frontlines

Violent Career Criminal Breaks Into His Last Home, Runs Into Armed Mama Bear Who Doesn’t Hesitate to Protect Her Children

By Warner Todd Huston, The Western Journal
A mother protecting her children in Louisiana is a recent example of the type of “good guy with a gun” story that liberals truly hate because it proves that guns save lives.

A convicted felon who had just perpetrated another string of violent crimes chose the wrong house to invade and the wrong woman to attack in Hammond, Louisiana, earlier this year when he met a mother who was determined to protect her children, WVUE-TV reported.

The Tangipahoa Parish Sheriff’s Office was called to a home on Klein Road in Hammond, but when they got to the residence, the action was already over.

The officers discovered the body of Robert Rheams, 51, just after 5 a.m. on a Sunday morning in January, after he tried to break into the home where a woman resided with her two young children.

The brave mother told the officers that Rheams broke in while the family was sleeping. According to WVUE, the convict was wearing a ski mask and was armed with a shovel and a lug wrench.

The woman added that Rheams confronted her and threatened to harm her with his weapons. But the woman had other ideas. She pulled out her firearm to defend her family and gave Rheams a reason to suspect he had broken into the wrong house.

The criminal was pronounced dead at the scene by the parish coroner.

Officers also said that the home invasion seemed to be a random act and that the attacker and the homeowner had had no prior contact.

After investigating the incident, the police discovered that Rheams was in the midst of a crime spree that was abruptly ended by the woman protecting the lives and safety of her children.

Officers traced Rheams’ activity back to an earlier carjacking only blocks from the woman’s home.

According to the owner of the car, Rheams carjacked the driver at a local motel.

“During the drive, he started striking the driver with his fist and the driver ran into a ditch, causing the car to become stuck,” said Tangipahoa Chief Deputy Jimmy Travis. “The driver was able to exit the car and flee to safety.”

Rheams is also the suspect in a robbery several hours before all this that occurred at a deli on Saturday night, according to the report.

Travis added that the woman would not be charged for killing Rheams because she was merely exercising her Second Amendment rights to protect herself and her children from a violent home invader.

https://www.dailysignal.com/2023/05/12/11-defensive-gun-uses-show-how-lawful-gun-owners-get-it-right/?utm_source=TDS_Email

Often lost in conversations about gun violence is the reality of who is responsible for the bulk of that violence. Most gun crimes aren’t committed by lawful gun owners but by a small subset of repeat violent offenders who already are prohibited from legally possessing firearms.

At the same time, the vast majority of the nation’s millions of lawful gun owners will never use their firearms to harm themselves or others (excluding, of course, actions taken in lawful self-defense).

Nevertheless, sometimes people make questionable—or even downright abhorrent—decisions with their lawfully owned firearms. This was quite apparent in recent weeks as several gun owners made national headlines for all the wrong reasons, recklessly resorting to the use of lethal force when it likely wasn’t warranted.

Although these individuals rightly should have their actions scrutinized, the reality is that Americans with legally possessed guns are far more likely to “get it right” than they are to “get it wrong.”    ............

Newsmax:  Watchdog: IRS Spent $10M on Weapons, Ammo Since 2020  by: Luca Cacciatore  Tuesday, May 2, 2023

The Internal Revenue Service has invested $10 million on weapons, ammunition, and combat gear over the last few years as Republicans warn of a militarized tax agency.

Published last week, OpenTheBooks found that the IRS spent $2.3 million on ammunition, $1.2 million on ballistic shields, $474,000 on rifles, $463,000 on shotguns, and $243,000 on body armor vests since 2020.

Another $467,000 were spent on duty tactical lighting, $354,000 on gear bags, and $1.3 million on "various other gear for criminal investigation agents" over that same period.

The spending spree comes despite the IRS appearing to be well-stocked before it, with the agency spending $35.2 million adjusted for inflation since 2006 on guns, ammo, and military-style equipment, the watchdog determined.

Republicans have frequently slammed the Biden administration for empowering the IRS, which received more than $80 billion in new funding as part of the $739 billion Inflation Reduction Act signed last year.

House Speaker Kevin McCarthy of California led his new Republican majority in January to vote to rescind over $70 billion of that new funding. However, the legislation has stalled in the Democrat-controlled Senate.

"Do you make $75,000 or less? Democrats' new army of 87,000 IRS agents will be coming for you — with 710,000 new audits for Americans who earn less than $75k," McCarthy warned on Twitter in August.

According to the New York Post, the IRS has defended its requirement that agents carry military-style weapons because of their consistent involvement in organized crime, drug, and gang investigations.

The Treasury Department has also claimed the IRS requires 86,852 new employees over the next decade, which conservatives like McCarthy believe will be used to target everyday Americans.

© 2023 Newsmax. All rights reserved.

Federal Judge Halts State’s New ‘Assault Weapon’ Ban, Cites Likely Second Amendment Violation

https://www.thegatewaypundit.com/2023/04/federal-judge-halts-states-new-assault-weapon-ban-cites-likely-second-amendment-violation/

https://www.breitbart.com/2nd-amendment/2023/04/30/fl-sheriff-commends-store-clerk-who-shot-robbery-suspect-8-times/

The Footnote to End All Gun Control  by John Crump|Apr. 3rd, 2023   According to the Bruen decision, the interest balancing test does not apply to Second Amendment cases. The courts can only rely on the original text, history, and tradition of the Second Amendment.
SCOTUS laid down a straightforward test for gun laws. If a law is inconsistent with the plain text, history, and tradition of the Second Amendment, it must be thrown out. This new test puts the burden on the states to prove that their law is compatible with the Second Amendment.

