semi auto fails, gets guy jail time for full auto?

[old82]

http://oathkeepers.org/oath/2009/10/...firearms-case/

this guy here seems to have it covered well

"Two important legal facts to mention are that the gun was a legally made semi-auto AR-15 manufactured by Olympic Arms and that it is well known fact that there is a malfunction that cause a semi-auto firearm to go FULL-AUTO and that occurs by a number of factors. 1). Slam firing is when the safety fails and a round goes off without the shooter intent or a part in the gun breaks or is prevented from doing it’s job and the gun fires on it’s own. Debris, sometimes pieces of brass from the shell or a bad primer falls apart and it lodges itself between the mechanisms designed to catch the hammer. This causes the hammer to be in a free state still under spring pressure, so when the the bolt comes back after firing it cocks the hammer, another part catches the hammer, if this part fails to catch the hammer because it is broken or debris falls onto it preventing it to perform then when the bolt goes back towards the barrel picking up a new round out of the magazine and loading it into the barrel the hammer slams the bolt hitting the firing pin causing the round to fire which then pushes the bolt back, which cocks the hammer which then does not get captured by the part that is supposed to and the bolt slams home another round and the hammer falls again on the firing pin and it keeps doing this until the timing is thrown off or the magazine is empty, that is a a classic case of slam firing. The most common thing is that it fires twice and jams. The reason is Full-auto fire is a mechanical process that requires precise timing, the parts were created at the factory to fire when the cartridge is all the way in the barrel and the bolt locked in place, otherwise extreme danger and injury can occur if there is a mechanical failure and the process is out of sync. A premature explosion can occur. But most of the time the gun burps out two to three shots or sometimes it empties the entire magazine. This has happened to a lot of shooters I have read about. The reason that it only fire twice and then jams is that on the third loading in the full-auto slam fire mode the round is not all the way seated in the chamber, the bolt is not seated in the barrel and the hammer is now pushing on the firing pin at the same speed the bolt and cartridge are moving in which will not provide enough striking power to set off the primer that is on the back and center of the cartridge for it to ignite the powder and set off the explosion that will propel the bullet and provide the type of energy the firearm requires to push the bolt back and •••• the hammer. So it just jams. Things break, things got broken off and little pieces of debris get caught in the mechanisms causing all kinds of malfunctions, notably this being the one we are talking about has caused such great controversy.
It is a well known fact that many firearms like the AR-15 were designed and intended for full auto fire, more correctly select fire, semi-auto and full-auto. Every person who claims to know a lot about military style firearms also knows that they had to be altered by the factory to be impossible to fire full-auto if sold as a semi-auto, though prior to 1986 many manufactures did make legally transferable select-fire or full-auto firearms too(paying a $200 tax to the BATFE a civilian could legally own under the supervision of the BATFE a full-auto as long as legal in the state they resided in)After 1986 all future full-autos made would not be sell able to the general public only to police and military or foreigners. So this gun was made as a semi-auto only, could not be made a full-auto. It does not have the right parts and the shape of the gun and it’s metal are not carved, machined or forged correctly for the parts even if they were installed to operate correctly. The gun can not be legally called a full-auto otherwise all semi-autos must be labeled “Potential Full-auto’s) right? How ridiculous. It really comes to how dumb down everyone is and how ignorant the media has made gun owners. For someone to say they are pro-gun but they want to ban “assault rifles” is like saying to the Minute men, you don’t need muskets, spears kill just as good, yeah right!
Point being legally would not some responsibility have to fall on the manufacture or the AR-15 too if the Government is going to take such an extreme position on the matter. If the gun malfunctions, then the design or the quality of the parts and the metal used would fall on the shoulders of the company that made it NOT the owner, but the maker. I mean there have been countless historical precedence in the auto industry, the tobacco industry, the health industry and in every other field where a designer or maker of something lost in court and was found liable for poor manufacturing or causing serious harm. So I feel that the state has violated this mans rights. First how is it if in your car driving it that your brakes fail or your steering brakes you are at fault? Or your roof collapses or a tree falls on your house you are at fault? This is absurd. The point is that this proud patriotic Army veteran needs a good lawyer or maybe a dozen to weed out this garbage. I for one know that he did not have a qualified weapons expert to testify for his defense. Or a lot of this I have been explaining would of made clear that he was not at fault. I also know that the conclusion did not even meet merit. If the gun had exploded because the metal was weak in it or the cartridge had been poorly made would they charge him with murder? •••• Cheney never spent a day in jail when he shot his friend out hunting. Accidents happen, right? I would think shooting your friend would be a bigger one than if your gun jammed, or shot two shots because of a malfunction would not you?

I think the liberals and haters of liberty won’t be happy till we all can’t own a handgun or a semi-auto and the only guns they will allow us to have will be Shotguns and scoped heavy barrel rifles in .308, for long range deer killing. AHH, no they don’t want that either!
Comment by mike — October 19, 2009 @ 12:16 am"

[otoc]

seems innocent until you read about the case and realize too much time on that comment post was spent focusing on what happens when a rifle jams by accident and not enough time was spent on the parts in bold below...

