Newsgroups: alt.fan.rush-limbaugh,talk.politics.guns,alt.law-enforcement,talk.politics.misc
From: [s t ratos] at [netcom.com] (Steve Fischer)
Subject: Dial 911 and Die?
Date: Fri, 11 Feb 1994 03:45:37 GMT
JPFO SPECIAL REPORT
DIAL 911 AND DIE!
By Aaron Zelman and Jay Simkin, JFPO
Copyright 1992 by Jews for the Preservation of Firearms Ownership
THE BAD NEWS: YOU'RE ON YOUR OWN..... Most Americans believe that their local
police have a duty in law to protect them against criminals. They are wrong.
Some of them are dead wrong. And some of those who are dead wrong are dead
because they have been duped by ignorant or dishonest politicians or police
chiefs, who promise protection that they cannot give. Some of these officials
know that they have no legal duty to protect the average person, and yet still
support disarming law-abiding people, the better "to protect" them from
criminals!
Front-line police officers sometimes are verbally abused by victims of
criminals who wrongly believe that police officers have a duty to protect the
law-abiding. These good citizens blame the police officer for not doing a job
for which they have never been responsible: protecting the average person
against criminals.
THE POLICE: WE SERVE EVERYONE, BUT NO ONE IN PARTICULAR.....U.S. law is based
on English common law. In English common law, "the Sheriff" is a government
employee whose main job is enforcement of government decisions: Seizure of
property, arrest of persons wanted by the authorities, collection of taxes,
etc. Maintenance of public order, a secondary duty, was done to the extent
resources allowed.
POLICE PROTECTION = POLICE STATE.....It is obvious -- 500 years ago in England
and in America now -- that a sheriff could not be everywhere at once. It was
-- and is -- equally clear that to protect every person would require an army
of Sheriffs (or sheriff's deputies).
Maintaining an Army of police officers - in effect a police state -
would nullify the Freedoms set forth in the Bill of Rights. Neither the
Framers of the Constitution - nor their successors - wanted to avoid the risk
of harm to some in individuals arising from criminals' activity by creating
a police state that inevitably would harm every individual.
POLICE STATE OR SECOND AMENDMENT RIGHTS.....Instead, the Framers provided for
a judicial system to deal with criminals, persons who abused the Freedoms
provided by the Constitution. The Framers assumed that a law-abiding person
would largely be responsible for their safety. As a matter of law, that
assumption still is valid.
THE GOOD NEWS: THE SECOND AMENDMENT PRESUMES INDIVIDUAL OWNERSHIP OF ARMS.....
The Second Amendment reads: "A well-regulated Militia, being necessary
to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear Arms,
shall not be infringed."
It is based on individual ownership of arms. Generally, the Framers
avoided stating the obvious. So, they did not word the amendment, "A well...
State, the right of EVERY PERSON...infringed." That is, the Framers assumed
that every person would look out after his own security, and of necessity
would be armed. They saw no need to state so obvious a truth.
THE MILITIA: ARMED PERSONS ASSEMBLED FOR LAWFUL PURPOSES.....Rather, the
Framers wanted to emphasize what they felt would be unobvious: that armed
individuals may lawfully assemble to use their Arms only to defend the State
based on the U.S. Constitution (but not to overturn the Constitution). This
is, perhaps, why the words Militia, State, and Arms are capitalized.
When armed individuals gather for lawful purposes - e.g., the defense
of the Constitution - they are "the Militia". A 20th Century derivative of
"the Militia" is the National Guard, which has existed since 1901. It is an
arm of the Federal Government:
"Since 1933, all persons who have enlisted in a state National
Guard unit have simultaneously enlisted in the National Guard
of the United States. In the latter capacity, they have become
a part of the Enlisted Reserve Corps of the Army, but unless and
until ordered to active duty in the Army, they retained their
status as members of a separate state Guard unit." [Perpich v.
Department of Defense, U.S. Supreme Court, No. 89-542, (1990)
L Ed 2d 312].
