Shownotes
The Armed Attorneys join host John on GOA's State of the Second to walk through what actually happens after a self-defense shooting, and why so many lawful gun owners end up in handcuffs. Emily and Richard are firearms attorneys in Texas and former felony prosecutors for Galveston County. They explain that self-defense is a justification that excuses what would otherwise be a crime, which means you can be charged with murder or aggravated assault and forced to raise self-defense at trial. As Richard puts it, even people who are acquitted do not feel like winners because the process is the punishment. They break down the five factors they use, drawn from Andrew Branca's framework: innocence, imminence, proportionality, reasonableness, and avoidance. Roughly 95% of self-defense cases, they say, land in a gray area where a jury decides whether the shooting was justified.
Much of the episode is practical. They lay out a plan for the worst night of your life: keep your 911 call to five or six words, give a short truthful statement about the defensive incident, then hang up and stop talking. If police arrive before you have a lawyer, say enough to point them at what happened, then clearly state you will not give a further statement until you speak to an attorney. If you are arrested, actually say the words to invoke your right to remain silent and your right to an attorney. They stress that finding a real firearms and self-defense lawyer ahead of time matters, because your wills-and-probate uncle cannot help you at 2 in the morning.
The conversation then turns to the title's myths. Dragging a body inside the doorway destroys your credibility the moment physical evidence stops matching. Stickers, signs, and social media posts all become potential state's exhibits. Emily points to Daniel Perry in Austin, convicted in part on his own messages about handling protesters. They argue this is a calculated risk decision each person should make on purpose, not wander into. In the policy segment, as GOA's legislative counsel in Texas, they preview goals for the 89th legislative session: bolstering self-defense rights, letting defenders raise an affirmative defense earlier to dismiss a case, shielding justified defenders from civil shakedowns, decoupling Texas from federal law on items like short-barreled rifles, and ending gun-free zones. They credit GOA for constitutional carry and the law banning firearm merchant category codes. Find them on YouTube and X as Armed Attorneys, and at Walker Taylor Law in Texas.
Links
Questions this episode answers
What actually happens legally after you use a gun in self-defense?
Self-defense is a justification that excuses what would otherwise be a crime, so you can still be charged with murder or aggravated assault and forced to raise self-defense at trial. The Armed Attorneys note that even acquitted defendants do not feel like winners, because the process itself is the punishment.
Why do people who clearly defended themselves still get arrested and charged?
Because self-defense is a legal justification rather than a finding of innocence, prosecutors can still bring charges and leave it to a jury. The Armed Attorneys estimate roughly 95% of self-defense cases land in a gray area where a jury decides whether the shooting was justified.
What are the five factors that make or break a self-defense case?
Drawing on Andrew Branca's framework, the Armed Attorneys use five factors: innocence, imminence, proportionality, reasonableness, and avoidance. Richard says that having all five makes for a rock-solid self-defense case.
What should you say, and not say, on a 911 call after a defensive shooting?
Keep the 911 call to five or six words, give a short truthful statement about the defensive incident, then hang up and stop talking. Saying more risks creating evidence that can be used against you.
How do you correctly invoke your right to remain silent and your right to an attorney?
If arrested, actually say the words to invoke your right to remain silent and your right to an attorney rather than just staying quiet. The Armed Attorneys stress that clearly stating these rights out loud is what protects you.
Why are gun stickers, signs, and social media posts a legal risk if you ever use self-defense?
Stickers, signs, and social media posts can all become state's exhibits used against you in court. Emily points to Daniel Perry in Austin, who was convicted in part on his own messages about handling protesters.
What gun-law changes are the Armed Attorneys pushing for in Texas's 89th legislative session?
As Gun Owners of America's legislative counsel in Texas, they want to bolster self-defense rights, let defenders raise an affirmative defense earlier to dismiss a case, shield justified defenders from civil shakedowns, decouple Texas from federal law on items like short-barreled rifles, and end gun-free zones.
Why does dragging a body into your house turn a justified shooting into a prison sentence?
Moving a body destroys your credibility the moment the physical evidence stops matching your account. The Armed Attorneys treat this as the kind of myth that converts a defensible shooting into a conviction.
Chapters
- 00:00 — Meet the Armed Attorneys
- 01:57 — Sponsors and rapid fire questions
- 05:32 — Home defense guns and family plans
- 06:39 — Why you need a home defense plan
- 11:30 — Self-defense as a justification, not innocence
- 12:35 — The five-factor self-defense framework
- 16:45 — Finding an attorney before you need one
- 18:33 — The 911 call and talking to police
- 22:09 — Invoking your rights after arrest
- 23:37 — Self-defense myths and a murder trial story
- 27:08 — Pleading out and the government's pound of flesh
- 29:11 — Stickers, signs, and social media as evidence
- 37:10 — From the Soapbox: Texas legislative agenda
- 44:10 — Decoupling from federal law and the ATF
- 55:44 — Where to find the Armed Attorneys
About the guest
The Armed Attorneys are Emily and Richard, firearms attorneys based in Texas. Both were felony prosecutors for Galveston County, Texas before leaving the district attorney's office to build a practice focused entirely on Second Amendment work, including criminal defense for people charged after using self-defense. They are GOA's legislative counsel in Texas, a role they began in 2021, and they work at the Texas capitol on firearms bills. They run the Armed Attorneys YouTube channel, where they focus on myth-busting and putting gun law in plain English, and they practice at Walker Taylor Law as licensed Texas attorneys. They are married with young children.
Key quotes
"even if they're acquitted, they're found not guilty, they do not feel like winners because the process is the punishment." — Richard
"his factors are innocence, imminence, proportionality, reasonableness and avoidance. And once you start, if you have all five of those, guess what, you got a rock solid self defense case." — Richard
"not having a plan at 3am with your eyes adjusting the light and your ears ringing, that's not the time to crack open the phone book." — Richard
"It's very important that folks know how to invoke the right to remain silent and invoke their right to an attorney." — Richard
"Everything you post on social media is potentially dangerous for you" — Emily
"We should be completely decoupled from federal law. Texas should be doing its own thing" — Richard
Transcripts
Welcome to GOA State of the Second podcast.
Speaker A:My name is John and today we're joined by the fighting Attorneys, the armed attorneys.
Speaker A:Welcome to the show guys.
Speaker B:Thank you.
Speaker C:Yeah, thanks for having us.
Speaker A:Not a climatic intro, but welcome in.
Speaker A:Go ahead and introduce yourself to the folks who you, who you guys are and what you guys do.
Speaker B:Sure.
Speaker B:So we are, I mean first and foremost we are firearm attorneys.
Speaker B:So we, I'll share our joint background because it's almost identical.
Speaker B:We were both felony prosecutors for Galveston County, Texas and then went from the DA's office into this very special practice where all we do is second amendment work.
Speaker B:You know, we do the criminal defense for people who have used self defense and need a lawyer because they're charged with a crime out of that incident.
Speaker B:We are, you know, involved in every aspect of firearms and administrative law in legislation and bill drafting here in the state of Texas.
Speaker B:And it is our, it's what we do.
Speaker C:Yeah.
Speaker C:And I would say apart from, you know, what you see a lot of lawyers who sue the federal government, there's a lot of glory and great headlines.
Speaker C:Unfortunately, we're down in the, you know, down mopping things up in the trenches with folks who have had to actually use their firearm in self defense or use some kind of force in self defense.
Speaker C:So it's not as glorious but it's, you know, you need a lot of different, you know, the, the laws of sword and a shield.
Speaker C:And so we find ourselves kind of just in the trenches with everyday people who find themselves on the worst day of their life having to use force or deadly force.
Speaker C:And that's, you know, that's kind of where we find ourselves.
Speaker A:Yeah, we need, we definitely need people like you guys in their, you know, self defense of the gun and with a gun is a constitutional right and we love that you guys are doing that.
Speaker A:We're going to start off real quick before we go too deep in.
Speaker A:We got to thank our gift sponsors.
Speaker A:So you guys will be receiving a gift from Palmetto State Armory and aac.
Speaker A:They sponsoring our gifts for our guests this season two of State ii.
Speaker A:So you guys will be receiving something from them here shortly.
Speaker A:Again, we want to thank Palmetto State Armory for everything they have done for the second amendment and for supporting goa.
Speaker C:That's fantastic.
Speaker A:Welcome.
Speaker A:I gotta love them.
Speaker A:They, they just announced that earlier.
Speaker A:So we're gonna have season two gifts for everybody.
Speaker A:So we're gonna get to our first segment which is rapid fire questions that's brought to you by blackout coffee.