Automatic gun transfer nets prison sentence

By John Diedrich of the Journal Sentinel

Posted: May 14, 2008
David R. Olofson

A Wisconsin man whose federal conviction for illegally transferring a machine gun drew national attention on CNN and the Internet was sentenced Tuesday to 30 months in prison.

David R. Olofson, 36, of Berlin, who remains a member of the Army Reserve until his felony conviction becomes official, was convicted by a jury in January.

Olofson, whose case has been reported several times on Lou Dobbs' show on CNN, faced up to 10 years in prison, Federal sentencing guidelines called for 27 to 33 months.

U.S. District Judge Charles Clevert said Olofson knew or should have known the gun in question fired automatically.

"This was a man who has considerable knowledge of weapons, considerable knowledge of machine guns," Clevert said. "Mr. Olofson, in this court's view, has shown he was ignoring the law."

Assistant U.S. Attorney Gregory Haanstad noted that Olofson had two previous gun-related convictions, including carrying a concealed weapon with his children trick-or-treating. He also noted that Olofson was reprimanded for corrupting Army computers and perhaps providing militia groups access to sensitive information.

Olofson's attorney, Brian Fahl, who had asked for probation, promised a swift appeal with help from the National Rifle Association. He argued that Olofson's rifle malfunctioned because of the way it was manufactured. Fahl said the case is being watched nationally because some believe it allows for criminal charges whenever a weapon accidentally fires more than once.

"If you have a multiple firing, it looks like you can be prosecuted," Fahl said.

Olofson, a stay-at-home father of three, made no statement in court and left without speaking to reporters.

Prosectors argued it is a straightforward case of someone knowing a gun fired automatically and giving it to someone else.

In July 2006, Olofson lent an Olympic Arms AR-15 rifle to Robert Kiernicki, who took it to a shooting range in Berlin, according to court documents. Kiernicki was responding to an ad posted by Olofson to sell an AR-15.

AR-15s are semiautomatic rifles that fire a bullet each time the trigger is pulled. Federal law classifies a weapon that fires more than one bullet with a single trigger pull as a machine gun.

People can legally own fully automatic, military-type M-16 rifles, but they must have a federal license and cannot transfer it to someone else.

According to court records, Kiernicki turned the rifle's firing selector to the third position, pulled the trigger, and three bullets fired with each pull. Then the weapon jammed. The automatic gunfire was reported to police, who contacted the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives.

Kiernicki testified Olofson told him the third position was for automatic firing, but it jammed, court records indicate. He also testified Olofson told him he had fired the weapon on the automatic setting at that same range without a problem, according to the records.

Olofson contended an ATF document showed that the company that made his AR-15 used M-16 automatic parts in some of them, including his, which would explain that it malfunctioned. Clevert reviewed the document and found it wouldn't exonerate Olofson.

Clevert said the key was not what parts were in the weapon but whether it operated in automatic mode. He played a video used at trial showing ATF agents firing Olofson's weapon in automatic mode. He also noted that in one ATF test, the rifle didn't fire automatically when military-grade ammunition was used.

Haanstad said Olofson had provided weapons and ammunition to so many people he couldn't keep track. A search of his home turned up books on converting rifles to fully automatic, and e-mail on his computer showed he bought M-16 parts, records show.

Olofson had contact with vigilante groups and professed to be part of the sovereign movement, which doesn't acknowledge federal laws as applying to them, Haanstad said.

Olofson's order to report to prison will take several weeks. In the meantime, Fahl said he would rush an appeal to stay the sentence to the 7th Circuit Court of Appeals.

To better complete the partial analogy by "mike" who feels that this is a case about liberals wanting to take his guns away even though it is legal to own a fully auto and the arrest happened during Bush's administration...

You know your car has bad breaks (shooting your mouth off to your friends about it) and you loan it to your ex-wife. She drives into a car killing herself and the occupants of the car she hit head on.

Are you on the hook for manslaughter charges or first degree murder?

...will your attorney and the exwife club you are a member of support you as an innocent victim whose only crime was that of being generous?

...with the big bad government portrayed as sending a guy to prison whose only crime was to "unknowingly" own a car with bad breaks?

The "unknowingly" part is the key, and while our legal system may not be perfect, it has allowed us the right to address grievances for over 200 years. His case is on appeal which is also part of the system he and these guys do not recognize and apparently wish to replace with...


....exactly what?

[Frank1946]

My AR-15 built "legally" only has a two position safety (Safe and Fire). If that AR-15 had a 3 position safety (Safe, Fire and Auto) like the M-16 I carried in Vietnam it was well on its way to being illegal. No sympathy here.

