A while back I saw an article, I did not have a chance then to look more closely at it,
about how the Florida Legislature was sending a bill to Governor Scott that would authorize the use of “Warning Shot” in the state code dealing with use of force.
My first thought was “what are they, stupid?” There are a number of reason why “warning shots” are a bad idea.. Lets just look at one possibility. Lets say you had a permit for a concealed carry and happen on a situation where a group of people are beating up another person.. You think “I will fire a warning shot to scare them off”. If you fire it into the air, like they used to do in the old cop shows, it is going to come down somewhere and might hurt, or kill, someone not even involved. If you fire it into the ground it is just as possible that it might follow a hard surface, such as a sidewalk, or even ricochet off the ground and hit someone.. Let us say that the person you are confronting is also armed. You let them know you are armed, and fire your “warning shot” to let them know you are serious. Maybe you don’t really intend to fire the “hit shot”, you just want to scare him, he would know that you will be firing that first shot away from him, and he will have the time it takes you to realign your aim to sight in on you and pull his trigger. It all sounds nice but you have given away your advantage.
There are all kinds of scenarios that could apply here but, most of them are not favorable to waning shots.
I looked up a couple of articles on the new Florida bill having to do with these “Warning Shots” and some people even thought the bill would make “warning shot” mandatory. At least one of the articles, from a newspaper, pointed out that the bill said that these “warning shots” would be legal where they could be done SAFELY which would rule it out in most cases…
The law does not “mandate” warning shots.. If that were true the state would be opening itself to all kinds of legal problems… Just think for a moment that the state of Florida were stupid enough to mandate “warning shots”.. I see bad guys mugging and old lady.. I charge up.. brandishing my weapon, I want him to know I have one, he ignores me.. I tell him I am armed and will shoot, and then, when he continues to ignore me, I fire a “warning shot”. I comes down about half a block away and gets some woman, innocently weeding in her yard, in the head..
Her layers are going to want to make some money, so the convince her family to sue… Who do they sue? You, the one to fire the shot, the mugger, who was the cause of the warning shot, or the state which made it mandatory?
No.. making it mandatory would be even too stupid for the Obama administration..
From what I can tell they just made it easier to defend yourself with out having to shoot, and do it so that you won’t get into trouble..
So lets not get carried away with the foul thoughts of Citizens being able to defend themselves.. just be cause it says we can in the constitution..
I know the Democrats seem to want to cater to the criminals.. That is understandable as they pander to the people who’s votes they want…
Thanks,
That Joe Guy
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That Joe Guy 
I remember when the cops in New York used to have to do that — until someone mentioned “Y’Know, that bullet has to come DOWN somewhere!” Duh-Oh! My Dad said that more often than not a warning shot went like this: “STOP! “Or I’ll shoot!” That might work in Montana or Texas, but in Florida you’d wind up with a pile of dead tourists! However, I’m for it in certain areas of the city — if you catch my drift…
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