JayC

Likely under state law he could have shot them because the bad guys clearly forcibly entered vehicle. Also these charges will get dropped, state preemption prohibits a person from being charged who is involved in a self defense shooting. No way the local DA goes to bat that the truck driver didn't have a reasonable fear of death after the bad guys came back and shot at him. And remember in all likelihood the DA would have to prove beyond a reasonable doubt the truck driver was NOT in fear of his life, that is not a easy hill to climb. Finally, while shooting shots into the air isn't a very good self defense strategy and frankly very dangerous, maybe we give the truck driver the benefit of the doubt since he was awoke out of a deep sleep by 3 bad guys trying to break into the place where he was sleeping.

TBI has a horrible false positive rate, more than twice the NICS system... You should call your legislators and complain that we're wasting $10 on background checks and they're much more likely to deny somebody the who isn't prohibited than somebody who is... We'd be better off going to the national system which is free.

Great job OhShoot.

WOW, that is a strong pro-2nd Amendment bill.... This isn't just a civil immunity law, it's a criminal immunity law as well!!! We all need to call our legislators and have them back this bill.

IANAL, but my understanding is that provisions of a contract which violate state law are not valid. State law says that keeping a firearm in your vehicle in the parking lot is legal and you can not be fired for doing so. It would seems to me that a contract provision which states otherwise would be null and void. And since she's part of a union she probably can't be fired without cause. But it's this non-sense that happens because TFA pushed these silly parking lot laws and tried to make a protected class of employee... it would have taken less political capital to allow HCP holders to carry at school, than to pass this.

I'm not suggesting that you go and carry into NJ, only that it's a unique legal way to challenge states refusing to issue non-residents permits. And you'd challenge them in federal court, not state courts. It doesn't rely on the 2A at all, only that they grant a privilege to citizens of the state and refuse to grant that privilege to non-residents, and that clearly violates the constitution.

I really worry about our education system some days. Where does Article IV Section 2 of the US Constitution talk about immigration? It talks about a limitation of power placed on the both of the individual states. That they can not charge a different tax rate for non-residents, or prohibit a non-resident from buying property in the state. Since TN claims that an HCP is a privilege, then per the plain reading of the Constitution they must allow any citizen of the many states the same privilege. Then you have 2 court cases which provide basic case law on the subject, one about a NJ prohibiting PA residents from collecting clams: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Corfield_v._Coryell And a slightly more known case Dred Scott v Sandford which opinion includes the following passage: That seems to be fairly on point, it comes from one of the worse decisions ever given by SCOTUS, but it's clear this line of thinking was around at or near the founding.

So, there is a MUCH bigger problem states have with denying non-resident permits, and that is it violates the US Constitution, lets not make a 2A argument that they are denying us a fundamental right, lets go even easier. Article IV - Section 2 The citizens of each state shall be entitled to all privileges and immunities of citizens in the several states. The plain reading of this basically means that TN can NOT grant a privilege only to it's residents, and deny those privileges to non-residents. The same goes for CA, NY, NJ etc. It's an interesting legal theory that doesn't appear to have been tried yet. It doesn't require a judge to be pro-2A, only enforce common case law that goes back nearly 200 years.

I don't expect them too... but if I'm a defense attorney, I'm going to save every bit of this to use in my clients defense in the future.

They have a bigger problem, the city of Knoxville has argued that this site is a park under the drug laws and added years onto people's sentences for selling drugs within so many feet of a park. The local PD and mayor are willing to put these convictions and future convictions of drug dealers at risk just to keep otherwise law abiding citizens from carrying into the park. It's my understanding this is not the TFA backed lawsuit? I suspect they will not settle, for anything less than the park being declared a park.

Yeah the only place we've ever seen it as the sole charge is trying to carry into the secure area of an airport.

Yeah this changed 2+ years ago, all parks are carry good zones, city, county, state or national.

Monkey has it all correct except this part right here. All public parks are open to HCP holders, and can not be legally posted in TN. There is currently a lawsuit working it's way through the court system on whether certain 'Entertainment venues' are covered by this section of law. But, what you'd normally call a city park is clearly legal to carry in. TN gun/carry laws are 'ok', but a hell of a lot better than IL. Want to buy an AR-15 with a 30 round mag and a Glock pistol with a 17 round mag, go down to the local gun store with your TN drivers license and you'll walk out the door with the guns 30-45 minutes later.

But the evidence doesn't back up your personal experience, somehow when you place average citizen X in a self defense shooting situation, they perform as well or better than the police officer who have 60x to 1000x more formal training. Studies advocating for more law enforcement training using scientific methods show that the differences between experience levels have virtually no impact on shooting ability between Expert, Intermediate and Novice shooters is almost the same at the 3-15 ft engagement distances, only do you see significant difference when you go beyond 21 ft, which as we all know very few self defense shootings take place that far out. As for the safety argument, that somehow more range time decrease ND's and overall safely handling firearms, show me the research because I for sure can't find it. The information I can find on the subject seems to suggest that unintentional firearm fatalities are down across the board, yet over the last 20 years firearms ownership and carry has exploded and in many states there is no required 'safety course' to carry a firearm (the majority of states today). Clearly some safety programs are working and are effective, Eddie the Eagle and similar education by parents is having an impact of children under the age of 10. But that is a far cry from saying that mandatory training for law abiding adults should be a requirement to carry a firearm for protection. Cruel, the fact remains that ranges and firearms instructors gave a VESTED interest in keep the status quo... It doesn't mean they're acting on that vested interest, but it sure seems odd they're the one's who keep arguing for the same or more training yet can't cite a single research paper that proves their point, that a simple video, or hand out with the rules of gun safety doesn't provide nearly the same impact as 8 hours of wasting your time trying not to fall asleep.