Speaker A:Check out Goa's no Compromise roast at Blackout coffee.
Speaker A:Get your caffeine and freedom from blackout coffee.
Speaker A:Available at the GOA store as well as on Blackout Coffee's website.
Speaker A:So I'm gonna ask you guys five questions.
Speaker A:You can answer them as briefly or as long as you want.
Speaker A:So the first question I'm going to ask is what is your go to pizza topic?
Speaker B:I'm a weirdo.
Speaker C:What is it?
Speaker B:I'm a weirdo.
Speaker B:Olives.
Speaker A:Olives.
Speaker B:I love olives.
Speaker C:Whole?
Speaker B:No.
Speaker C:Okay.
Speaker B:But green.
Speaker C:All right.
Speaker C:I'm pretty simple.
Speaker C:I'm a simple person.
Speaker C:Pepperoni mushroom.
Speaker A:Pepperoni mushroom.
Speaker A:Okay.
Speaker A:Do you watch more of TikTok or YouTube?
Speaker B:YouTube.
Speaker C:Yeah.
Speaker C:Tick Tock's a Chinese spy apparatus.
Speaker B:A Chinese spy apparatus.
Speaker B:We are very anti Tick Tock in this office.
Speaker B:Well, we.
Speaker B:Not Richard's wife necessarily.
Speaker B:So it's all over his house.
Speaker A:But what is the most watched content creator you watch on YouTube?
Speaker B:Ben Shapiro, hands down, every episode.
Speaker B:Never miss one.
Speaker C:I probably watch a lot of Tim Pool.
Speaker C:Really enjoy Tim's work.
Speaker B:That's.
Speaker A:I haven't heard of Tim.
Speaker A:Maybe I'm just behind Ben.
Speaker A:Ben.
Speaker A:I've heard of.
Speaker A:Of watch a lot of Ben, but not Tim yet.
Speaker A:Go to edc.
Speaker B:Well, I'm a lady, so it changes based on my outfit.
Speaker B:But so I really love my very favorite.
Speaker B:My very favorite gun that I carry whenever I can.
Speaker B:Which is also winner is an M&P9C.
Speaker B:I love it.
Speaker B:I don't know.
Speaker B:I know that people hate on mmps.
Speaker B:I did replace the trigger which makes it a lot more tolerable.
Speaker B:I love it.
Speaker B:But then also it's like you got a purse revolver.
Speaker B:I think you know what is it a Glock?
Speaker B:I think it's a 26 that I carry to when I want something a little bit slimmer.
Speaker B:Because Dylan, normally my husband steals the 43.
Speaker B:So I end up with the 26 a lot.
Speaker B:It depends.
Speaker B:It depends on your outfit.
Speaker B:Do I need a purse gun?
Speaker B:Am I wearing a big coat?
Speaker B:He's in the skinny.
Speaker C:Yeah, I. I carry a Glock 43X.
Speaker C:It's just too easy.
Speaker A:I'm with you.
Speaker A:I. I carry.
Speaker A:It depends on what I'm wearing.
Speaker A:Maybe that makes me different.
Speaker A:But I.
Speaker A:It's all.
Speaker A:There's a rotation.
Speaker A:You got to have a rotation of things.
Speaker A:Choices are always better.
Speaker B:Well, and I love that the choice of the revolver too makes a big difference for me.
Speaker B:Cuz like I love cuz like when you throw in a bag like that roofer, the lcr like just right in the first.
Speaker A:Are you purse or a fanny pack?
Speaker B:Me?
Speaker A:Yeah.
Speaker A:Do you like the fanny?
Speaker A:Have you.
Speaker B:Oh, a purse.
Speaker A:Have you done the fanny pack?
Speaker B:No, I'm.
Speaker B:I am 38 years old that I know the younger ones like the fanny packs.
Speaker B:I'm too old.
Speaker B:I can't pull it off.
Speaker B:I'm not young enough pull it off.
Speaker A:Have you done the fanny pack?
Speaker B:Richard, though, has a fanny pack.
Speaker B:So that's why I was.
Speaker B:I was like, oh, wait, me?
Speaker B:No, he's the fanny pack guy.
Speaker C:I do have a fanny pack.
Speaker C:It's red, white, and blue.
Speaker A:I love the fanny pack.
Speaker A:That's like, that's my go to carry because I wear basketball shorts everywhere.
Speaker A:So fanny pack is.
Speaker A:Is the way I roll.
Speaker A:Go to home defense gun.
Speaker B:So, I mean, again, my.
Speaker B:My answer is so long.
Speaker B:But so I guess here we go.
Speaker B:Okay.
Speaker B:Because I am the.
Speaker B:I'm the woman, right?
Speaker B:And we have kids.
Speaker B:So the go to home defense gun is the f. In my husband's bedside table.
Speaker B:And, and it's suppressed because if don't.
Speaker B:My children are sleeping and they are toddlers.
Speaker B:They are hard to get to sleep.
Speaker B:But like, my job, right, because, like, I mean, I imagine like, we are all talking about our home defense plans with your family.
Speaker B:My job is to go get the kids and to get the kids to a safe place.
Speaker B:His job is to shoot the intruders.
Speaker B:So it's the.45s, the FN in his nightstand.
Speaker B:And I'm like racing out to get my daughter and then scooping around to get my son, and then we're heading to safety.
Speaker C:My answer is much.
Speaker C:I know.
Speaker B:See, I. I know I got a lot.
Speaker C:I have a. I have a brace pistol.
Speaker C:It's a Daniel defense.
Speaker C:That's my, my go to home.
Speaker C:So.
Speaker B:Because your wife's getting the kid.
Speaker C:Theoretically, yeah.
Speaker B:Right.
Speaker A:So that wraps up our rapid fire questions, which brings me into a great topic because you brought it up.
Speaker A:Do you recommend people have a home defense plan?
Speaker A:Because I've, I've talked to a lot of people and some of them do, some of them don't.
Speaker A:Like, what do you recommend people do in a home defense situation?
Speaker B:You know, I mean, we keep it pretty simple, you know, because, like, my husband's like, you know, I mean, the closest I've come to being law enforcement is being a prosecutor.
Speaker B:My husband's not law enforcement.
Speaker B:He's a great shot.
Speaker B:He was a nationally ranked pistol shooter in college.
Speaker B:But so we keep it as simple as, like, we talk about, like, okay, you know, someone's going to come in.
Speaker B:We know in our house what part's most vulnerable.
Speaker B:This is where someone's going to come in.
Speaker B:We talk about where we diverge, how we keep the kids safe.
Speaker B:And then we practice it once or twice.
Speaker B:Like, I'll practice, like grabbing the key because we have to go through a back door for me to get to one of the kids.
Speaker B:And like, I'll practice it.
Speaker B:So I've got the muscle memory, but I think it's great.
Speaker B:That's as much as we do.
Speaker B:What do you guys do?
Speaker C:Well, a lot of it has to go into programming your smart house to play welcome to the jungle to turn on the strobe light and the smoke machine.
Speaker C:But.
Speaker C:No, but in all serious seriousness, I mean, we have general, general plan strategic defensive positions we've identified inside of the house.
Speaker B:Well, you're going to shoot your spouse if you don't.
Speaker B:If you don't.
Speaker B:I mean, if you're.
Speaker B:If your plan is get the home defense gun and keep yourself safe because this is Texas and it's cow starving state, and if you come in, you're gonna die.
Speaker B:You got to make sure you don't accidentally shoot your spouse.
Speaker B:It's really important, I think, to have that plan.
Speaker A:I'm with you.
Speaker A:I, I'm.
Speaker A:I have our, our set of plans.
Speaker A:I've got two strategic positions because we've got a front and a back door.
Speaker A:I, I know our, our house.
Speaker A:The way it's set up is we have a loft or upstairs is a loft.
Speaker A:So I've got firing positions.
Speaker A:And it's.
Speaker A:The wife goes to the.
Speaker A:The closet in the master bedroom, calls 911 and there's a her handgun and a shotgun in there in case.
Speaker A:I told her, if, if it's not my voice or it is, if it is my voice, please don't shoot through the door.
Speaker A:So, and I love talking that with people because everybody.
Speaker A:There's a lot of people who just go home defense situation, don't really think about the planning.
Speaker A:And then you start talking about the plan and muscle memory and go running through drills.
Speaker A:They're like, you're crazy.
Speaker A:I'm like, no, be prepared.
Speaker A:You run fire drills in your house, don't you?
Speaker A:Like, no, I don't want to fire.
