual significant statement in Martens’ article.\u00a0 It may well be the last.<\/p>\n It is a fact that Cornish’s bill expands a person’s “domicile” to include their yard, their garage, their car and the like.\u00a0 This is a good thing<\/em>.\u00a0 Because while Minnesota’s “Castle Doctrine” law gives the citizen certain presumptions while in their home, those presumptions end at the door – which is why some ignorant but hopeful homeowners say, sometimes-but-by-no-means-always jokingly, “if someone tries to attack you on your porch, shoot him and drag him inside!”.\u00a0 It will prevent absurdities like being convicted for failing to retreat into their house if they’re attacked in their garage.<\/p>\n Still, kudos to Martens; she managed one true fact.<\/p>\n The lie comes next:<\/p>\n If someone enters “by force or by stealth” — in legal terms, that means as little “force” as turning a doorknob or opening an unlatched gate — then the person is “presumed” to intend to badly hurt someone. In court, a presumption cannot be rebutted, so no evidence would be allowed that showed the dead person had entered the yard by error, by invitation of the homeowner, to rescue a drowning child, or for any other reason.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n True, more or less.<\/p>\n Of course, there’d be the little matter of showing that lethal force was justified<\/em>, and that the property owner had a reasonable <\/em>fear of death or great bodily harm.\u00a0 Absent both <\/em>of those, the property owner will more than likely be convicted of some sort of homicide.<\/p>\n (And it’s interesting to watch people like Heather Martens come up with scenarios that reflect their view of their fellow human; that an otherwise law-abiding citizen would sit in his back yard inviting strangers into his yard to “legally” shoot them to death.\u00a0 Huh? How many moons orbit Heather Martens’ world?)<\/p>\n A Brief Divergence Into Facts – Which Prove Cornish’s Case, And Undercut Martens’, Anyway Martens writes:<\/p>\n The main rationalization for this bill is the false claim that Minnesotans can’t legally defend themselves [it’s a strawman, of course; nobody said any such thing.\u00a0 Merely that there are ambiguities in the law that would be well rationalized before a law-abiding citizen’s life is ruined – Ed<\/em>] and that even if someone invades a Minnesotan’s home, the homeowner must run away. In fact, self-defense is legally protected in Minnesota; we already have “Castle Doctrine.” Here are three examples from recent years:<\/p><\/blockquote>\n (For those of you who take Martens seriously, I’ll emphasize the bits that lead you to where she undercuts herself).<\/p>\n Minneapolis:<\/strong> Vang Khang shot two police officers who had invaded his home by mistake<\/em>. Khang was not prosecuted <\/em>and collected over half a million dollars from the city.<\/p>\n Coon Rapids:<\/strong> Gerald Whaley shot and killed an unarmed teenager who entered Whaley’s home<\/em>, apparently believing it to be a vacant house. Whaley was not charged<\/em>.<\/p>\n Rockford:<\/strong> Eric Cegon shot and killed his partner’s ex-boyfriend, who was armed and breaking into the couple’s home<\/em>. Cegon was not charged.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n One wonders if Martens thinks the cases above were mistakes; Khang’s home was assaulted by a SWAT team carrying out a no-knock raid\u00a0on the wrong house<\/em>.\u00a0 Don’t think Khang was in the right?\u00a0 How often do\u00a0you <\/em>think you can shoot cops and have it stand up in court.\u00a0 The Cegon case was a blazingly legitimate shoot (I covered it when it happened<\/a>).\u00a0 And the Whaley case (I’m not intimately familiar with it) was dismissed by a county attorney who has shown himself not to be especially friendly to citizens and self-defense.<\/p>\n And all three are a digression – because, as I emphasized,\u00a0all three occurred in the citizens’ houses<\/em>.<\/p>\n So what if Samantha Simons’ (Eric Cegon’s girlfriend) ex boyfriend had cornered the two, and their child, in the garage rather than the bedroom?<\/p>\n Probably\u00a0 nothing; Wright County is good GOP territory; the law-abiding can catch a break.<\/p>\n Proponents of Shoot First (sic)\u00a0laws have no examples of Minnesotans who have been sent to prison for defending themselves.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n Had they lived in Susan Gaertner’s Ramsey County at the time?\u00a0 Gaertner would have had every means (and likelihood!) of prosecuting them for murder, because they didn’t retreat as fast and far as they could.\u00a0 She might have lost – but Cegon and Simons would have had to prove their innocence in court, against the full weight and budget of the Ramsey County Attorney’s office, even though the shoot was in every possible way legitimate.<\/p>\n And that is<\/em>, in fact, just plain wrong.<\/p>\n Lie #7: State Boundaries Make A Difference<\/strong><\/p>\n Martens mixes up her laws in the next bit:<\/p>\n But in states that passed Shoot First laws [I keep asking lefties who use that terms – “does it make sense to you to shoot second when your life is legitimately in danger?\u00a0 They never, ever answer – Ed<\/em>] (over law enforcement’s objections), [to be accurate, “big law enforcement” is a political, not ethical, organization<\/em>] unintended consequences abound.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n But will Martens favor us with any?<\/p>\n As Paul A. Logli, president of the National District Attorneys Association, pointed out, such laws “basically giv[e] citizens more rights to use deadly force than we give police officers, and with less review.”<\/p><\/blockquote>\n That is a completely absurd statement, presented without the faintest support; police in every <\/em>jurisdiction have deadly force rights that are vastly more lax than private citizens.<\/p>\n There are some states who passed “Make My Day” laws which moved some <\/em>presumptions of innocence in favor of citizens…<\/p>\n …but not in Minnesota. <\/em>Because Minnesota’s criteria for legal self-defense aren’t changing<\/em>; not under Cornish’s bill, or any other!<\/p>\n In Minnesota, the associations of police chiefs, peace officers and county attorneys all opposed Shoot First (sic)\u00a0in 2008, when it was rejected by the House Public Safety Committee.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n![\"\"](\"http:\/\/farm5.static.flickr.com\/4017\/4575208799_e7c6e34c94.jpg\")
<\/a>Maybe not in every single area of her life.\u00a0 She may well be perfectly good, ethical human being in some areas of her life.\u00a0 I don’t know.<\/p>\n\n
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