The United States of America is founded on the presumption of innocence. After the Supreme Court’s landmark New York State Pistol Rifle Association v. Bruen Supreme Court decision, there is now a presumption that gun laws are unconstitutional unless the government can prove there was a similar law at the time of the ratification of the Second Amendment.

This decision put most anti-gun politicians and advocates in a precarious position. Almost no gun control existed at the time of the Second Amendment’s ratification.  With the combination of little to no supporting historical evidence and without leniency from the previous interest balancing test, gun control advocates will have a much harder time of successfully passing legislation that will defeat SCOTUS’s new test. The anti-gun side had to find something in history that would save gun control laws.

Anti-gun state and gun control advocates usually point to the Sir John Knight’s Case that challenged the Statute of Northampton. According to the anti-gun side, the law forbids carrying a firearm in public. Still, most legal scholars agree that it banned the carrying of a gun in public only if the intent is to terrify the people. Without many other examples of gun control laws, the anti-gun side must base their arguments on this case.

Unfortunately for the gun control side, the Supreme Court addressed the Sir John Knight’s Case and others like it. According to Footnote 11 of the Bruen decision, whenever multiple interpretations can be taken from a case, the Supreme Court will favor the interpretation that favors the Second Amendment. This demand puts the burden on the state to prove their analog is consistent with the original text, history, and tradition of the Second Amendment.

Footnote 11 reads: “The dissent discounts Sir John Knight’s Case, 3 Mod. 117, 87 Eng. Rep. 75, because it only “arguably” supports the view that an evil-intent requirement attached to the Statute of Northampton by the late 1600s and early 1700s. See post, at 37. But again, because the Second Amendment’s bare text covers petitioners’ public carry, the respondents here shoulder the burden of demonstrating that New York’s proper-cause requirement is consistent with the Second Amendment’s text and historical scope. See supra, at 15. To the extent there are multiple plausible interpretations of Sir John Knight’s Case, we will favor the one that is more consistent with the Second Amendment’s command.”

Because SCOTUS referenced the case in a footnote doesn’t mean the state will not try to use Sir John Knight’s Case. We have seen states argue that they can use laws from the ratification date of the Fourteenth Amendment to defend their anti-gun statutes. The Fourteenth Amendment was ratified shortly after the Civil War ended when states passed laws to prevent formerly enslaved people from getting firearms. Some courts might even accept these arguments, but it is delaying the inevitable.

About John Crump

John is a NRA instructor and a constitutional activist. John has written about firearms, interviewed people of all walks of life, and on the Constitution. John lives in Northern Virginia with his wife and sons and can be followed on Twitter at @crumpyss, or at www.crumpy.com.

Gun Confiscation Around The World

Click here for a printable Pdf copy

Three New York Congressmembers Want House of Representatives to Label NY Pistol Law Unconstitutional

Geneva, NY, United States / Finger Lakes Daily News  Ed Vivenzio   Jan 17, 2023

Three New York Congressmembers are urging the House of Representatives to call out New York’s concealed carry pistol law as unconstitutional.

Claudia Tenney (NY-24), Elise Stefanik (NY-2), and Nick Langworthy (NY-23) were joined by Darrell Issa (CA-48) to reintroduce a resolution expressing the sense of the House of Representatives that New York State’s Concealed Carry Improvement Act (CCIA) is unconstitutional.

The CCIA was passed last July in response to the June US Supreme Court decision striking down New York’s previous “may issue” pistol permitting scheme in the case of NYSRPA v Bruen.

Below are statements from the three New York Congressmembers:

“The ability to keep and bear arms is a fundamental right protected by the Constitution,” said Congresswoman Tenney. “New York State’s new concealed carry law is just another way that Kathy Hochul is working to limit New Yorker’s Constitutional rights and attack the Second Amendment. Last June, the Supreme Court repealed New York’s overly restrictive concealed carry laws, and instead of respecting the Court’s opinion, Governor Hochul chose to enact another unconstitutionally restrictive law. This resolution affirms our belief that New York’s latest law is unconstitutional and that state governments should support our Second Amendment rights, not undermine them.”

“Kathy Hochul’s gun grabbing law is unconstitutional and a direct attack on our Upstate rights and values,” Congresswoman Stefanik said. “We know that Hochul passed this law declaring historical reenactors and lawful gun owners in the Adirondack Park felons in direct defiance after the United States Supreme Court struck down New York’s gun laws, but still she doubled down on her unconstitutional agenda. I am bringing the concerns of New York patriots to the highest levels, and, just as we did in the previous concealed carry issue, I am committed to bringing this all the way to the Supreme Court.”

“As I have said from Day One, the concealed carry law is Unconstitutional and does absolutely nothing to make New Yorkers safe. Albany’s obsession with constantly targeting law-abiding gun owners while allowing violent criminals to have free rein on our streets would be laughable if it wasn’t so deadly. I am proud to join with my colleagues in standing up against our dictatorial state government and will do everything in my power to protect New York’s Second Amendment rights,” said Congressman Nick Langworthy.

Who is Going to Blink First? New York or the Supreme Court?