Thus, the National Guard exists to enforce government policy. It is
not THE "Militia", but A "militia". U.S. Law states that a "State may
provide and maintain at its own expense a defense force that is exempt from
being drafted into the Armed Forces of the United States". [32 U.S.C. Sec.
109(C)]. Nonetheless, no state now does so.
If the Federal authorities used the Army or National Guard to change
the Constitutional order - or a State governor so abused a state militia - a
disarmed citizenry would be helpless. The Framers did not want this. Gener-
ations of their successors have agreed.
As a result, the Framers wanted the wording of the Second Amendment to
make it clear that armed individuals could gather together for specific pur-
poses, e.g., defense of the Constitution and the Liberties it proclaims.
UNCONTROLLED CRIMINALS SUBVERT THE CONSTITUTION.....The Framers felt no need
to state that individuals would use arms to defend themselves against whom the
government never promised to provide, and indeed, never has had an obligation
to provide.
It is only the failure of the government to control criminals in
recent decades that has called into question the validity of the individual
right to own arms for the essential purpose of defending the Constitution.
This is as much an individual duty as is personal self-defense.
THE LAW: THE POLICE ARE NOT THERE FOR *YOU*.....State and city governments -
rather than the Federal authorities - are responsible for local law enforce-
ment. So, only occasionally have Federal Courts ruled on the matter of police
protection.
However, in 1856 the U.S. Supreme Court declared that local law en-
forcement had no duty to protect a particular person, but only a general duty
to enforce the laws. [South v. Maryland, 59 U.S. (HOW) 396,15 L.Ed., 433
(1856)].
The Fourteenth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution gives you no right
to police protection. In 1982, the U.S. Court of Appeals, Seventh Circuit,
held that:
"...there is no constitutional right to be protected by the
state against being murdered by criminals or madmen. It is
monstrous if the state fails to protect its residents against
such predators but it does not violate the due process clause
of the Fourteenth Amendment or, we suppose, any other provision
of the Constitution. The Constitution is a charter of negative
liberties: it tells the state to let people alone; it does not
require the federal government or the state to provide services,
even so elementary a service as maintaining law and order."
[Bowers v. DeVito, U.S. Court of Appeals, Seventh Circuit,
686F.2d 616 (1882) See also Reiff v. City of Philadelphia,
477F.Supp.1262 (E.D.Pa. 1979)].
There are a few, very narrow exceptions. in 1983, the District of
Columbia Court of Appeals remarked that:
"In a civilized society, every citizen at least tacitly relies
upon the constable for protection from crime. Hence, more than
general reliance is needed to require the police to act on be-
half of a particular individual. ...Liability is established,
therefore, if the police have specifically undertaken to pro-
tect a particular individual and the individual has specifically
relied upon the undertaking. ...Absent a special relationship,
therefore, the police may not be held liable for failure to
protect a particular individual from harm caused by criminal
conduct. A special relationship exists if the police employ an
individual in aid of law enforcement, but does not exist merely
because an individual requests, or a police officer promises to
provide protection." [Morgan v. District of Columbia, 468 A2d
1306 (D.C. App. 1983)].
As a result, the government - specifically, police forces - has no
legal duty to help any given person, even one whose life is in imminent peril.
The only exceptions are a person who:
* Has helped the police force (e.g., as an informant or as a
witness).
* Can prove that they have specifically been promised
protection and has, as a result, done things that they
otherwise would not have done.
RELY ON THE POLICE: AND PAY HEAVILY.....Even someone repeatedly threatened by
another has no entitlement to police protection until they have been physical-
ly harmed.
In 1959, Linda Riss, a New Yorker, was terrorized by an ex-boyfriend,
who had a criminal record. Over several months, he repeatedly threatened her:
"If I can't have you, no one else will have you, and when I get through with
you, no one else will want you." She repeatedly sought police protection,
explaining her request in detail. Nothing was done to protect her.
When he threatened her with immediate attack, she again urgently beg-
ged the New York City Police Department for help: "Completely distraught, she
called the police, begging for help, but was refused." The next day, she was
attacked" A "thug" hired by her persecutor threw lye (sodium hydroxide) in her
face. She was blinded in one eye and her face was permanently scarred.
