D.C. Convicts Man for "Dummy" Possession

From Legal Insurrection: Someone who’s not David Gregory convicted of stupid DC gun law violation

Yesterday, a D.C. Judge found Mark Witaschek guilty of “attempted possession of unlawful ammunition” for possessing an antique replica muzzleloader bullet.

Emily Miller at the Washington Times has thoroughly chronicled Mr. Witaschek’s court proceedings, which to date have spanned nearly two years and now appear likely to continue into the appellate stage.

In brief, the case centered on a single inert piece of ammunition, which rested on Mr. Witascheck’s desk in the District, and which he did not know was illegal.

William F. Vanderpool, a retired supervisory special agent for the Federal Bureau of Investigation, [explained] to the judge that the saboted lead balls have no powder or propellant attached, so are not “live…”
The primer on the shotgun shell had already been struck by the firing pin. Mr. Witaschek kept the misfired shell on his home office desk as a memento from a hunt.

Ultimately, Mr. Witaschek was sentenced to time served, a $50 fine, and is required to enroll with the Metropolitan Police Department’s firearm offenders’ registry within 48 hours.

One can be reasonably sure that Mr. Witaschek is not a anti-gun media spokesman, or a someone with good contacts in the D.C. hierarchy:

As noted on Legal Insurrection before, NBC anchor, David Gregory, previously managed to avoid prosecution even after the anchor violated D.C. laws by procuring an empty 30-round magazine and displaying it on live television.

Unlike Mr. Witaschek’s unknowing violation of the law, the violation by Gregory and NBC was no accident. Indeed, as we’ve shown here before, an e-mail from an NBC News representative explicitly inquired into the legality of the use and possession of the empty magazine. The D.C. Metropolitan Police Department told NBC that, “possession of high capacity magazines is a misdemeanor.”

Roughly 36 hours following receipt of that unequivocal advisory e-mail from the MPD, Gregory brandished the magazine on NBC’s Sunday program, Meet The Press.

It was later determined by the Office of Attorney General, in no uncertain terms, that Gregory and NBC clearly violated D.C. laws by possessing the magazine. The MPD delivered a Warrant and supporting Affidavit to OAG, a document OAG has refused to provide to Legal Insurrection in response to our Freedom of Information Act request, and which we are now fighting in court (with the help of Judicial Watch) to obtain.

Notwithstanding this determination that Gregory and NBC News violated the law, the OAG opted not to prosecute Gregory or anyone at NBC because, among other things, “prosecution would not promote public safety in the District of Columbia nor serve the best interests of the people of the District to whom this office owes its trust.”

Purely coincidentally, Gregory’s wife attended a charity function with D.C Attorney General Irvin Nathan.

In related news, anti-gun California State Senator Leland Yee (D) has been arrested for gun running.

“BREAKING: Anti-Gun CA Senator Leland Yee Charged With Gun Running,” reports The Truth About Guns:

It what would surely place his likeness prominently on the Mt. Rushmore of hypocrisy if the allegations are proven in a court of law, famously anti-gun California state Senator Leland Yee has been charged with, in addition to bribery and public corruption…yes…gun running. Specifically conspiring with known organized crime lord Kwok Cheung “Shrimp Boy” Chow to illegally import firearms and sell them without a license . . .
The affidavit charges that the $2 million worth of weapons to have been secreted into the country from the Philippines included rocket launchers and machine guns, some of which Yee himself had fired while on Mindanao. A portion of the weapons Yee conspired to bring into the U.S. through New Jersey were to have been forwarded on to North Africa via Sicily.

You gotta keep the competition down.

Reign of Pain Update

The Administration's attempt to whip up a backlash against the sequester (which, by the way, they designed) by cutting services that people value, rather than the ones they think are a waste has been so transparent that even such reliable sycophants as the writers at The Washington Post and The Hill have noticed that it's not working, and are urging the President to find some solution to accommodate White House Tours.  From the Post:

Reopen the White House doors to tourists

THE DECISION to drop White House tours always had a whiff of what’s known as Washington Monument syndrome. The ham-handed tactic is employed when government is faced with budget cuts and officials go after the services that are most visible and appreciated by the public. It’s a kind of bureaucratic hostage-taking, so the pushback that the Obama administration has encountered is a proper comeuppance...

But even accepting the explanation by a Secret Service spokesman that the decision involved a broader reassignment of officers to minimize furloughs, is the $2 million that’s estimated to be saved through September really worth the price of shutting Americans out of 1600 Pennsylvania Ave.?

And from The Hill: White House tour move backfires on Obama

The White House is playing defense over the decision to cancel tours at President Obama’s residence, the latest stumble for Obama in the messaging war with Republicans over the sequester.

White House press secretary Jay Carney fielded a series of pointed questions Wednesday about why the tours had to be canceled. Emboldened House Republicans also challenged Obama on the issue at a private meeting on Capitol Hill...

“Using the tours to send a message seemed like a surefire winner,” said Tobe Berkovitz, a professor of communications at Boston University who specializes in political communication and advertising. “I think the White House was expecting everyone to go ‘Oh, this is so horrible!’ but this time it didn’t play, perhaps because it was too overt.”

Sensing a problem with the canceling of the tours, Obama backed off, saying in an interview Wednesday that the decision wasn’t made by him and that the White House is looking into setting up tours for school groups.

Meanwhile, ICE decided it might be a good idea to re-arrest a few of the thousands of illegal, excuse me, undocumented aliens, excuse me, immigrants that it released in anticipation of the possible sequester:

The Obama administration said Thursday it has rearrested and brought back four of the most dangerous immigrants it released from detention last month in the run-up to the budget sequester cuts.

U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement Director John Morton testified to Congress that his agency released 10 “level one” offenders, and has gone out and brought four of them back in. He said the other six are non-violent.

Mr. Morton also acknowledged that overall, 2,228 immigrants were released — far more than the several hundred the agency had initially admitted to.

Of those, 629 had criminal records, though Mr. Morton said they were low-level offenders...
“The optics of this are just terrible. This looks like it might have been an attempt to undermine comprehensive immigration reform,” said Rep. Charlie Dent, Pennsylvania Republican.

It's sad when the president overestimates the presses willingness to lie make excuses for his cause.