Speaker A:Well, then that's your problem.
Speaker C:Yeah.
Speaker C:And then I would say a key aspect that a lot of folks leave out of their plan is, all right, you have a dead body in your living room because you just had to stop someone.
Speaker C:What do you do now?
Speaker C:And so even coming up with a plan with, all right, here's what we're going to do.
Speaker C:We're calling 911.
Speaker C:Here are the things that we're saying.
Speaker C:This is how we're preparing the house for when the police arrive.
Speaker C:Theoretically, you know, assuming the scene is safe, separating yourself from a firearm, you know, what are you going to say to the police?
Speaker C:Are you calling an attorney?
Speaker C:Do you, do you know who you're going to call?
Speaker C:Because not having a plan at 3am with your eyes adjusting the light and your ears ringing, that's not the time to crack open the phone book.
Speaker B:What do you do with your gun that keeps you safe, but also isn't committing another crime by tampering with evidence?
Speaker B:To have thought about all those things,.
Speaker A:Well, that gets me into the meat and potatoes of this podcast about who you guys are, what do you guys do, all that stuff.
Speaker A:So let's start off like you guys were both criminal defense.
Speaker A:You, you've defended a lot of people who have gotten in self defense shooting.
Speaker A:So let's kind of go through, you know, first off, go ahead and go full intro on yourself and kind of explain it and then kind of go through like what does.
Speaker A:Because a lot of people don't know what happens when you do get into a self defense shooting or a home defense shooting.
Speaker B:You start, you want to talk about channel and then we'll talk about.
Speaker C:Yeah, so, and that's part of why we started the Armed Attorneys.
Speaker C:You can find us on armed attorneys on YouTube is just a little bit of myth busting, you know, you know, say talking to lawyers, that's not a lot of fun generally.
Speaker C:But we try to put things in plain English.
Speaker C:And the problem is if you just read the law, then you're not going to be.
Speaker C:You don't have enough information to make an informed decision.
Speaker C:Because part of this is seeing how it applies, seeing how courts have interpreted things, knowing how other cases have, you know, the outcomes of other cases.
Speaker C:So there's a lot of experience that informs the law that I think a lot of people miss out on.
Speaker B:Yeah.
Speaker B:And knowing like the personality of the chief law enforcement officers in your area too, which can be a really important piece of that puzzle to have.
Speaker B:Like talk to a lawyer who says, well, the judges here are like this.
Speaker B:And this cheap prosecutor is like this.
Speaker B:And if you know this law enforcement agency gets called out, they're going to be cooperative with this.
Speaker B:But they hate this.
Speaker B:I mean it.
Speaker B:There's a lot that goes in.
Speaker A:Yeah.
Speaker C:And so you know, a lot of this kind of just background on self defense in general because a lot of people learn it the hard way.
Speaker C:You know, it's a justification that excludes what would otherwise be a crime.
Speaker C:You know, general rule, can't shoot people, can't point guns at people, can't assault people, can't run people over with your cars.
Speaker C:But sometimes it's critically important because you have to save your life, you have to save your loved ones.
Speaker C:And so I think a lot of people, you know, they always, I mean as simple as a question of hey, if I shoot somebody who breaks into my house, am I going to go to jail?
Speaker C:I don't understand why people are getting arrested for this.
Speaker C:It's because, guess what, you get charged with the crime, you get charged with the murder, with the aggravated assault.
Speaker C:And then you know, depending on your state, depending on your self defense rights, the burdens maybe even on you as the self defender to persuade a jury that what you did was reasonable and immediately necessary.
Speaker C:Because an affirmative defense, and that's how self defense works in virtually every single state.
Speaker C:It's a defense that you raise at your trial, you know, in front of a trial judge or trial jury.
Speaker C:And so in the meantime you've potentially gotten arrested, dragged through the system for years and then you find yourself at trial.
Speaker C:And you know, we talk to folks, even if they're acquitted, they're found not guilty, they do not feel like winners because the process is the punishment.
Speaker A:Yeah.
Speaker A:And that a lot of people talk about the, the self defense triangle that the things you have to have in there to, to cause for the causation, to have a self defense scenario.
Speaker A:Can you guys dive into that a little bit real quick?
Speaker C:Yeah, I mean we look at, we actually use very, very similar, we have a little teeny tiny differences, but greatly, we appreciate, appreciate and, and are informed by Andrew Branca.
Speaker C:You know, the way that he analyzes a self, I mean we, we talk to hundreds and help hundreds of people a year and his factors hold up really well under those.
Speaker C:And so his factors are innocence, imminence, proportionality, reasonableness and avoidance.
Speaker C:And once you start, if you have all five of those, guess what, you got a rock solid self defense case.
Speaker C:And we can talk about those elements in a little bit more detail and what they mean.
Speaker C:But once you start losing one or multiple of these things, it can really start messing up a self defense case.
Speaker C:And what you'll find is the vast majority of self defense cases out there, they're not, you know, black and white.
Speaker C:I mean I would say the overwhelming majority, 95% of self defense cases are in that gray area where hey guess what, you're going to have to have a fact finder, a jury, a judge determine.
Speaker C:All right, Was this justified or not justified?
Speaker B:Yeah, no, I mean, it is.
Speaker B:You know, and that's where I mean, I think when we talk about the law behind self defense, generally your legal factors.
Speaker B:Right.
Speaker B:Were you reasonable?
Speaker B:Was it immediately necessary?
Speaker B:Was it, you know, in response to a life threat?
Speaker B:You know, that's great, but it's that Branca factor, avoidance, that really, really.
Speaker B:And clean hands too, right?
Speaker B:Yeah, that.
Speaker B:Those are the ones that really trip people up because those aren't written into the law.
Speaker B:But they're probably the single most important factors in your jury.
Speaker B:Your law says you have to act proportionately.
Speaker B:Your jury says you better not have started that whole nonsense that ended in you having to use deadly force.
Speaker B:And that's probably not the law telling you, but man, those 12 people sit there and if they don't like what you did, the black and white letter of the law is not going to save you.
Speaker C:Yeah.
Speaker C:So the triangle, you'll see that written into law, those two factors, just to give a little bit more background on them.
Speaker C:You know, we call it innocence.
Speaker C:That's, you know, juries like it when someone is just beat bopping along, minding their own business, and then they're forced to respond to a threat.
Speaker C:They do not like to see a, a defender who kind of started this chain of events that led to a use of force or deadly force.
Speaker C:And so, you know, what does that look like?
Speaker C:Is it, you know, do you lose innocence if your car is getting burglarized out on the street and you go outside?
Speaker C:Maybe.
Speaker B:Maybe.
Speaker C:Right.
Speaker C:If you're pumping gas and somebody pulls a gun on you, are you innocent?
Speaker C:Are you just be popping along?
Speaker C:Yes.
Speaker C:All right, so you see how that can play out in a different few different scenarios.
Speaker C:And then that avoidance, and really when we talk about avoidance, is, is there a reasonable, safe alternative to using force or deadly force?
Speaker C:You know, it's just going to depend on the circumstances.
Speaker C:And sometimes the answer is no.
Speaker C:Hey, look, you got your back in the corner.
Speaker C:You got to act right now.
Speaker C:And juries will give a lot of grace to folks if they, if they're backed into a corner.
Speaker C:But if there was some alternative, you know, that is always going to hang in their mind.
Speaker C:And it's even as silly as it sounds, you know, we have states that are stand your ground, you know, you have no legal duty imposed to retreat.
Speaker C:And jurors are told, hey, guess what?
Speaker C:You can't consider this person's failure to Retreat, you know, so long as they're not breaking the law, they're in a place they're legally allowed to be.
Speaker B:Right.
Speaker B:And they don't think about a purple elephant.
Speaker C:Yeah, they just can't help themselves.
Speaker C:They're told not to think about it and they can't help themselves.
Speaker C:And so that's why that factor, you know, outside of the triangle is so important.
Speaker A:Yeah, that's you know, moving and again, where I originally had just passed stand your ground right when I left, but moving to like a freer state like Arizona where I live now, you know, it's technically not a stand your ground state, it's a no duty retreat state.
Speaker A:And the laws from state to state are also play a factor if you, if you have reciprocity when you're going from state to state.
Speaker A:And a lot of people don't really understand that as well.
Speaker A:I mean, how, let's just say, you know, we get into a self defense shooting and we'll just blanket this.
Speaker A:What, what is the steps to get an attorney?
Speaker A:Because I, you get a phone call, you call an attorney, figure you can find them in the yellow pages.