The Court of Appeals of New York ruled that Linda Riss has no right to
protection. The Court refused to create such a right because that would
impose a crushing economic burden on the government. Only the legislature
could create a right to protection:
"The amount of protection that may be provided is limited
by the resources of the community and by a considered leg-
islative-executive decision as to how these resources may
be deployed. For the courts to proclaim a new and general
duty of protection ...even to those who may be the partic-
ular seekers of protection based on specific hazards, could
and would inevitably determine how the limited police resources
of the community should be allocated and without predictable
limits."
Judge Keating dissented, bitterly noting that Linda Riss was victim-
ized not only because she had relied on the police to protect her, but because
she o
beyed New York laws that forbade her to own a weapon. Judge Keating
wrote:
"What makes the city's position particularly difficult to understand
is that, in conformity to the dictates of the law, Linda did not carry any
weapon for self-defense. Thus, by a rather bitter irony she was required to
rely for protection on the City of New York, which now denies all
responsibility to her." [Riss v. City of New York, 293 N.Y. 2d 897 (1968)].
CALIFORNIA: AN IMMINENT DEATH THREAT MEANS NOTHING.....Even a person whose
life is imminently in peril is not entitled to help. On 4 September 1972
Ruth Bunnell called the San Jose (California) police department to report that
her estranged husband, Mack Bunnell, had telephoned her to tell her that he
was coming over to her house to kill her.
In the previous year, the San Jose police, "had made at least 20 calls
and responses to Mrs. Bunnell's home...allegedly related to complaints of
violent acts committed by Mack Bunnell on Mrs. Bunnell and her two daughters."
Even so, Ruth Bunnell was told to call back only when Mack Bunnell arrived.
Some 45 minutes later, Mack Bunnell arrived and stabbed Ruth Bunnell
to death. A neighbor called the police, who then came to the murder scene.
The California Court of Appeals held that any claim against the police
department:
"...is barred by the provisions of the California Tort Claims
Act, particularly Section 845, which states: `Neither a public
entity nor a public employee is liable for failure to establish
a police department or otherwise provide police protection or,
if police protection service is provided, for failure to provide
sufficient police protection." [Hartzler v. City of San Jose,
App., 120 Cal.Rptr 5 (1975)].
WASHINGTON, D.C.: RAPE IS NO CAUSE FOR CONCERN.....If direct peril to life
does not entitle one to police protection, clearly imminent peril of rape
merits no concern.
Carolyn Warren, of Washington, D.C., called the police on 16 March
1975: tow intruders had smashed the back door to her house and had attacked a
female house-mate. After calling the police, Warren and another house-mate
took refuge on a lower back roof of the building. The police went to the
front door and knocked. Warren, afraid to go downstairs, could not answer.
The police officers left without checking the back door.
Warren again called the police and was told that they would respond.
Assuming they had returned, Warren called out to the house-mate, thus reveal-
ing her own location.
The two intruders then rounded up all three women. "For the next
fourteen hours the women were held captive, raped, robbed, beaten, forced
to commit sexual acts upon each other, and made to submit to the sexual
demands of (the intruders - ed.)
The Superior Court of the District of Columbia held that:
"...the fundamental principle (is -ed.) that a government
and its agents are under no general duty to provide public
services, such as police protection, to any particular
individual citizen...The duty to provide public services is
owed to the public at large, and, absent a special relation-
ship between the police and an individual, no special legal
duty exists."
In an accompanying memorandum, the Court explained that the term
"special relationship" did not mean an oral promise to respond to a call for
help. Rather, it involved the provision of help to the police force.
[Warren v. District of Columbia, D.C. App., 444 A.2d 1 (1981)].
ILLINOIS: SCHOOL TEACHERS GET NO HELP EITHER.....On 20 April 1961, Josephine
M. Keane, a teacher in the Chicago City Public Schools was assaulted and
killed on school premises by a student enrolled in the school. Keane's family
sued the City of Chicago, claiming that:
"...the City was negligent in failing to assign police pro-
tection to the school, although it knew or should have known
that failure to provide this protection would result in harm
to persons lawfully on the premises (because) it knew or
should have known of the dangerous condition then existing
at the school."
