Archive for October 21st, 2010

You’ll shoot your eye out, kid!

Thursday, October 21st, 2010

Unless you live in the City of Chicago, where Daisy (yes, the airgun company) is on the Chicago Police Department “Roster of Unsafe Handguns“.

Note that “Where a model or type is not specifically referenced, all models from the listed manufacturer are designated unsafe.” It seems to me that could easily be interpreted as not only banning Daisy handguns, but even the Red Ryder and other Daisy long guns. I know, it sounds silly, but do you really want to trust the jackbooted thugs of Daley and the CPD?

Hattip on this to Jay G., who also points out that the list bans Smith and Wesson models with “spur triggers”. Smith and Wesson hasn’t made a gun with a spur trigger for over 100 years.

Posted in Guns, Politics | 2 Comments »

Art (Acevedo), damn it! watch. (#N of a series)

Thursday, October 21st, 2010

I know, two updates in one day about Austin’s police chief, but this is too good not to share.

Remember the APD officer who got fired for DWI? The one who shot an 18-year old back in May of last year? Yeah, this guy.

Remember how Chief Acevedo’s firing and promotion decisions keep getting overturned by arbitrators?

Can you guess what’s happened now? Yes. Officer Quintana has been reinstated by the arbitrator.

Posted in Clippings, Cops, Law, Politics | 7 Comments »

Bell update.

Thursday, October 21st, 2010

Robert “Ratso” Rizzo has been charged with two more crimes:  conflict of interest, and “misappropriation of funds for a value exceeding $1.3 million”.

If he is convicted of the second count, Rizzo would have to provide a DNA sample.

But he won’t have to provide a DNA sample if he’s convicted of the first crime, or any of the other 53 felonies he’s been charged with?

(Edited to add: Well, according to the California Attorney General’s web site, “Starting January 1, 2009, Prop 69 requires that the Department of Justice begin taking samples for any adult arrested or charged with any felony offense.” So it seems that Rizzo should already have had to give up his DNA based on the previous 53 felony charges; I’m not sure why the LAT felt that it needed to call out #55 in particular. I’m also not going to comment on the whole “any adult arrested or charged with any felony offense” thing.)

And I wanted to note this yesterday, but it snuck past me. Guess where at least some of the money to pay Rizzo’s salary came from? If you said “a fund that was supposed to be used to provide housing for low-income residents“, take two gold stars and advance to the next blue square.

Posted in California Über Alles, Clippings, Law, Politics | Comments Closed

Random notes: October 21, 2010.

Thursday, October 21st, 2010

Links to obits, to keep the record straight: Bob Guccione, Tom Bosley, and Johnny “Boy” Sheffield.

The University of North Texas has fired football coach Todd Dodge.

Dodge never won more than two games in a his first three seasons at UNT, which is 1-6 in his fourth season. He finished 6-37 for a winning percentage of .139, the worst for a coach in the history of major team sports at the school.

(Thanks to A.T. for the tip on this.)

And our old friend Art Acevedo has made his decision; the Austin Police Department is standardizing on the Smith and Wesson M&P in .40 as their issue weapon.

I pretty much come down on the side of letting officers carry whatever they can qualify with, subject to minimum power requirements. And I find the argument that it’ll make it easier for officers to share ammo in a shootout somewhat specious; if officers are in a high volume firefight like that, they should be fighting their way to their patrol rifles. Or calling in SWAT. Or the National Guard.

On the other hand, I’m not an expert in police tactics, and I’m willing to acknowledge I could be wrong about this. On the gripping hand, it puts more money in S&W’s pocket (which, as an S&W fanboy, I appreciate), and it may lead to more high-quality former police weapons showing up at the gun shop.

Posted in Clippings, Firings, Guns, Obits, Sports | Comments Closed