Speaker A:Not all attorneys are the same.
Speaker A:So you know, you call, call somebody, they might be a real estate attorney or this, you know, what's the steps after that that you have to go into?
Speaker B:Yeah, well, I mean it is, it is tough to find an attorney who practices firearms and self defense law who will answer your call at 2 in the morning.
Speaker B:It's tough.
Speaker B:There are lots of services out there that provide that.
Speaker B:Lots of insurance type services, lots of, you know, prepaid legal type services.
Speaker B:Do your research.
Speaker B:They're not all created equal, but that's a really good way to get that.
Speaker B:And beyond that, you know, maybe you can find a firearms or a criminal defense attorney who will take, you know, like a micro retainer from you and you say, you know, listen, this is, this is so that I can call you in the circumstance and I want you to pick up the phone without an attorney though, because you're right if you just start from scratch.
Speaker B:I mean, you know, if you're calling your great uncle who does mostly wills and probate in the middle of the night because you shot somebody, he's not, he might take your call.
Speaker B:He's not going to be able to help you in the absence of having an attorney to help you.
Speaker B:Right.
Speaker B:Then you really need to be able to, I mean you need to have, just like you plan your home defense we were talking about earlier, you need to plan that response until you can, you know, go to jail, get bonded out, Then you need to start doing your research and you need to find an attorney who actually practices the self defense laws and has taken and successfully defended self defense cases in the past.
Speaker B:And do you want to talk about maybe the, our, the plan if you don't have an attorney?
Speaker C:Sure, yeah.
Speaker C:Yeah.
Speaker C:So you know, for those folks who, let's say, all right, and I would say this is a good foundation regardless of whether you have one of those services or you know, what attorney you're going to call following a self defense incident.
Speaker C:I mean foundational to all of this are, you know, how do you make your 911 call?
Speaker C:What do you say when the police come on scene, what happens if you're arrested and how to respond in each of those kind of three scenarios?
Speaker C:Because I'll say, you know, and most of these criminal cases, the first few hours, I mean it's going to be very hectic, very overwhelming.
Speaker C:But once you've, you know, been released from jail, I mean the whole system really slows down, almost painfully slow.
Speaker C:And so, you know, best practices for a 911 call, it's really about minimizing your exposure to law enforcement.
Speaker C:So things that we tell people to say, name, location, hey, I need police ems.
Speaker C:You'll hear disagreements in the community about this next step.
Speaker C:But this has been, this is my experience, a short, truthful statement about the defensive incident.
Speaker C:When I say short, I mean like five or six words.
Speaker C:Someone just broke into my house and I had to defend myself.
Speaker C:You know, some people will say, you know, I was in fear for my life.
Speaker C:I don't, we don't like that.
Speaker C:It sounds rehearsed, it sounds played out.
Speaker C:Police aren't into it, prosecutors disregard it, juries are, they are numb to it.
Speaker C:So we think that that kind of solves that problem.
Speaker C:Short truth, real statement about the defensive incident.
Speaker C:But again, short, short, short, and then hanging up the phone immediately.
Speaker C:And the moment, you know, a lot of people don't know this.
Speaker C:When you call 91 1, the moment you hit dial, the phone is ringing.
Speaker C:It records immediately.
Speaker C:The phone is already recording.
Speaker C:So everything you're saying is being recorded.
Speaker C:And why is this 911 call so stinking important?
Speaker C:This is typically the first exhibit in a, in a trial.
Speaker B:It states one.
Speaker C:Yeah, it states one because this is the, you know, a trial is, it's telling a story and what kicks off the story or you know, how does law enforcement get involved?
Speaker C:It's that 911 call.
Speaker C:So a lot of times they, they do this chronologically.
Speaker C:They want to start with the first call.
Speaker C:And so this is a, A key piece of information.
Speaker C:And we think about all these kind of marketing tricks people play on people.
Speaker C:You know, anchoring, you know, we're human beings.
Speaker C:We kind of latch onto the first piece of information that we get.
Speaker C:And then, you know, we, we orient our, our opinion about something or our, our thoughts about something completely around that piece of information.
Speaker C:So we see why this is so stinking important.
Speaker C:And, and then the next step, hanging up the call.
Speaker C:And then if you can, your next call should be an attorney.
Speaker C:But we'll go back to that foundation.
Speaker C:If you don't have an attorney, just knowing your rights and how to stand on them.
Speaker C:You know, once the police arrive, that's, that's where I think we should go.
Speaker B:Yeah.
Speaker B:And then, you know, again, once the police arrive, if you don't have an.
Speaker B:If you have been able to speak to an attorney, great, they've probably helped you with a short statement.
Speaker B:But if you've not, there's really not much.
Speaker B:I mean, you know, staying totally silent, probably not necessary.
Speaker B:Depends on the facts.
Speaker B:You know, this guy attacked me.
Speaker B:I want to help you as much as possible, but I cannot give any further statement until I've had an opportunity to speak to a lawyer.
Speaker B:Being rude to police is never going to work in your favor.
Speaker B:And then in the absence of, you know, we don't.
Speaker B:Like I was in fear for my life.
Speaker B:It doesn't sound good.
Speaker B:The, the, the government's onto it, basically is something that sounds rehearsed.
Speaker B:It's something that, you know, you went through in your head beforehand, perhaps didn't really feel, but things like, I knew he was going to kill me or I was going to die.
Speaker B:I knew I was going to die tonight.
Speaker B:That's great.
Speaker B:That says the exact same thing.
Speaker B:It satisfies the element and it sounds so much more natural and so much more truthful.
Speaker B:So if you can get that out.
Speaker B:And a, he attacked me and then I can't give you any further statement, you are, you are doing better than 99% of people.
Speaker B:People.
Speaker C:Yeah.
Speaker C:And it's important.
Speaker C:You know, apart from that, let's say you get arrested, right.
Speaker C:It's.
Speaker B:Which you might.
Speaker C:Yeah.
Speaker C:Which you very well might.
Speaker C:I mean, there.
Speaker C:And that's the thing about self defense.
Speaker C:You're not saying I didn't do it.
Speaker C:You're saying I did it and I had a really good reason to.
Speaker C:And so do the police have, you know, probable cause to arrest you for in this case?
Speaker C:Let's say murder.
Speaker C:Yeah, there's a dead guy.
Speaker C:You're saying you did it.
Speaker C:Like they have enough information to arrest you if they want to.
Speaker C:Yeah, but let's say they make an arrest.
Speaker C:It's very important that folks know how to invoke the right to remain silent and invoke their right to an attorney.
Speaker C:You know, invoking your right to remain silent, actually saying I invoke my right to remain silent and then remaining silent.
Speaker C:And why do you do that?
Speaker C:The court's required.
Speaker C:If you just are quiet, the courts are going to let all this post arrest silence in at trial.
Speaker C:It looks really weird.
Speaker C:And so you got to be very, very careful.
Speaker C:How do you invoke your right to an attorney?
Speaker C:I invoke my right to an attorney.
Speaker C:That's exactly how you do it.
Speaker C:Don't mince words.
Speaker C:Can't be unequivocal.
Speaker C:You have to make, you know, you can't be wishy washy about it.
Speaker C:I think I should get a lawyer.
Speaker C:That's not going to satisfy it.
Speaker B:I'm not talking to you without a lawyer.
Speaker C:That'll work.
Speaker C:Yeah, that'll work.
Speaker C:And so I mean if you have get that defense out, limiting your exposure, invoking your rights, I mean like Emily said, you're going to be better off than 99.99% of people.
Speaker A:Now before I, I've got two questions so I'm going to hold off on the one.
Speaker A:So you guys are educating the public on this.
Speaker A:We seen a bunch of new gun owners and things like that.
Speaker A:How do we reach out to them and start educating on some of this?
Speaker A:And this is where it ties into.
Speaker A:My second question is the myths of self defense.
Speaker A:The myths that you've heard.
Speaker A:We've all heard old granddad who said, well if you shoot him in the doorway, you drag him in the house, which we all know that that's tampering with evidence.
Speaker A:But we've heard these myths and things like that.
Speaker A:So first off, let's start with the education of the public and how to get these new gunners to understand the self defense laws and then kind of tie into some of the, those myths and misnomers that they've heard over the years.
Speaker B:Yeah, you know, I mean we, we hope that our, you know, our content and that creators like you and creators, you know, out there providing this information.
Speaker B:There are, I mean there are lots and we know most of them personally and it's great.
Speaker B:And we hope that that's something that's hitting the radar of new gun owners.
