Rocky Mountain News: Columnists

Theft of a Loved One:

The Rocky Mountain News has an article on a new ban in Denver, coupled with the seizure of property. The property? People's dogs: seized and killed, because they were born pit bulls.

A uniformed officer arrives at a home. "I'll get him," she announces to her partner. Rather than fight it all, a distraught man emerges, weighs going to jail and a fine, and in the end hands over his dog.

"I'm definitely sad," he later tells a reporter. "He's like a member of my family."

Later in the day, a woman pleads: "I don't have no dogs!

"There ain't no dogs in the basement!" she yells as the uniformed man and woman, responding to an informant's report of a pit bull, interrogate her. Outside, squad cars filled with police officers wait to see if they are needed.

The Geek with a .45 wonders how these police happened to know who had a pit bull in the first place.

So, here we have the animal control officers, backed up by men with guns, operating on a tip, and apparently without a warrant.

The only thing we need to complete the scene is a refrain from the Nuremberg chorus.

Oh, wait! Here it is!

"I'm just doing my job," the woman officer later laments.

The Geek is making a point about how much this looks like the way government goes after firearms: first it registers them, promising that the registration will never lead to confiscation; and then it confiscates the registered property and destroys it. We have seen this happen over and over again, worldwide.

But there are other points of similarity as well.

The article quotes genuine dog experts, to see how much sense it makes to ban pitbulls. Answer: none whatever. The ban -- like the so-called "Assault Weapons" ban -- was written by the ignorant. It seeks to ban something that is scary to people who don't know anything about it.

Another reason, not cited by the article, is this: the ban is breed-specific. Pitbull purebreeds are not dangerous, as I understand it, having lived around and trained dogs my whole life. What is dangerous is crossbreeds, where a pit is bred to an animal of another breed (often a Rottie), with the individual two dogs chosen for being particularly aggressive. That is, you can make a violent animal if you set out to do it. But the pitbull as a breed is playful and gentle (except to my hats -- one pit I know, named Havoc, lept up and stole one right off my head and ran away with it, chewing it merrily).

The other thing is the willingness of the police to use "grey" tactics to enforce these laws. Gwa45 cites the lack of warrants. Here is an article which has a far worse abuse, by the BATFE. The article is about .50 caliber firearms, and while the author is not sympathetic to them, he is horrified by police tactics:

Several years ago, the BATF asked [Mr. Robert Steward, who makes perfectly legal 'kits' for collectors who wish to manufacture a firearm] to stop. He refused. Shortly after that (according to published reports) two men entered his gun shop with an AR-15 rifle, requesting that he adjust the scope mount. He put it on his bench and began to work on the scope. As soon as he put a screwdriver to the gun, the men produced BATF badges and arrested him for working on an illegal machine gun. The AR-15 had been illegally converted without changing the exterior appearance.

So how was he to know it was illegal? If he had taken it apart to see, he would have been just as liable under the law -- and the only reason it was in this condition was to enable the police to make him a felon. As a felon, he is forbidden from life from operating his business, as it would entail the possession of firearms.

Mr. Steward was arraigned on June 22nd. Over the objections of the prosecution, the judge released him on his own recognizance. (The prosecution claimed that Mr. Steward must be deemed a threat to his community because of his strong "second amendment views.").... It is a strange world where a federal prosecutor demands a high bail because the accused assumes the United States Constitution means what it says.

Can you think of any other case in which having "strong views" on the importance of a part of the Bill of Rights is said to make you a danger to the community?

How about the Fourth Amendment? There are no dogs in my basement. Get a warrant.

How about the Fifth? You can't just take my dog and kill him, without paying me just compensation. That includes compensation for the pain and suffering endured by the three-year-old boy, who has to watch armed men lead his best friend off and kill him.

Invoke either, and you face "jail time and a fine." Your dog isn't popular, you see. We don't like his kind -- or yours.