Firearm discharge

“ Any offence relating to the dealing in or smuggling of ammunition, firearms, explosives or armament, or the possession of an automatic or semi-automatic firearm, explosives or armament.
Any offence in contravention of section 36 of the Arms and Ammunition Act, 1969 (Act No. 75 of 1969) , on account of being in possession of more than 1 000 rounds of ammunition intended for firing in an arm contemplated in section 39 (2) (a) (i) of that Act. ”

“ Handguns also appear to be a very popular weapon among criminals. In a 1997 survey of inmates who were armed during the crime for which they were incarcerated, 83.2% of state inmates and 86.7% of federal inmates said that they were armed with a handgun. See Dept. of Justice, Bureau of Justice Statistics, C. Harlow, Firearm Use by Offenders 3 (Nov. 2001) , online at http://www.ojp.usdoj.gov/bjs/pub/pdf/fuo.pdf; see also Weapon Use and Violent Crime 2 (Table 2) (statistics indicating that handguns were used in over 84% of nonlethal violent crimes involving firearms from 1993 to 2001) . ”

“ Stretching language in order to write a more effective statute than Congress devised is not an exercise we should indulge in. But in any case, the ready ability to use a gun that is at hand as a weapon is perhaps one of the reasons the statute sanctions not only using a firearm, but carrying one. ”

“ Also the ‘enemy’ makes constant use of flares.
“We always carry our normal load of ammunition with weapons loaded. If a man knows his weapon is loaded he will be more careful in handling it. Accidental discharge of a weapon automatically means a fine and immediate reduction to the grade of private. In our work, we must take drastic measures to guard against accidental discharge of weapons.34 We learned our lesson in Tunisia, where the accidental discharge of a rifle queered a raid and caused a 24-hour delay in operations. [See comment on this subject following “Night Attack.”] ”

“ Its merits are that the gun lies easily before the thigh, pointing upward behind the right arm, so that an accidental discharge, if such a thing were possible, could hurt no one; it is easily removed by shifting the arm within and lifting it from the bag without the trouble of casting off any secondary fastening; and above all, it is impossible that even in the roughest riding the charge could be jerked forward in the barrel to the imminent danger of bursting it, as we ourselves have witnessed at the first discharge, where the gun has been carried muzzle downwards. ”

“ Using a Firearm During a Crime of Violence Schroeder, Branch, Whitecliff, Castillo, Fagan, Fatta, Craddock, Avraam and Riddle were charged with using a firearm during a crime of violence in connection with the first ATF shootout on February 28, 1993. ”

“ He purposely discharges a firearm from a vehicle at a person, or at a vehicle, conveyance, or a residential or commercial occupiable structure he knows or has good reason to believe to be occupied by a person, and thereby causes the death of another person under circumstances manifesting extreme indifference to the value of human life. ”

“ In the same period, for the 41% of firearm injuries for which the weapon type is known, 82% of them were from handguns. Firearm Injury and Death from Crime 4. And among children under the age of 20, handguns account for approximately 70% of all unintentional firearm-related injuries and deaths. Firearm-Related Injuries 890. In particular, 70% of all firearm-related teenage suicides in 1996 involved a handgun. Id., at 889; see also Zwerling, Lynch, Burmeister, & Goertz, The Choice of Weapons in Firearm Suicides in Iowa, 83 Am. ”

“ If the firearm possessed by a person convicted of a violation of this subsection—
" (i) is a short-barreled rifle, short-barreled shotgun, or semiautomatic assault weapon, the person shall be sentenced to a term of imprisonment of not less than 10 years; or " (ii) is a machinegun or a destructive device, or is equipped with a firearm silencer or firearm muffler, the person shall be sentenced to a term of imprisonment of not less than 30 years. ”

“ The Court is confident that "scratching one's head" with a firearm is not "more than" brandishing it. See ante, at 233. I certainly agree-but only because the "more" use referred to is more use as a weapon. Reading the Guidelines as they are written (rather than importing the Court's deus ex machina of a culpability scale) , and interpreting "use a firearm" in the strange fashion the Court does, produces, see ante, at 232, a full sevenpoint upward sentence adjustment for firing a gun at a storekeeper during a robbery ”

“ If its attendant were killed in action, the weapon would in fact go on firing its complement of cartridges until the last one was expended. The rate of discharge can be regulated from once a minute to the astonishing maximum of six hundred per minute. The same system of belt-feeding has been applied by Mr Maxim to ordinary rifles fired from the shoulder; and it is probable that the attention of our War authorities will be called to the matter.
How few of us realise the fact that there are among the sixty-three hitherto known elements of which this world is composed, no fewer than fifty metals. ”

“ Stated simply, they may not be trusted to possess a firearm without becoming a threat to society. This title would apply both to hand guns and to long guns.
'All of these murderers had shown violent tendencies before they committed the crime for which they are most infamous. They should not have been permitted to possess a gun. Yet, there is no Federal law which would deny possession to these undesirables. ”

“ When a person is ordered to be blown from a gun, he is taken to the one which is fired daily to announce the hour of midday, and is fixed on a small hill close to the Sherpur cantonment. He is there tied to the gun in such a manner that his back is against the muzzle, and on the explosion of the charge the greater part of his body is blown into pieces. Blowing from guns is a punishment intended to strike terror into the hearts of others, but it is no doubt a preferable death to other forms of execution, inasmuch as it is sudden. ”

“ If a man should walk down the street here with a loaded revolver in his pocket he could be arrested and imprisoned, or fined, but in this State a man could walk down the street with a shot gun in his hands or any other weapon where it is exposed so people could see it. A law against carrying concealed weapons imposes no burden upon any law-abiding citizen. There are regulations, of course, permitting certain persons to carry weapons concealed, police officers, a sheriff, and other peace officers ”