Speaker B:You know, I Think that there's a lot of outreach being done at ranges with instructors sort of pushing good, good legal content to instructors as well.
Speaker B:That makes a huge difference.
Speaker C:Yeah.
Speaker C:And as far as myths go, I.
Speaker C:And that's important.
Speaker C:I mean, we talk to instructors every single week about, hey, how do I explain this to, to our class?
Speaker C:Or I'll talk to new gun owner who is like, I just talked to this instructor and they said the craziest thing, maybe even the dragging the body into the house.
Speaker C:I mean, you know, you'd be really surprised.
Speaker C:And why myth busting is really important.
Speaker C:Well, to, to that example specifically.
Speaker C:Hey, guess what?
Speaker C:When the police come out and the physical evidence doesn't match, like if that, that doesn't take rocket science, when the physical evidence stop.
Speaker C:Stops matching, you know, your credibility goes through the floor and all right now you're looking at spending the rest of your life in prison.
Speaker C:So, you know, those types of things I think, think people erroneously think, hey, I'm going to get more self defense rights.
Speaker C:It was inside my house.
Speaker C:No, no.
Speaker B:And you know, oh, boy, there's just, there's just so much that can go wrong.
Speaker B:There's so much that can go wrong.
Speaker B:I mean, Richard knows I'm preparing for a murder trial right now.
Speaker B:It's going to happen in a couple weeks here.
Speaker B:And despite the fact that he did not put himself in the situation, someone started burglarizing his property.
Speaker B:Um, he did all of these things.
Speaker B:And I don't want to talk about it too much because it still hasn't gotten trial, but he did all of these things that when he explains it, I'm like, oh, okay, I understand why you did that.
Speaker B:I understand why you moved this, I understand why you touched that.
Speaker B:I understand why you ran this way.
Speaker B:I understand why you fired this shot.
Speaker B:But on the whole, in the aggregate, it's like, oh, it's like every little thing that he could have done sort of improperly, he did.
Speaker B:And then you hear a story and you're like, I get it, I get it, you know, but, but man.
Speaker B:And luckily he had lawyers on the scene that night, which is one of the things that I think is going to save us at trial.
Speaker B:But again, perfectly innocent on his part.
Speaker B:Properties being burglarized.
Speaker B:He goes, responds, ends up killing one of the burglars.
Speaker B:And yet it is like a comedy of errors that, you know, I think we're going to get out of.
Speaker B:But it can be really tough and really easy to jam yourself up.
Speaker C:And that's what.
Speaker C:And I'll Just say, I mean those types of cases are the absolute, I mean they're, they're the absolute worst.
Speaker C:Yeah.
Speaker C:And it's the norm because it's all or nothing.
Speaker C:It's like you are either justified, you're a free man, you're going back to the free world, or hey, maybe you're spending the rest of your life in prison.
Speaker C:There's no real in between on, on these cases.
Speaker A:Now I've, I've heard, we've talked about this and I learned this when I was teaching, but you may get pushed off on, you know, found acquitted or justified in your defensive shooting.
Speaker A:But we always see that what's up working district attorneys and things like that always have their win loss records that they're looking at and you might be charged with something silly.
Speaker A:You know, how, how often do you guys see something like a discharging of firearm in a city limits or something silly just so that that defense attorney gets, or the district attorney gets their win loss record a little boosted a lot.
Speaker B:Yeah, the government loves to get its pound of flesh and they know, they know that they can coerce you into it because ultimately, I mean, you know, I just had this happen and my, you know, I just had a very recent case in Houston in which the guy was accused, there was a road rage incident.
Speaker B:He's accused of displaying a firearm.
Speaker B:He actually didn't, not in the way that they accused him of.
Speaker B:But it's Texas.
Speaker B:Everybody's got a gun in their car.
Speaker B:So you call and say, someone flashed a gun at me.
Speaker B:The police are going to find a gun in the car and that's all it takes.
Speaker B:And so despite the fact that there was not very much evidence, you look at that case and you say, okay, we're going to trial.
Speaker B:What's the worst thing that could happen?
Speaker B:You could go to prison for 20 years or the state's going to give you this misdemeanor and you get to stay out in the free world.
Speaker B:And maybe that misdemeanor gets dismissed after a couple years on probation.
Speaker B:But they want something from you and they know, they know that even an innocent man's going to say, I can't risk 20 years in prison.
Speaker B:I'll take the little ticky tacky thing you're going to give me so that you get your pound of flesh and I'm not taking the risk.
Speaker B:And it happens constantly.
Speaker A:Yeah.
Speaker A:And as a gun owner, so we've heard a lot, I've heard a lot of stories like that where people get blamed for brandishing you Know, as a gun owner, you know, what's the, I guess, best way to combat that?
Speaker A:If something happens where somebody accuses you of brandishing, is there a way to combat that?
Speaker C:Yeah, I mean, we have ideas, but the, you know, I'll say the context that this comes up in overwhelmingly is road rage.
Speaker C:And juries, prosecutors, police, they hate road rage cases.
Speaker C:We spend probably too much time as like a public service telling people, please stop pulling your guns on the roadway.
Speaker C:Because, you know, talking about that last element of avoidance, hey, guess what?
Speaker C:You're in your big, safe, metal, movable box.
Speaker C:Why didn't you just slow down or get off the road or move away?
Speaker C:So, I mean, there's.
Speaker C:Juries are very unsympathetic to it.
Speaker C:And so those are really precarious cases.
Speaker C:But I think we have a solution.
Speaker B:We do have a solution.
Speaker B:Yeah.
Speaker B:So your, your car gun should be wild, it should be bedazzled, it should be pink sparkles, it should be Ghostbusters with slimer painted on the side of it and neon green.
Speaker B:I mean, it should be whatever is going to make it so unique and so recognizable.
Speaker B:Because when that guy calls when you didn't actually display the firearm.
Speaker B:So if you display the firearm, it better be justified because they're identifying it.
Speaker B:But when you didn't, didn't.
Speaker B:And that guy calls because he says, I see the NRA sticker on the back of his truck.
Speaker B:I see the goa.
Speaker C:Black or silver?
Speaker B:I see the.
Speaker B:Yeah, right.
Speaker B:You know, I see the, you know, we protect the second sticker on the back of his truck.
Speaker B:They're going to say, ah, he pointed a black handgun at me.
Speaker B:Or a silver handgun.
Speaker C:Yeah.
Speaker B:And then when you're like, yeah, check out the pink sparkles in my center console.
Speaker C:Yeah, it's hunter orange.
Speaker B:Yep.
Speaker A:I love that.
Speaker A:My, my go to new carry gun is the, the GOA Canic.
Speaker A:Have, have you seen that one yet?
Speaker A:It is, it is silver top with blue and red all over it.
Speaker A:So it is very noticeable on what it is.
Speaker C:Nice.
Speaker B:Perfect.
Speaker A:So, and I've talked to people about that and a lot.
Speaker A:That is a big fear.
Speaker A:As a gun owner, you mentioned stickers on the back of cars and things like that.
Speaker A:What?
Speaker A:I'm anti sticker on the back of my vehicles.
Speaker A:I.
Speaker A:What are you guys, what do you.
Speaker B:Hate the first Amendment?
Speaker B:Well, yeah, we are very anti sticker too.
Speaker B:And that's what everyone says to us.
Speaker C:No, and we, you know, this was probably one of our first videos.
Speaker C:It was titled take down your funny gun signs.
Speaker C:You know, they they create and we talk about just firearm stuff, firearms accessories, these things.
Speaker C:We break them into two categories of function enhancing and non function enhancing.
Speaker C:Function enhancing would be an example of like a modified trigger or maybe an optic, something that makes you more lethal, get on target.
Speaker C:You know, those are all very easily explained at trial.
Speaker C:And non function enhancing modifications, you know, think about, right, you know, engraving, smile, mother, effort around the barrel or, you know, I think these signs fall into that second category.
Speaker C:You know, it's, it's a tangential accessory where it just kind of creates a needless issue at trial.
Speaker B:Yes.
Speaker B:The, the murder case I'm going to trial on in two weeks, there was a, I don't even know if you know this.
Speaker B:There was a sign up on his property that said we shoot.
Speaker B:And that doesn't look good when the state's like, well, you did and then you went and you murdered him in cold blood afterwards.
Speaker B:So it's not good.
Speaker B:And does it mean that he didn't act in self defense?
Speaker B:No.
Speaker B:Do I want to explain it to a jury?
Speaker B:No.
Speaker B:And I'm.
Speaker C:Yeah, you explain.