The Appeals Court affirmed the judgment of the Circuit Court of Cook
County. Presiding Justice Burke of the Appeals Court held that, "Failure on
the part of a municipality to exercise a government function does not, with-
out more, expose the municipality to liability." Justice Burke went on to
say that:
"To hold that under the circumstances alleged in the complaint
the City owed a `special duty' to Mrs. Keane for the safety and
well-being of her person would impose an all but impossible bur-
den upon the City, considering the numerous police, fire, housing
and other laws, ordinances and regulations in force." [Keane v.
City of Chicago, 98 Ill App2d 460 (1968)].
NORTH CAROLINA: HELPLESS CHILDREN DON'T COUNT.....Even defenseless children
merit no special care. On 3 June 1985 police tried top arrest a man and his
"girl friend", both of whom were wanted on multiple murder charges, and who
were known to be heavily armed.
The alleged murderers - along with the "girl friend's" two sons, aged
nine and ten years, - tried to flee in a car. As the police closed in after
a running shoot-out, the children were poisoned with cyanide and then shot in
the head either by the mother or her "boy friend", one of whom then blew up
the vehicle, killing both. The boy's father - who had filed for divorce -
sued the law enforcement agencies and officers for "wrongful death" of his
sons. The North Carolina Court of Appeals held that:
"...the defendant law enforcement agencies and officers did not
owe them (the children - ed.) any legal duty of care, the breach
of which caused their injury and death...Our law is that in the
absence of a special relationship, such as exists when a victim
is in custody or the police have promised to protect a particular
person, law enforcement agencies and personnel have no duty to
protect individuals from the criminal acts of others; instead
their duty is to preserve the peace and arrest law breakers for
the protection of the general public. In this instance, a special
relationship of the type stated did not exist....Plaintiff's argu-
ment that the children's presence required defendants to delay
(the) arrest until the children were elsewhere is incompatible with
the duty that the law has long placed on law enforcement personnel
to make the safety of the public their first concern; for permit-
ting dangerous criminals to go unapprehended lest particular indiv-
iduals be injured or killed would inevitably and necessarily en-
danger the public at large, a policy that the law cannot tolerate,
much less foster." [Lynch v. N.C. Dept. of Justice, 376 S.E. 2nd
247 (N.C. App. 1989)].
VIRGINIA: WRONGFUL RELEASE = WRONGFUL DEATH? WRONG!.....Marvin Munday mur-
dered Jack Marshall in Virginia. Mundy - convicted for carrying a concealed
pistol - was sent to jail by a judge who expressed concern that Munday,
"might kill himself or a member of the public". Munday was mistakenly
released from jail 8 days later. Nine days later he was re-arrested on a un-
related charge. Five hours later, the same jailer and sheriff released him,
apparently without checking to see if that was proper. Three weeks later,
Mundy robbed and murdered Marshall. Marshall's widow sued, alleging negli-
gence on the part of the sheriff and jailer, asserting a violation of Jack
Marshall's right to due process. The Court rejected the claim:
"....a distinction must be drawn between a public duty owed
by the officials to the citizenry at large and a special duty
owned to a specific identifiable person or class of persons.
....Only a violation of the latter duty will give rise to
civil liability of the official....to hold a public official
civilly liable for violating a duty owed to the public at
large would subject the official to potential liability for
every action he undertook and would not be in society's best
interest.".....no special relationship existed that would
create a common law duty on the defendants to protect the
decedent (Marshall - ed.) from Mundy's criminal acts. Sim-
ilarly, without a special relationship between the defendants
and the decedent, no constitutional duty can arise under the
Due Process Clause as codified by 42 U.S.C. Sec. 1983. There-
fore, plaintiff's (Mrs. Marshall - ed.) due process claim also
must fall." [Marshall v. Winston, 389 S.E.2nd 902 (Va. 1990)].
