What Can We Learn from the Clearwater Florida Shooting?

It was recently announced that Michael Drejka who shot and killed Markeis McGlockton last month in Clearwater, Florida in what appeared to be a case of Stand Your Ground Self-Defense has now been arrested and charged with Manslaughter.

Being that Drejka was not initially charged by Pinellas County Sheriff Bob Gualtieri, who cited Floridas Stand Your Ground Law as justification, definitely shows some serious pressure was applied from both the DA and the heavyweight champion of legal taskmasters: The court of public opinion.

Which of course begs the question: Are We a Nation of Laws or of Public Opinion?

Well, folks, as I have said many times before, when you carry a gun for self-defense, you must always be prepared to fight for your life TWICE: Once on the Street and Once in the Courtroom, and in America today when it comes to a self-defense case, Public Opinion weighs VERY HEAVILY in favor of the victim, especially when the victim is a non-white.

And for those of you out there that say RACE had nothing to do with the legal change of heart in this shooting, get real. When a non-white get’s killed it makes the news, when white people get killed, it is barely a second page by-line. Don’t believe me? READ THIS and then ask yourself, did you hear anything about it on the lamestream news? Not a peep.

Legal history in self-defense cases in Florida also backs me up here.

Remember the Treyvon Martin and George Zimmerman case in 2012? Zimmerman was found not guilty by a jury of his peers but King Obama, not being able to stay out of a Sovereign States’s business, stuck his big federal Nose in it and had his legal lap dog, Operation Fast and Furious himself, Eric Holder, pursue “Hate Crime” charges against Zimmerman (which never materialized.) (Federal) Racial Bias at work.

Hollyweird even did it’s part and recently put out a despicable piece of legacy propaganda called “Rest in Power: The Treyvon Martin Story” which attempts to put Martin in a more favorable light than the pot smoking hoodlum that he was.

Are we a nation of Laws or of Public Opinion?

The Sad Truth is that we are Both friends, with Public Opinion always leading the charge.

Stay Alert, Stay Armed and Stay Dangerous!

 

The Surveillance State: First was the Breathalyzer, now Meet the “Textalyzer”

We’re all familiar with the Breathalyzer, the brand name for a roadside device that measures a suspected drunken driver’s blood-alcohol level. It has been in use for decades. Now there’s a so-called “textalyzer” device to help the authorities determine whether someone involved in a motor vehicle accident was unlawfully driving while distracted.

The roadside technology is being developed by Cellebrite, the Israeli firm that many believe assistedthe Federal Bureau of Investigation in cracking the iPhone at the center of a heated decryption battle with Apple.

Under the first-of-its-kind legislation proposed in New York, drivers involved in accidents would have to submit their phone to roadside testing from a textalyzer to determine whether the driver was using a mobile phone ahead of a crash. In a bid to get around the Fourth Amendment right to privacy, the textalyzer allegedly would keep conversations, contacts, numbers, photos, and application data private. It will solely say whether the phone was in use prior to a motor-vehicle mishap. Further analysis, which might require a warrant, could be necessary to determine whether such usage was via hands-free dashboard technology and to confirm the original finding.

The legislation was prompted by intense lobbying from the group Distracted Operators Risk Casualties (DORCs). The son of its co-founder, Ben Lieberman, was killed in 2011 by a distracted driver in New York. The proposed law has been dubbed “Evan’s Law” in memory of 19-year-old Evan Lieberman.

“When people were held accountable for drunk driving, that’s when positive change occurred,” Lieberman said in a press release. “It’s time to recognize that distracted driving is a similar impairment, and should be dealt with in a similar fashion. This is a way to address people who are causing damage.”

Cellebrite already has roadside devices to scrape the contents of a phone, so this technology would just dial it back a bit. If the legislation passes, Cellebrite would have to bid on the project, as would other tech firms.

“Cellebrite has been leading the adoption of field mobile forensics solutions by law enforcement for years, culminating in the formal introduction of our UFED FIELD series product line a year ago,” Jim Grady, Cellebrite’s CEO, said in a statement. “We look forward to supporting DORCs and law enforcement–both in New York and nationally to curb distracted driving.”

The law, which is before the New York Senate Transportation Committee, would recast the motor-vehicle driving law to make it so that motorists give “implied consent” for “determining whether the operator of a motor vehicle was using a mobile telephone or portable electronic device at or near the time of the accident or collision, which provides the grounds for such testing. No such electronic scan shall include the content or origin of any communication, game conducted, image or electronic data viewed on a mobile telephone or a portable electronic device.”

Police will inform motorists involved in an accident that “the person’s license or permit to drive and any non-resident operating privilege shall be immediately suspended and subsequently revoked should the driver refuse to acquiesce to such field test.”

According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, each day in the US nine people die and more than 1,153 are injured because of distracted driving accidents. That’s roughly 20 percent of mishaps caused by distracted driving.

“The facts regarding distracted driving are startling,” said Republican New York Senator Terrence Murphy, who is one of the proposal’s backers.

The cause of the accident that killed Evan Lieberman was discovered after the Lieberman family subpoenaed the mobile phone records of the driver involved in the crash, which showed that the motorist was allegedly distracted while driving.

Read the Original Article at ARSTechnica