Speaker C:You say, look, these people were on notice that if they went in this property, they were taking their life into their own on hands.
Speaker B:Sure.
Speaker C:And they knew.
Speaker B:And then when the state says he waited there and he hunted him down like animals because they had stolen from him before and he's got that sign up and he's just been thinking about killing them for the last two months that they was, you know, I'm going to say you're not.
Speaker C:That you're very persuasive.
Speaker A:Well, and that brings up the point of like people with, we don't call 911, front door mats and things like that.
Speaker A:You know, I like expressing, keep honking, I'm reloading.
Speaker A:Yeah, yeah.
Speaker A:Like my doormat says, please don't ring the dog door, you're going to disturb the dog.
Speaker A:So like I've joked and I'm like, oh, I'll get one of these stickers or something and it'll be funny on the inside.
Speaker A:And then I think more and more about it.
Speaker A:I'm like, wait, if I actually have to use my gun in self defense, what is state evidence number five where they pull this up and go, hey, look at this.
Speaker B:Yeah, absolutely.
Speaker C:And you know, we've seen good examples where.
Speaker C:All right, because at trial, you know, a trial in guilt and innocence, it's kind of like a black and white photograph.
Speaker C:Did this happen?
Speaker C:Did this not happen?
Speaker C:And the court's job is to exclude, you know, the General rule is relevant evidence comes into trial, you know, if it's not relevant, it's excluded, but there's still exceptions to that rule.
Speaker C:And so if it falls in one of these exceptions, you know, we've seen cases where, all right, absolutely, this stuff gets tossed out.
Speaker C:It doesn't come in trial, doesn't make an issue.
Speaker C:But we've seen lots of cases where, yeah, it makes its way in, Into.
Speaker C:Into court.
Speaker C:I mean, Emily had a case where self defense incident, singular firearm, and they tried to, they wanted to parade this guy's entire gun collection in front of the jury to just scare him and say, hey, like, this guy's a gun nut.
Speaker C:But what did the court say?
Speaker B:Yeah, well, luckily the court kept that out.
Speaker B:But it was a, it was a, it was a fight.
Speaker B:It was a real battle.
Speaker B:And the thing is that it's not just.
Speaker B:And people don't realize it's not just your stickers.
Speaker B:It's not just the signs around your house.
Speaker B:Everything you post on social media is potentially dangerous for you, because that is almost.
Speaker B:I mean, the court's going to do a balancing test to see if it's more prejudicial than probative.
Speaker B:But I mean, it's a statement of a party opponent.
Speaker B:It is your, Your words.
Speaker B:And so the chances that the judge is going to let that into court are pretty darn high.
Speaker B:So every time you get on Facebook and you post, you know, Second amendment something or other, and then, you know, talking about how, well, I would definitely do this, or who was it it was Daniel Perry in Austin sent messages about how he would handle protesters, which, you know, you don't think anything of.
Speaker C:It until you actually have to handle a protester.
Speaker B:You have to handle a protester, and then the government pulls that out, it gets admitted to trial, and that man was convicted on the basis of his messages, not on what he did.
Speaker B:And so, I mean, it is.
Speaker B:You got to be really, really cautious about everything you put out there, because Lord forbid you have to use self defense, and then it comes back to haunt you.
Speaker C:And it, it's a, it's an uncomfortable conversation because obviously we don't believe in censorship.
Speaker C:We don't believe in self censorship, but you have to.
Speaker C:And it's, it's all about a risk calculation.
Speaker C:You know, if you're comfortable with this, having a States exhibit sticker on it and put in front of a jury, go nuts.
Speaker C:And even if it's some, you know, maybe some people's tolerances are extremely high.
Speaker C:And.
Speaker C:But I, I think the ultimate just, you know, decision should be with the individual.
Speaker C:Hey, this needs to be a calculated risk decision.
Speaker C:We just don't want people kind of wandering into it.
Speaker C:If you've made a risk calculation, go nuts.
Speaker C:Right.
Speaker C:But if you're just doing it without any kind of contemplation about how could this be used against me.
Speaker C:That's where we see people get in a lot of trouble.
Speaker B:I mean I, I'll say, you know, Richard, I are out there on the Internet advising people about gun law and it like my personal social media is first of all totally locked down.
Speaker B:But I don't post anything.
Speaker C:I don't post anything.
Speaker B:I mean there's, and there's nothing about the second amendment.
Speaker B:There's nothing about guns.
Speaker B:I leave that to our channel.
Speaker B:And even the channel scares me because I think if I have to, if I have to ever defend myself, the government is going to pour through.
Speaker C:Poor intern.
Speaker B:I know whatever government intern it is and find every time I've said something inflammatory like oh yeah, I definitely kill someone for blah, blah, blah, and they are going to use that against me.
Speaker B:And I mean it's the risk that we take.
Speaker B:Yeah.
Speaker B:Because it's part of our business now.
Speaker B:But, but I fully am aware that they're going to use that.
Speaker A:I'm in big, big trouble then.
Speaker A:No, I'm just kidding.
Speaker A:So we are about at the halfway point we're going to go to our next segment which is from the Soapbox.
Speaker A:That's where we talk policy, politics, biggest frustration.
Speaker A:Scripts with the atf.
Speaker A:All the above.
Speaker A:This is brought to you by Patriot Mobile.
Speaker A:Again use GOA for one month free of Patriot Mobile.
Speaker A:Patriot Mobile is a pro freedom wireless network using the same cell towers as the big wireless companies.
Speaker A:Again for one month free use code goa.
Speaker A:So guys, what is your from the Soapbox topic you want to touch on today?
Speaker B:Richard?
Speaker C:Well, I mean we're about to start the 89th legislative session here in Texas.
Speaker C:So we're pretty policy focused.
Speaker C:You know, we got involved with GOA not too long ago.
Speaker C:2021 Is kind of when we started working with Goa.
Speaker C:We're their legislative council here in the state of Texas.
Speaker C:So all these great GOA bills that you see that come out of our office, we work, we're down at the capitol.
Speaker C:You know, we're down at the capitol for most of the session trying to get these things over the finish line.
Speaker C:And there's a lot of interesting things going on that we're working on.
Speaker C:You know, big things are, I mean, and it's tough because Texas, it Feels like a lot of wind was taken out of the sails once we had constitutional or permits carry pass here in Texas.
Speaker C:Everybody, thank you.
Speaker B:Goa.
Speaker C:Thank you.
Speaker C:That was goa.
Speaker C:You know, everybody, I feel like everybody's like, all right, we won, let's go home.
Speaker C:But we have, I mean, we have, if you could see this, I mean, we have 10 lifetimes of, of changes we need to make to Texas law in order to make it comply with the second Amendment.
Speaker C:That's how much stuff we have to do.
Speaker C:So we are not, we are full steam ahead.
Speaker C:There's a ton of things that we need to look at.
Speaker C:And I would say the things that we're really focused on this session are bolstering self defense, improving defenders rights, protecting them on the criminal side, protecting them on the civil side.
Speaker C:And then there's a lot of other fun issues that just need to get addressed.
Speaker B:Just to give you a taste of some of the small things, for example, we have insurers who are all of a sudden pulling insurance company coverage, carriers who are declining to renew gun ranges and clubs and manufacturers.
Speaker B:So that's a huge problem we'd like to remedy here.
Speaker B:You know, we have.
Speaker B:Richard, we haven't actually talked much about a bill on this yet, but we have police departments here in Texas refusing to return guns once someone's case is dismissed.
Speaker B:And they're doing an ATFE trace on every single gun and calling it mandatory, even when there's an order.
Speaker B:And a very angry defense attorney saying, give me the effing gun right now.
Speaker B:I would love to have some sort of bill that sanctions the, the government for that kind of behavior.
Speaker B:So, I mean, there is everything you can imagine from, you know, making sure the government doesn't act badly to making sure private companies don't act badly, to just fixing the system to make sure that, you know, people don't go broke because they've had to defend themselves and they're fighting civil lawsuits for a decade.
Speaker C:Yeah.
Speaker C:So like last session, for example, so two sessions ago, we got constitutional carry here in Texas.
Speaker C:Last session, our big victory was basically banning private gun registries.
Speaker C:You know, what we had was the ISO, International Standards Organization.
Speaker C:They promulgate these things called merchant category codes.
Speaker C:There are transaction numbers associated with whenever you swipe your credit card.
Speaker C:They created new transaction codes for firearms, ammunition and accessories.
Speaker C:And what we saw was the government was using this.
Speaker C:Maybe the federal government.