THE BOTTOM LINE: YOUR LIFE IS IN YOUR OWN HANDS.....These cases - and there
are many others - show clearly that under U.S. law:
* No individual has a right to police protection, even when
life is in clear and immediate peril;
* There is no right to police protection simply because there
are not enough police resources available to enable every per-
son who feels threatened to be protected;
* To make police officers answerable to individual citizens
for a failure to provide protection would make police officers
afraid to do anything for fear that an action - or inaction -
would expose them to civil liability.
This is unavoidable:
* Life is risky;
* The police cannot be everywhere at once;
* It is impossible to hire enough police officers to protect
every person who needs it or thinks they needs it.
No one can or should rely on the local police force to defend him or
herself, even against a specific threat coming from a known source. Each of
us is responsible for ensuring his or her personal safety.
Anyone who says "You don't need a gun, the police will protect you",
at best is mis-informed, and at worst is simply lying. To offer such advise
suggests that police have a duty to provide protection and usually will pro-
vide it. The police have no such duty. And, while police may try hard to
provide protection - and a failure to do so can be castrophobic - there is no
legal recourse for a person harmed by that failure.
WHAT WE NEED LEAST: GUN BANS AND WAITING PERIODS....."Gun Control" is found-
ed on a total misunderstanding of the role of police in our society. "Gun
control" advocates presuppose the police have a duty to protect every indiv-
idual. But, as proved above, the police never had this duty, and indeed, can-
not have it so long as the Constitution remains in force.
Therefore, bans on gun ownership - or imposition of a waiting period
before a gun may be purchased - simply give an attacker a legally-protected
Window of Opportunity to do you harm. Moreover, "gun control" makes the law-
abiding person less able and willing to take responsibility for their own
defense. We will never eliminate criminals. But we must do far more to curb
them. That is what the Constitution requires.
Many police forces are under-strength. But it is quite clear that to
enable the police to defend each and everyone of us , would require us to set
up here a police state that makes Joe Stalin's Russia look like a "Love Boat"
cruise ship. That is not the lesser of two evils - i.e., better than letting
criminals run free - it is the greater.
WHAT WE NEED MOST: NATION-WIDE CONCEALED CARRY.....A law-abiding person's
security - as a matter of Law and a matter of Fact - is in their own
hands. Even if we had effective criminal control - and we are far from that
happy state of affairs - each law-abiding person would still be responsible
for their own safety.
Any law-abiding person should be able legally to carry firearms, con-
cealed, as this is the best way to enable such persons to protect themselves.
It is a potent deterrent: the criminal would not know who was, and who wasn't,
armed. It would enable a person who had been threatened - and was not en-
titled to police protection - to have at hand the means to protect themselves.
THE FUTURE: NO MORE KILLEEN MASSACRES.....Concealed carry is not a panacea.
A criminal would always have the advantage of the first shot. But if the in-
tended victim(s) were lawfully entitled to carry a concealed firearm, the cri-
minal's first shot could be their last. If concealed carry of a firearms were
Federal Law, massacres such as occurred in Killeen, Texas, would almost cer-
tainly become a thing of the past. The criminal would be killed, quickly, by
one of the intended victims.
Licensing is not needed, simply because criminals now carry concealed
weapons at will. Licensing would only affect the 99+% of Americans who own
firearms, and who do not abuse them. What purpose is served by the costly
building of huge files on law-abiding people? Moreover, is not the presump-
tion in U.S. Law that a person is presumed innocent until proven guilty?
It is better that we enact and strictly enforce harsh penalties for
concealed carry by those legally debarred from firearms ownership - persons
with criminal records of violence - the more so if commission of a crime were
involved.
LIFE OR DEATH: ITS' UP TO YOU.....Wise-up those who back "gun control" --
Federal, State, and local law-makers. law-enforcement chiefs, prosecutors, and
Media personalities -- that the police have no duty to protect you. Let them
know that their support for "gun control" puts your life at risk. Send them a
copy of this Special Report. Urge them to ditch "gun control" and to lobby
urgently for nation-wide concealed carry. Your life depends on it.
--
Steve Fischer / Atlanta, Georgia
Disclaimer: I don't tell netcom how to run their business and they don't tell
me what to think or post.