by House Minority Leader Rep. Dick Hinch: Just a few months ago in December, Rep. Stephen Shurtleff won the election for House speaker, and I wished my friend the best. He accepted his nomination by saying that, “it’s important to put partisanship aside to work for the common good of our people…” I couldn’t agree … Read more
Good people do not need laws to tell them to act responsibly, while bad people will find a way around the laws. —Plato
Senator Sharon Carson (R) Dist. 14, Chair, Senate Judiciary (Londonderry), sent me a message yesterday afternoon that the Senate Judiciary Committee voted 4-1 on HB 135 to recommend, “Inexpedient to Legislate…” legislative speak meaning the committee recommends the subject bill be killed and not pass on in the process.
Senator Sharon Carson just messaged me… The Committee voted to recommend 4-1 HB 135 ITL —MORE TO COME…
“Don’t tell people how to do things, tell them what to do and let them surprise you with their results.” —George S. Patton
I was at the State Senate hearing yesterday on HB 135. I heard a great deal of testimony. Senator Carson asked people not to read their testimony, Zandra Rice-Hawkins, boringly read hers. Other such liberals gave us the same old boring crap.
Alton’s Police Chief Ryan Heath, speaking in favor of passage of HB 135, told the committee that the average person simply isn’t trained to make these on-the-spot decisions regarding use of deadly force. He asserted that Police have training in the handling of firearms, use of force and it is part of their jobs. And Chief Heath is correct. there is nothing incorrect about his statement. In fact, I had become so used to hearing it.
Something happened at that very moment. I received a text message question from an individual organizing a “training”
c/o Scott Smith / Facebook
New Hampshire: Shurtleff Criminal Protection Bill Scheduled for Senate Committee Hearing in Concord on Tuesday
On Tuesday, April 23, the Senate Judiciary Committee is scheduled to hear House Bill 135. Introduced by state Representative Stephen Shurtleff (D- Merrimack 11), HB 135 will render law-abiding citizens defenseless victims by removing consequences for criminal activity. The New Hampshire House of Representatives already undermined your inherent right to self-defense by passing the Shurtleff Criminal Protection Bill by a 189-184 vote on March 27.
HB 135 would repeal important self-defense provisions enacted in 2011, making the following changes to New Hampshire’s current self-defense laws:
If the proposed changes to RSA 627:4 in the form of HB 135 are adopted (i.e. the return to the previous version of the law-see below), the affirmative defense will no longer be available to those who are forced to defend themselves or others at places other than their home. Nothing good will come from this. Innocent New Hampshire citizens are currently being regularly, unfairly and unreasonably charged for defending themselves and will have a greatly lessened chance at being found not guilty due to inadequate jury instructions if HB 135 passes, and thus less justice, the price for HB 135….potentially years of their life in prison.
If the accused in a self defense case “wins” as in is acquitted at trial, the price many pay is their job (in many instances a cash only bail is ordered, and many people cannot afford $10k or $25k cash bail, so are kept in jail and are fired from work because they cannot go to work). Ask yourself if you were absent from work for a month or two *(or longer) because you were in jail awaiting trial, would your boss keep your job open? What about those of you who might work for less than firearm friendly corporations? What is the likelihood you would HAVE a job after the charges against you were announced? Citizens who are forced to defend themselves while at the grocery store, walking home, leaving work, or anywhere they might be currently are NOT given a “free pass” by the very weak New Hampshire “stand your ground” affirmative defense law, but rather, after they are charged criminally, and then they may be allowed to raise the defenses found in RSA 627:4.
Many people do not understand what an affirmative defense is.
“Finally, is not liberty the restricting of the law only to its rational sphere of organizing the right of the individual to lawful self-defense; of punishing injustice?” —Frederic Bastiat
Yesterday, The New Hampshire Union Leader featured a story where, “Lawyers say stand your ground works” Prominent Granite State criminal defense lawyer, Mark Sisti told the Union Leader’s Dale Vincent, “I’m not seeing a downside to the (stand your ground) law.” Rep. Stephen Shurtleff (D) Penacook, is sponsoring
“Because hypocrisy stinks in the nostrils one is likely to rate it as a more powerful agent for destruction than it is.” —Rebecca West
“It’s hard to know exactly how people develop the characters they do. There could be people from humble beginnings that turn into jerks. Some characteristics are just part of that special soul of that human being.” —David Maraniss
House Bill 135 today in Concord. Ann M. Rice is the Deputy Attorney General for the State of New Hampshire. She appeared to testify for HB 135 in an effort to roll back the “stand your ground” provision passed by the last house. Fine. whatever…it’s to be expected. Just another example of liberals thinking we the people are too stupid to exercise sound judgment.
So here we are…citizens jam-pack