Speaker C:I don't believe that they don't track firearms, and I fully believe they have a database, but they're, they don't keep a List, Sure.
Speaker B:Illegal to keep a list.
Speaker B:Richard.
Speaker B:Surely they're not doing it.
Speaker C:But I, but they're in round or, or you know, where they could say, oh, this is how we got the information was they were going to go to these major credit card companies and it's the, you know, it's a third party and so there's really, you have a lowered expectation of privacy there.
Speaker C:And so they would just go and get, gather the information from these private corporations.
Speaker C:And so what we did in Texas is we banned merchants from using those codes and we made some really stiff penalties if these banks and financial institutions don't comply.
Speaker C:Some really, really crazy notification.
Speaker C:You know, if they accidentally transmit one of these codes, they have to notify the consumer and the attorney general.
Speaker C:And so, I mean, Richard made the.
Speaker B:Bank lobbyists really uncomfortable.
Speaker C:Yeah, I got screamed in my face a couple months.
Speaker B:They were not happy.
Speaker C:But, but you know, but what we're looking forward in this session, I mean, another one that we haven't talked about.
Speaker C:Scott Pressler put the word out we need to have voter registration with license to carry applications.
Speaker B:Yes, we do.
Speaker C:Yeah, we need that.
Speaker C:Yes, we do.
Speaker C:So, you know, there's all kinds of, you know, automatic reciprocity here in Texas right now it's up to the governor.
Speaker C:You know, there's only a handful of states we don't recognize.
Speaker C:We should recognize everybody.
Speaker C:We're looking at how can we move that timeline up from self defense instead of it being at trial?
Speaker C:How can we move it further up in the process so that folks aren't going bankrupt paying for lawyers and they're ultimately justified.
Speaker C:We're looking at improving.
Speaker C:You know, we have a bunch of scumbag plaintiffs lawyers who they'll sue.
Speaker C:They'll sue self defenders even when they're found, you know, not guilty, even when their case is dismissed or they're no build, they're still, you know, suing them, saying, hey, you need to pay my guy.
Speaker C:Do you have insurance?
Speaker C:I mean they just want to, yeah, they just want to shake the people, people down for money.
Speaker B:They do.
Speaker B:The insurance companies will pay for anything.
Speaker B:And particularly someone gets shot.
Speaker B:Insurance companies lose their minds.
Speaker B:They're terrified of it.
Speaker B:They are used to slip and falls.
Speaker B:They are used to things that are not intentional acts.
Speaker B:And despite the fact that because it's an intentional act, they're actually going to be less liable.
Speaker B:They freak out, the lawyers freak out, the carriers freak out and they're like, oh, here's some money.
Speaker B:And then it encourages all the scumbag plaintiffs lawyers.
Speaker B:To keep going doing it.
Speaker C:Yeah.
Speaker C:So what we're looking at on the civil side is hey if a person has been no build their case has been dismissed or they've been found not guilty that hey you cannot recover damages from that person.
Speaker C:If you sue that person you're going to be responsible for their attorney's fees.
Speaker C:And so we think that that's really going to shut down a lot of these frivolous lawsuits, you'd hope.
Speaker C:Yes.
Speaker C:And then on the self defense side and this actually would go for a ton of crimes in Texas, not just self defense.
Speaker C:We're looking at a defense motion to dismiss if an affirmative defense exists.
Speaker C:So basically all right you're charged with murder, you file a motion to dismiss alleging hey I the affirmative defense of self defense is available to me burdens on government to prove that self defense does not apply.
Speaker C:If they can't satisfy the judge very early on in the process then the case needs to be ordered dismissed.
Speaker C:So we're really looking at how can we ease this which you would think.
Speaker B:Wouldn't be a tall order because law lots of states have something similar but boy it is really hard once once criminal procedure is entrenched in a state it is really hard to convince the legislature to change it.
Speaker B:And so that's an uphill battle but it's I think it's one we're committed to.
Speaker C:Yeah.
Speaker C:Some other fun things.
Speaker C:Decriminalizing short B rifles under Texas law.
Speaker C:Yeah.
Speaker C:Just because we right now we have we are tied to federal law and anytime we see federal federal law and state law tied together in Texas we're always attacking it.
Speaker C:We should be completely decoupled from federal law.
Speaker C:Texas should be doing its own thing and so anything else what else have we got?
Speaker C:I know there's a lot of them.
Speaker B:There's a lot of them.
Speaker B:You know that's a pretty good summary.
Speaker C:Getting getting rid of gun free zones.
Speaker C:I mean we're always we're always going to go for that.
Speaker C:You know so we, we have we have a it's got a full plate.
Speaker B:It's a full plate.
Speaker A:Well can I just say God bless Texas on that.
Speaker A:Yeah we love suing for so people don't know Goa loves suing in the state of Texas because we normally win most of our cases in the state of Texas.
Speaker A:Oh yeah and set president have it.
Speaker B:Hurt by Judge Pittman.
Speaker A:Yes.
Speaker A:But you know touch on a few things the I'm running into the same my buddies running the same issue in Arizona where the state is his gun got stolen from his vehicle, they caught the guy with it.
Speaker A:He had a laundry list of crimes as long as you can get.
Speaker A:This was two years ago.
Speaker A:He still hasn't gotten his gun back the state.
Speaker A:So a buddy of ours worked for the local PD where it was stolen.
Speaker A:He was like, yeah, we got it clear, we're good to go.
Speaker A:You get your gun back.
Speaker A:And then this, the, the other city that he was actually arrested in was like, no, we're going to use this as evidence.
Speaker A:So we're going to hold on to this for a while.
Speaker A:Which is definitely infringing on his second amendment right.
Speaker A:As we all know, a right delayed is a right denied.
Speaker A:So that is a big thing and I, I really hope you guys win that in Texas on, on history, tradition and tax.
Speaker A:To show a right delay is a right denied.
Speaker A:The other thing is the, the coming from the state of Ohio where the burden of proof fell upon the state, you know, that was a big thing that really as a self person concealing, carrying, that just lifted some ease off your shoulder a little bit, you know.
Speaker A:But at the same time you're like, you still got to defend yourself in court.
Speaker A:But the burden of proof falling on the state is always a big win for those who, who are concealed carrying and a big win for the second amendment overall.
Speaker C:Yeah, I mean that.
Speaker C:And in Texas we have, we do have a scenario where the burden starts on the government and we call them our legal presumptions of reasonableness, that's use of deadly force in cathode locations, occupied home, occupied vehicle, place of employment in response to some very serious and violent crimes.
Speaker C:Murder, robbery, aggravated robbery, sexual assault, aggravated sexual assault and aggravated kidnapping.
Speaker C:So there are scenarios where, hey, the burden starts with the government.
Speaker C:But even in those cases, it's a presumption.
Speaker C:It's a presumption.
Speaker B:You gotta go to trial to get.
Speaker C:It and you gotta go to trial to get it.
Speaker C:And so, you know, how do you keep someone's life?
Speaker C:Because I mean, and this is going back to, hey, this might be a misconception or this is where new gun owners need to have their head on a swivel.
Speaker C:You know, you get charged with a crime, you're showing up to court every single month for possibly years.
Speaker C:You're calling into a phone number every day to see if you're randomly getting drug tested.
Speaker C:You have all these conditions of bond on you.
Speaker C:Maybe you have a ankle monitor that has to go get know checked in.
Speaker C:Every so often your employer now sees, hey, you got this charge against you.
Speaker C:There's a lot of kind of just collateral consequences associated with it.
Speaker C:Even when you, you know, you're, you're innocent until proven guilty, the way the system kind of feels, it doesn't feel that way.
Speaker C:And so just all of this inconvenience and everything, it destroys your life.
Speaker C:And so we're trying to minimize that as much as humanly possible with, you know, being able to assert these ass affirmative defenses earlier.
Speaker C:You know, we've seen great cases.
Speaker C:You know, you see like Florida and Georgia, they have a law very similar to this.
Speaker C:So this isn't like brand new out of, you know, out of pie, out of the sky.
Speaker C:I mean, this stuff exists and it works.
Speaker C:And so that's what we need for Texas.
Speaker A:SBIR is in Texas, you guys are trying to make them legally separated from the federal government.
Speaker A:You guys have already got that with suppressors.
Speaker A:You know, by doing that in the state of Texas, is there a way to set precedent for the rest of the country to try to get these items off the nfa?
Speaker A:And I know we've sued in with you guys on pistol braces and stuff like that, won that very overwhelmingly.