We're just going to have to agree to disagree... The reality is very few self defense uses of a firearm by a citizen results in these bad outcomes you describe. We don't see news reports from other states in our region who don't have training requirements for law abiding citizens to carry firearms for personal protection. I'd suggest reading this paper on the subject, it paints a very stark picture how little training buys you on the range - http://www.forcescience.org/articles/naiveshooter.pdf And we know how bad the results drop in real world shootings, NYPD scoring a 18% hit rate in real life shootings.

Agreed, corporate welfare for ranges, and firearms instructors.

We're talking about a proposed law that would allow law abiding citizens to carry without jumping through any hops, and you complain that lack of training is a reason why this proposed law isn't a good thing. I'm pointing out that just isn't true. 2 years ago we allowed handgun carry in a vehicle by any law abiding citizen over 18, can you cite a single example of a questionable shooting because of that change in the law? What makes you think this change would be any different. Of course if somebody asks me about purchasing a firearm for self defense, then first thing I explain is training is key, but the fact is the amount of training MOST people need to protect themselves from bad guys is keep your meat hook off the trigger until you want it to go bang, and the death comes out this end. That is the GREAT equalizer of firearms, very little training, and you're good to go for most common self defense situations. Heaven forbid any of us are forced to use our pistol for self defense someday, but the reality is most of the time, there is going to be little question who is trying to do you harm, and the distance to the target is going to be short enough that aim is likely not going to matter so much as point shooting. Training and education are really for those 'extreme' cases that we as otherwise law abiding citizens are rarely going to come into contact with. Training and education is important, get as much of both as you can afford in time and money, but don't let a lack of either of those things keep you from carrying a firearm to protect yourself and the one's you love whenever you can legally.

This statement just doesn't meet up with the FACTS. While I agree training is a good thing, the fact is that every state except for 1 (GA) that touches TN allows unlicensed carry with no training, some of the states that touch TN allowed licensed carry with no serious training. Where are the incidents of blood running in the streets in these other states, our population is not significantly different from those states, so why do you think it would be different here. I'll leave you with one other little fact that most people don't know, police officers are 5+ times more likely to kill an innocent person in a self defense shooting than your average citizen. Police Officers receive significant training both in law and in firearms, yet their ability to hit bad guys during a justified shooting is much lower than criminals and the general population. Training isn't everything, and shouldn't be a government requirement to protect yourself, full stop.

As much as I think this is a bad idea... it would solve a lot of problems, including loosing our gold star HCP due to the recently changed law.

They may fight it, but there were court cases over other similar nation wide licensing laws, and in all cases SCOTUS deferred to the Federal law. I'm not a huge fan of a national carry law, but it's almost certainly to be ruled constitutional by SCOTUS.

I'm not aware of anybody who seriously think a person who had been judged mentally incompetent should not have their rights restricted, included the right to own a firearm. But that is a VERY small % of the population and frankly would be a rounding error compared to the violent crime we see on a daily basis. But if you're legally allowed to own a firearm you should be allowed to carry it with no further restrictions.

The fact remains, our founding fathers believed and many of us still believe today that we're endowed with inalienable rights, they saw those rights coming from our Creator, while some people who don't believe in God see them coming from our humanity. It doesn't matter which side of that fence you come from, we should all believe in those inalienable rights. JAB, many of us were lost in the view given to us by society since our birth, we'd talk about freedom, and rights in school, and then be conditioned to believe that those rights can have conditions set upon them our 'parent' the government. The right to protect yourself and your loved ones without interference from the majority is as important as the right to believe and freely practice your religion without interference of the majority. Any infringement what so ever on those rights are at best immoral and tyranny. If as adults we can't see the problems around us and have ideals that should not be compromised under any condition them how does the government function if we're not moral men and women? It doesn't and we've seen it go faster and faster down hill for the last 150 years. The reality is every immoral rule and law imposed by the government ends with an implied threat, if you don't follow this law men will show up at your house and use whatever force is needed including death to make you do it. JAB, you asked the question about the majority out and out banning firearms because we allow nut cases to carry those firearms... I'd point out AZ passed it's constitutional carry after a nut job attacked a sitting congresswoman killing many innocent people. The reality is it's immoral to limit our freedoms because of what somebody else might do. I think your argument is a red-herring, when we lax stupid gun laws blood doesn't run in the street, crime goes down and people feel empowered. We see this time and time again both here in TN and in other states around us. Finally, if the government bans firearms, then I personally will feel the social contract is fully null and void. I will remove my consent to be governed by said government, and return to a 'state of nature' such as described by Thomas Hobbes, and John Locke.

TN is in the minority, 30 states have some form of unlicensed carry. While only a handful have full on Constitutional Carry, which just means concealed carry without a license, many states have no laws against open carry by unlicensed law abiding citizens. TN which should set an example isn't and we should push harder to fix that.

This is because the TFA violated it's own beliefs and started to push for HCP holders to be a protected employment class... They burned a LOT of bridges in the process, and pissed off a lot of supporters that are business owners and property owners like myself. They need to refocus their efforts on removing gun free zones from the public sphere, and tell their members if their current boss doesn't care enough about their safety to allow them to carry a firearm, they probably should go find a new employer.

The thing the NRA does well is informing gun owners about proposed legislation it doesn't agree with and getting us to call in droves... That along with the fact a lot of us are single issue voters, if you're anti-gun you're not ever going to get my vote. The NRA would be just as effective in blocking bad legislation today if they said NO to any new gun law that takes rights away... for example after Sandy Hook. I had hoped they had learned a lesson from the mess they almost created, but here we go again with NRA language to back removing a constitutional right with no due process of law before the fact.