[otoc]

Originally Posted by Frank1946

My AR-15 built "legally" only has a two position safety (Safe and Fire). If that AR-15 had a 3 position safety (Safe, Fire and Auto) like the M-16 I carried in Vietnam it was well on its way to being illegal. No sympathy here.

cool point...

Sounds like the guy not only cut the brakes on his car, but left a note attached to the break lines that absolved the manufacturer from blame.

Semi-automatic AR-15 for sale to civilians and fully automatic versions for sale to law enforcement and military customers, though nearly identical in appearance, are quite different internally. The hammer and trigger mechanisms are of a slightly different design. The bolt carrier and internal lower receiver of semi-automatic versions are milled differently, so that the firing mechanisms are not interchangeable. This was done specifically to satisfy BATF requirements that civilian weapons may not be easily convertible to fully-automatic. Despite this, through use of a "Drop In Auto Sear" or "lightning-link," conversion to full automatic is very straightforward (sometimes requiring slight modification to the bolt carrier).[13][14] Such modifications, unless using parts made prior to 1986, are illegal. An illegally converted fully-automatic AR-15 was used in the North Hollywood shootout.
Automatic variants have a three-position rotating selective fire switch, allowing the operator to select between three modes: safe, semi-automatic, and either automatic or three round burst, depending on model. Civilian AR-15 models do not have three-round burst or automatic settings on the fire selector. In semi-automatic only variants, the selector only rotates between safe and semi-automatic. Due to this, weapons modified to fully automatic using a lightning-link are capable of fully automatic fire only unless a fully-automatic fire select switch is substituted.[13]

So much for analogies to "prove" how a "patriot" was the "victim" of the nasty government deserving no support. Oathkeepers is the one that seems to reek of the same thing they portray themselves as defending against...

[old82]

well, i've e-mailed them that story. maybe they'll take him off their site... :/

[madhatter256]

Not this thread again....

[Pixels303]

Sorry for bumping madhatter, but otoc had a well thought out and informed view on this matter. If there were more people with similar informed perspectives, there would be fewer people who get away with murder.

[taman]

When a sear in a semi auto weapon breaks, there is no mistaking it when you next fire. The sear is responsible for holding the hammer back when the weapon is cycled until the trigger is pulled again. The end result is the weapon will fire it's full magazine until it is empty or jams (or if you are crazy enough to try to grab the bolt or slide with your hands.)

Seems dude was selling a BS story to cover his a$$.

[tucker]

If a weapon is hot enough there is a chance you can get a cook-off. A round will fire without contact from the firing pin. Cook-offs usually take a number of seconds between rounds it is nowhere close to the usual rate of fire from an automatic weapon. A cook-off most often happens with air cooled machine guns and artillery weapons [cannons]. It’s not likely in this case but it is something to think about.

[/\/\adGamer]

You can also shoot some weapons like the Ak/SKS/ar-15 variants simulating automatic fire mode using the hip fire/bump fire technique where you hold the whole weight of the semi auto rifle with one arm and hold the trigger while resting the rifle against your hip with the wrist of the trigger arm. That is legal to do and fun as hell,however As someone said there is NO reason this gun had a 3 way selector switch except as to have autofire that alone makes the gun"illegal" with out the federal firearms stamp. Myself I think gun laws regulating small arms like semi-auto or full-auto is stupid.If you can own one legally you can own the other as the only qualifier for full auto is a fat check made out to the gubberment.

[otoc]

Originally Posted by old82

well, i've e-mailed them that story. maybe they'll take him off their site... :/

I'd be pleasantly surprised if they did. Considering the founder of the oaths is involved in writing up the failed defense response...

Oath Keepers Founder Stewart Rhodes writes Pro Bono Amicus Brief in Support of Olofson’s Appeal to the Supreme Court

Olofson then appealed to the U.S. Supreme Court. Olofson’s excellent brief, submitted by William J. Olson P.C., Attorneys at Law, can be found at their web site: http://www.lawandfreedom.com
Stewart Rhodes, the founder of Oath Keepers, and fellow Second Amendment attorney David T. Hardy (http://armsand thelaw.com), working pro bono (for free), submitted an an Amicus Brief to the United States Supreme Court in support of Olofson’s petition for writ of certiorari (see the below embedded PDF). That amicus brief was submitted on behalf of the Montana Shooting Sports Association and the Virginia Citizens Defense League.

...I think not.

[old82]

it's cointelpro i tells ya! ..... this does make me sad, but it also makes me wonder what the real intention behind this is...

[Invictus]

Originally Posted by old82

it's cointelpro i tells ya! ..... this does make me sad, but it also makes me wonder what the real intention behind this is...

Simple, they (police) want to be the only ones with the automatic weapons.

[otoc]

Originally Posted by old82

it's cointelpro i tells ya! ..... this does make me sad, but it also makes me wonder what the real intention behind this is...

Intention as in Rhodes or the court?