Speaker A:Is it, do we see a path that way through Texas on other NFA items as well?
Speaker C:Well, I think just the biggest thing is the, the immediate effect of decoupling is if you decriminalize something under state law and a lot of states, you know, as, as far as it goes to with guns, you see a lot of mirroring between state and federal law.
Speaker C:And then if you don't see mirroring, you see, hey, this is a crime if it's a crime under federal law.
Speaker C:So when you resolve those conflicts when you decouple or you don't mirror the federal law, well, guess what, 99% of people don't come into contact with federal authorities.
Speaker C:I mean, it's probably, it's probably even higher than that.
Speaker C:And so if you're not coming into contact with federal authorities and it's not a crime under your state law, well, guess what?
Speaker B:Liberty in the second Amendment sanctuary for which there are stiff penalties against law enforcement for, for cooperating with the federal government on new federal gun crimes.
Speaker B:Thank you again, the state of Texas.
Speaker B:Yeah, you have created a lot of freedom.
Speaker B:And so, you know, in part, even without the benefit of litigation, because that's how things get applied nationally, is you start litigating and then it goes up far enough and then, you know, hopefully the Supreme Court makes a decision and the holding of which is something that is nationally applicable, not, you know, highly, highly specific.
Speaker B:But you see that states, I mean, lobbyists and states look at what other states have done, they see what works, they mirror those bills.
Speaker B:And so, I mean, a bill that is successful in one state can, I think, have far reaching impact.
Speaker C:Yeah.
Speaker C:And to speak on the maiden Texas suppressor law that we have, I mean, that was modeled after Kansas, Montana, anybody.
Speaker C:There's maybe what was there.
Speaker B:There is one more, but I can't recall now.
Speaker C:Maybe Wyoming, but, you know, Texas tried to, you know, each of these states tried, it failed for various different reasons.
Speaker C:We tried to fix all of those problems.
Speaker C:Right now we are in the process of, hey, don't build a maiden Texas suppressor just yet.
Speaker C:The courts have not adjudicated this.
Speaker C: That passed back in: Speaker C:We see it's still working, still winding its way through the courts.
Speaker C:And we're having some standing issues with the court saying, all right, you have standing to, to sue on this.
Speaker C:So, you know, it is a laboratory.
Speaker C:We are trying to figure it out.
Speaker C:And it's the kind of the same thing we'd see with New York State Rifle and Pistol Association v. Bruin cases.
Speaker C:You know, a lot of folks.
Speaker C:And I, I totally get the frustration.
Speaker C:You know, you want to snap your fingers overnight and all these infringements go away.
Speaker C:You know, that case gave us the framework and now we have to litigate all of these issues.
Speaker C:And once we figure out how to, for example, sensitive place, you know, once we figure out, all right, this is the path to getting this, this erroneous sensitive place law struck, struck down, guess what, the floodgates are going to open.
Speaker C:Same thing with this, you know, list of prohibited people.
Speaker C:You know, if these things aren't constitutional, they need to fall.
Speaker C:Same thing with firearms restrictions.
Speaker C:And so it does take some time.
Speaker C:And I understand the frustration, but it's working.
Speaker C:I mean, there are thousands of cases going on right now.
Speaker B:Oh, yeah.
Speaker C:And it's happening.
Speaker C:Ron Paul.
Speaker C:Ron Paul.
Speaker C:Gif.
Speaker A:Yeah.
Speaker A:Well, and one last thing before we wrap up, I want to bring up, we talked about, we talked about the code for credit card companies.
Speaker A:We talked about, you know, ATF not having a registry.
Speaker A:And this is one of my favorite stories to bring up because it makes a giant middle finger to the government and I love it.
Speaker A:A friend of mine is a lieutenant for one of the police forces.
Speaker A: ot of guns, he had a stack of: Speaker A:So they call him down to the ATF office and he pulls up and he calls the, the case officer and it's like, hey, come meet me outside.
Speaker A:Well, he pulls up in his patrol car and he goes, cool.
Speaker A:So, you know, you're not allowed to take those forms.
Speaker A:Why don't you turn around, I'm gonna take you down to the precinct and book you.
Speaker A:And the guy's like, oh, we're gonna drop this right now.
Speaker A:So to say that the ATF is not looking at your forms, I have a feeling that I'm going to get a knock.
Speaker A:I know a friend who just got his ffl, was under investigation by the ATF because he had done so many transfers in a short period because he does YouTube and does do gun reviews.
Speaker A:You know, it's crazy to not think that the ATF is looking at those forms when they're not supposed to be, but they do what they want because it's rule for the and not for me when it comes to the atf.
Speaker A:And we're hoping with this new presidency and new Congress and new Senate that we will get some reform with the ATF or even try to get rid of them altogether.
Speaker B:You know, the direct.
Speaker B:Yeah, the executive direction is so incredibly important for how well the ATF is behaving or not.
Speaker B:And you know, I will say the guys who are just pound in the streets, they're generally not bad guys.
Speaker B:You know, the ones that I interacted with.
Speaker C:Yeah, there's a, there's pro gun ATF agents.
Speaker B:Oh, yeah.
Speaker B:Exist.
Speaker B:They exist and they like dogs.
Speaker B:State.
Speaker B:Yeah, State by state.
Speaker B:It varies and you know, jurisdiction by jurisdiction.
Speaker B:It varies about, you know, are your guys like, look, I am a gun guy.
Speaker B:I'm following my, my marching orders right now.
Speaker B:And I know this is stupid, but this is my job versus, you know, Jack booted thugs who want to abuse your rights.
Speaker B:And it is going to vary, but I do think that there are enough, enough out there who do respect the second Amendment, do respect firearms, that when you get that new executive in place who is also respectful of the second Amendment, then, I mean, things change.
Speaker B:They change overnight.
Speaker B:They change so quickly.
Speaker B:And I am so excited for January 20th, I can't even tell you.
Speaker C:Yeah, and then we've seen.
Speaker C:I mean, this is, from what I can tell, I mean, this is going to be a legitimate policy direction that the Trump administration intends on taking with cases like Loper Brightbeat, you know, Raimondo, I mean, cases that take down Chevron, Deference cases like EPA versus West Virginia that addresses major questions doctrine.
Speaker C:We have an SEC case about administrative agencies.
Speaker C:Yeah, Javarsky, you know about administrative agencies getting to hold these like star chamber courts where they get to adjudicate their own rules.
Speaker C:No, guess what?
Speaker C:You have a right to have a jury trial by a jury of your peers.
Speaker C:So once we see, and I think this is what they're going to do, I mean we'll see.
Speaker C:But when they start not enforcing these regulations that really shouldn't be in place in the first place and then if there was going to be a subsequent administration to try to come in behind them and enforce them, I mean we're going to see crazy standing issues on all of these things.
Speaker B:Well, let's take down the infrastructure.
Speaker C:Yeah, yeah.
Speaker B:The regulatory state is mostly illegal.
Speaker B:Yeah, let's take down the infrastructure.
Speaker B:Let's make it so.
Speaker B:It is really difficult for that next one who wants to come in and utilize it.
Speaker B:Like let's shred the cfr.
Speaker C:Love it.
Speaker B:Shred it.
Speaker C:Sign me up.
Speaker A:So hashtag boss, the nfa, hashtag boss, the gca, hashtag Bosch.
Speaker A:All of them.
Speaker A:I think I run out of hashtags here.
Speaker A:But yes, I agree.
Speaker A:Yeah, we are at that time.
Speaker A:My producer is telling me to wrap up.
Speaker A:So guys go ahead and plug away.
Speaker A:Where can people find you if they want to follow you, get more information, all that fun stuff?
Speaker C:Yeah, you can find [email protected] armed attorneys or on Twitter at Armed Attorneys.
Speaker C:Still call it to Twitter.
Speaker C:It's the X now we have a Facebook and Instagram.
Speaker C:I mean there you're, you're going to find us in a lot of different places but I'd say the two primary ones are YouTube and X.
Speaker B:And if you are in the state of Texas and you need a criminal defense attorney or firearms legal advice, you can find us at Walker Taylor law.com We are licensed attorneys in the state of Texas.
Speaker B:That is our full time job and what we do.
Speaker B:So you can always call us there.
Speaker A:Well guys, again thank you for being on.
Speaker A:I know we had to make some scheduling changes.
Speaker A:I really appreciate you guys taking the time.
Speaker A:Make sure guys to like share, subscribe.
Speaker A:Hit the little bell for notification.
Speaker A:Five star review on all podcasting hosts and we will catch you on the next one.