“ When actually at the firing point, a soldier is taught that he must “keep his rifle pointing up the range,” for accidents happen easily, and, in spite of the extreme caution of officers and instructors, hardly a year goes by without some accidental shooting to record. The wonder is not that this sort of thing happens, but that it does not happen more often, for, until a soldier has undergone active service and seen how easily fatal results are produced with a rifle, it seems impossible to make him understand the danger attaching to careless use of the weapon. ”

“ Beware of the muzzle of the gun being kept hanging downwards; when so carried, the shot is apt to force its way from the powder, especially in clean barrels; if it happens that a space of sixteen or eighteen inches is thus obtained, and the gun fired with its point below the horizon, it is ten to one but the barrel bursts. There are other perilous consequences besides those that generally accompany the disruption of a barrel, for the men, horses, and dogs, are in perpetual danger of being shot when a gun is carried in the before-mentioned pendent manner. ”

“ And in the Klondike and this same British Yukon there is a Firearms Act which makes it against the law for any civilian to tote a gun. And that law is sure carried out. Fact is, there's no need for a gun. ”

“ In my opinion, the common error of all American fowlers and duck shooters, lies, in the first place, in the overloading the gun altogether, causing it to recoil so much as to be exceedingly disagreeable and even painful, and in the same degree diminishing the effect of the discharge; for it must never be forgotten that when a gun recoils, whatever force is expended on the retrogressive motion of the breech, that same force is to be deducted from the propulsion of the charge. ”

“ Be careful where you discharge your guns, for our lives are precious. Many have now been called to handle guns that never have been used to it. Let such put on a double guard over themselves, and know that they must not use firearms carelessly. ”

“ If the article illegally possessed is a rifle, carbine, grease gun, bazooka, machine gun, submachine gun, hand grenade, bomb, artillery of any kind or ammunition exclusively intended for such weapons, such period of imprisonment shall not be less than five years nor more than ten years. ”

“ A pistol is the one weapon that has no legitimate use. An axe, a knife—even a rifle, has some lawful function. But a pistol is an appliance for killing human beings. It has no other purpose whatever. A man who is found with house-breaking tools in his possession is assumed to be a house-breaker. Surely a man who carries a pistol convicts himself of the intention to kill somebody.
"But perhaps the police had some reasonable plan. ”

“ The possibility of accidents is thus reduced to a minimum and the efficiency of the men increased to a maximum. The moral effect of a high order of marksmanship of an entire police force, when generally known, cannot be overestimated. Practice and skill in the use of the revolver embodies the essential elements of rifle shooting, so that in case of riot, insurrection, or war, a large police force could be made quickly available for duty with very little additional instruction, by arming them with rifles. ”

“ Statistics furnished by the police department show startling facts. Citizens do not realize the number of persons who are either wounded or killed every year by shooting with the revolver. One can hardly pick up a metropolitan paper without finding an account of a shooting, either by accident or design. We have laws forbidding the carrying of concealed weapons, which are to a certain extent effective, but to a very small extent, because it is practically impossible to search every man on the street—and keep him searched. ”

“ The contents of all gunshot wounds should be preserved, as they may be useful in evidence. A pocket revolver, as a rule, leaves the bullet in the body.
Wounds inflicted by firearms may be due to accident, homicide, or suicide. Blackening of the wound, singeing of the hair, scorching of the skin and clothing, show that the weapon was fired at close quarters, whilst blackening of the hand points to suicide. Even when the weapon is fired quite close there may be no blackening of the skin, and the hand is not always blackened in cases of suicide. Smokeless powder does not blacken the skin. ”

“ It is dangerous to put into the hands of a weak person a weapon which may carry death and destruction by the small pressure of the finger. The very handling of such weapons [Pg 512] seems to breed the desire to use them. The situation is something similar to that of a man who gazes over the brink of a precipice and to whom there comes an almost irresistible desire to throw himself over.
There would be some force in the argument that the law-abiding citizen has the right to carry a revolver to protect himself from thugs if his pistol were any real protection ”

“ All ammunition should, as a rule, be kept in some secret and safe place, and always under lock and key. Every man knows that edged tools are dangerous, consequently that the leaving loaded firearms within the reach of anybody who may chance to come across them is simply leaving means of destruction unprotected, and he should bear in mind that this mischief of his own neglect might accidentally at any moment be wielded against himself. ”

“ While out shooting, in getting through a hedge he dragged his fowling-piece after him, the muzzle towards his own body, when, the lock becoming entangled in the brambles, his immediate death was the result. Such a piece of foolhardiness on the part of a man accustomed to the use of firearms is astounding.
Use dulls the edge of caution, and some men, unhappily, who are accustomed to deal [25] constantly with weapons and ingredients of destruction, become not only careless but indifferent and callous. ”

“ I wonder that there is not more havoc with human life in this day, when it is getting so popular to carry firearms. Most of our young men, and many of our boys, do not feel themselves in tune unless they have a pistol accompaniment. Men are locked up or fined if found with daggers or slung-shot upon their persons, but revolvers go free. There is not half so much danger from knife as pistol. The former may let the victim escape minus a good large slice, but the latter is apt to drop him dead. On the frontiers, or engaged in police duty, firearms may be necessary ”

“ The historical use of pistols as 'arms' of offense and defense is beyond controversy." "The maintenance of the right to bear arms is a most essential one to every free people and should not be whittled down by technical constructions." ”

“ The rising sound of the reports told plainly of the swinging muzzle, and officers and men dropped flat in the mud and waited till the sweeping bullets had passed over their heads. Men may work on and 'chance it' against rifle fire alone, but the sweep of a machine-gun is beyond chance, and very near to the certainty of sudden death to all in the circle of its swing. ”