FishOrMan won his appeal!
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This notice is a bit belated, but I'd like to offer congratulations to FishOrMan, who has won his appeal while representing himself, striking a small but personally significant blow for open-carry. I've stayed away from blogging about the case for a couple reasons. First, it seems to me that his actions were on the borderline of what the law allows; normal open carry is arguably legal under state law, by way of an affirmative defense, but open carry inside a bank strikes me as exactly the sort of situation that might legitimately "warrant alarm", which would violate the law. Second, representing yourself in court is usually a very poor decision, and rarely bodes well for the results. Third, given that he was representing himself, any commentary I could have offered would have been uncomfortably close to legal advice, something I am not qualified to offer, and might well do more harm than good. And fourth, I was concerned that he had gotten himself into a foreseeable bad situation without adequately preparing for it, and thus put the whole concept of open-carry at risk in Washington State. That said, I have been following the case personally, and I'm glad that he won. I do have one caution, though. Just because you won this one on a technicality doesn't mean you'll win the next one. Pick your fights more carefully, and make sure you're prepared to fight them before they start. |
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