Carrying an offensive weapon

[bruce]

don't pick up a cricket bat but use a frying pan instead.

 

This also perhaps explains why 4D and 6D Maglites are much loved by security guards. Generally held at the bulb-end between thumb and fingers at shoulder level, with the "shaft" resting on the shoulder. I believe the technique is to dazzle them before hitting...

 

Of course I wouldn't recommend anyone to do this. The 4D maglite I keep beside my bed is purely for safety, in case we get a power cut at night.

 

I am speaking as someone who, 3 years ago, heard a noise in the middle of the night. I got up, wearing only boxer shorts, and wandered through to the kitchen, thinking that one of the cats wanted out, or that one of the kids had woken up. I found the back door forced open. I ran back through towards the bedroom, and met a druggie coming out of my 7-year-old daughter's bedroom. Bizarrely he had no shoes on, and was wearing my wife's Berghaus jacket... And he wouldn't leave - "There's someone waiting for me outside, if I don't take stuff out he'll kill me." I grabbed him and started to bundle him out of the house. My wife arrived. He said "It's Ok, missus, I've not touched your kids". She screamed and whacked him with a bronze table lamp base before dashing into the kids rooms.

 

His last words to me as I chucked him out the door "Are you OK about this? Don't call the police..."

 

Reading this thread and writing this has brought back a lot of bad memories.

[mr_towers]

I often walk home from my gigs, even if its from Brusfield to Murrayfield. I've walked home with the pouches still on, but I put the tools in my bag to avoid trouble. No one said if tools come off pouches have to as well :D

[andy_s]

No one said if tools come off pouches have to as well :D

 

I doubt they do - after all they aren't the sharp or pointy bit....and they might sting a bit if you tried to "pouchwhip" someone...

 

but I suppose there might be a possiblity of them being mistaken for something else - see story about "leatherman + maglite = possible firearm from a distance" further up the thread.

[sonic]

This bit:

In fact it was the only thing keeping me from being cmopletely terrified while walking through the meadows at 3am... scary place! worries me to death - 3am, dodgy place, have leatherman out ready to use...

 

You misinterpret me slightly... I had the leatherman in my pocket - closed... but the thought of it being there made me slightly less scared - thats all! And taking a taxi wasn't an option - I had no money, not even on my cards, my phone was dead and I had to move all my stuff from one side of the meadows to the other.

 

I think I would be right in saying I'd be just as bad as the muggers if I had carried my leatherman - blade out in an open area for the intention of hurting people! Sorry to have caused any confusion. :D

[indigogecko]

I had fun going out to the states last summer when it came to my attention at the carry-on luggage x-ray point (checked bags already long gone by this point) the backpack I was taking with me was the same one I'd been using for my running gear on the latest show, and I'd left my mini -AJ in the bottom. Once they worked out what it was they were quite happy for me to take it in with me as long as it stayed in the bag, and once I'd landed it got transferred to the suitcase and left there.

 

I lost a swiss army knife doing the same thing a few years back in the aftermath of 9/11.

 

I'm now a lot more careful about checking bags for kit, everything is stored attached to the same lanyard (small items) or in a tool box, so there's less risk of anything floating in a backpack or duffel.

[Andrew C]

This article from the Tory Telegraph last Friday is interesting. It seems that the law is not a complete ass...

 

Judge takes scythe to CPS over case of the gardener

 

A JUDGE has ordered the Crown Prosecution Service to make a public apology to a gardener who was arrested and taken to court for carrying a scythe which he said he needed for his work.

 

Peter Drew, 49, a self employed ground clearance contractor, had the scythe and other bladed tools in his work van when he was stopped by police on his way to a job in Penzance, Cornwall. He told police he used the equipment in the course of his work but he was charged with possessing a bladed instrument in a public place.

 

Mr Drew waited eight months for his case to come to court, but just as he was about to stand trial at Truro Crown Court last week, the Crown Prosecution Service offered no evidence and dropped the case.

 

Judge Paul Darlow freed Mr Drew and said: "I want to find out why we have got to the start of the trial and the CPS is sud¬denly saying 'Oops'. I do not think the CPS can escape criticism or blame if they leave it to the last minute to make up their minds.

 

"We despair of trying to run these courts in any sort of efficient way. "We have had cases collapse on Monday, Tuesday and Thursday. Try telling this to jurors who come from their jobs and their homes, quite apart from any trial and trauma that Mr Drew has been through by knowing that in October he would be in front of a jury. "I think some sort of public apology to Mr Drew from the court would not go amiss."

 

The prosecuting counsel Philip Lee, responded: "Or behalf of the CPS I apologise that it has taken this long. "Some decisions are very obvious and some less so, and I would not say this was an obvious decision."

 

Mr Drew, of Heamoor, near: Penzance, said he obtained written references from clients whose gardens he had cleared confirming they had seen him use the scythe and other bladed tools to cut down undergrowth and brambles.

Mr Drew said he was "disgusted" with the way the case was handled. "The whole thing knocked me for six. I have lived in Heamoor all my life and when I was arrested people were ask¬ing me what it was all about."

 

Last night, a CPS spokesman said: "After a thorough review of the evidence, a senior pros¬ecutor concluded that a jury would be unlikely to convict. According to the code for crown prosecutors, if there is not a realistic prospect of a conviction, a case must not proceed. Having reached this decision, he informed the court and the defence at the first opportunity and before the trial started."

 

Tradesmen are entitled to carry tools that could potentially be used as weapons provided they are doing so in connection with their work. An electrician who used a Stanley knife to cut wires in the course of his job would have to accept he probably did not have a lawful excuse if he were still in possession of it when he went to the pub in the evening.

 

Mr Drew was accused under the Criminal Justice Act 1988 which states that anyone who has a pointed or bladed article in public is guilty of an offence unless he or she can show good reason or lawful authority.