WI - Straw Buyer Sentenced

[Sir_Macadoo]

what happened to 10 years in jail and a $250,000 fine?

 

[larryh1108]

Let's just apply this rule to everything that could be used to hurt someone.... Let's make it so you can't sell a car to someone, because they might drink and drive, and you know, kill someone with it.

I guess this is mind numbing to me how anyone could possibly think this was a good idea.

-Mike

I'm asking if a law like this would deter sales to known felons and straw purchases. The car analogy is not the same since it is not illegal to sell a car to someone you know is a drunk. If the act is deliberate (selling to a known felon) then you may be culpable. They already do it in other cases.... if you are committing a felony (getaway driver in a home burglary) and your cohort hits an unexpected victim and he dies, the getaway driver can be charged with murder as well. Also, I said it was a discussion. Something to toss around on a slow day. The extra separation was because your buddy did not use it to kill anybody but someone else did. You started the process by selling it illegally in the first place and that is the whole point. Should you be culpable? It's only meant to stimulate thoughts not to grandstand.

I guess we can talk about Glock lovers/haters or the caliber effectiveness again.... geez.

 

[drgrant]

I'm asking if a law like this would deter sales to known felons and straw purchases.

We already have a metric ton of laws which make straw purchases or selling guns to known felons...illegal. it's already "very illegal" - like federal felony illegal. If people are still doing it, I fail to see how adding another law for them to ignore is going to deter anything. This is nothing more than par for the course anti logic straight out of the Brady/VPC playbook. "What we did didn't work, so let's do more of that!!"

The car analogy is not the same since it is not illegal to sell a car to someone you know is a drunk.

Depending on the circumstances whether the original act was illegal or not may be 110% irrelevant to determining vicarious criminal liability.

Vicarious criminal liability is a very touchy concept, and it only gets used in RARE cases where it can be demonstrated that there is an incontrovertible, direct link between the actions of one person influencing the actions of another.

This is the best example I've seen yet.... A woman who cried "rape" gets charged with manslaughter because her actions DIRECTLY led to the death of someone else.

http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,354049,00.html

Now mind you, what she did (yelling rape) by itself is not normally illegal, but the prosecution was able to argue that there was a direct relationship between her doing that and the death of another person. The "act" she committed itself was not illegal but she was still convicted for the direct results of her actions.

If the act is deliberate (selling to a known felon) then you may be culpable.

Yeah, you are culpable of breaking a federal law, and that's it... not necessarily for other laws the buyer might break later with that firearm, unless the buyer comes up to you and says "hey dude sell me that gun I'm going to shoot those guy right over there!" and you still sell him the gun anyways.... Then, if he actually does shoot that guy, you might also be held liable criminally because your act of selling him the gun had the direct outcome of enabling the crime to occur. Selling some doper a gun and then him randomly shooting someone with it a week later, on the other hand, is not the same ballgame.

In a civil suit the limits of vicarious liability get more interesting, it might be possible that a victim's family could sue the straw seller and receive an award, if they can prove that the seller knew the buyer was going to do something malicious with it. In practice though, this never happens because anyone selling guns illegally probably doesn't have lots of ash hanging around... there's no pot of gold at the end of the rainbow for the trial lawyer to get, so these suits rarely occur.

They already do it in other cases.... if you are committing a felony (getaway driver in a home burglary) and your cohort hits an unexpected victim and he dies, the getaway driver can be charged with murder as well.

Vicarious criminal liability is not a concept which is applied lightly, as it's somewhat difficult to prosecute.

This example, compared to your original example/idea, are two different ballgames.

In the example of a straw purchaser/illegal seller, there are greater degrees of
separation between the original act and some violent crime which may have occurred later.

In your "home robber" scenario, it's WAY easier for a prosecutor to prove vicarious
criminal liability because the party being accused was more directly involved with the
events that lead to the person being killed.

Also, I said it was a discussion. Something to toss around on a slow day. The extra separation was because your buddy did not use it to kill anybody but someone else did. You started the process by selling it illegally in the first place and that is the whole point. Should you be culpable? It's only meant to stimulate thoughts not to grandstand.

Understood... you might want to do a little more research on investigating and understanding the limits of vicarious liability.... in both criminal and civil law realms. The thing you are asking for (broadening of vicarious criminal liability) would cause serious problems with our judicial system. You would be unable to confine it to one area of law, as well, without a risk always being present that it would bleed into things you don't want it to.

Vicarious liability in both civil and criminal law realms have implied limits attached to it because without them anyone and everyone could be sued for things they were only peripherally involved in, making for a judicial cluster-F of epic proportions.

-Mike

 

[larryh1108]

See Dr Grant? That is exactly why I posed the question in the first place... so I can learn and anyone who reads this thread can learn. How can I look up vicarious criminal liability when I just learned, here, what it is? We can look up just about anything that is discussed here but we come here because we enjoy "hanging" with like kind of people and mindsets. The original post was about the light sentence for a seller knowingly selling straw purchases. To me, the sentence was a slap on the wrist considering the implications of the crime. If this guy knew he could be facing 25 to life for doing this, would that deter him in the first place or would he still be greedy and sell it?

A lot of these boards are "what if" and they even have "what if" scenario threads to "act out". I don't understand the terse nature of your reply. It was like saying "that was dumb, don't post that stuff here." Am I being overly sensitive here?

 

[Alchemist17]

One question I've had on straw purchases:

Let's say you want to buy a firearm as a gift for someone that's not covered by the straw purchase exceptions, or that your buddy has been looking for a specific gun and asked you to pick one up if you see one. If you pick up a firearm under these conditions with the intent and understanding that the firearms will be transferred at a later date through an FFL (and are not given to the individuals until such time), is this considered a straw purchase?