Canadian police found in undercover operation at Great Falls gunshow [More]
We’ve seen what happens before when ATF arrogance presumes to ignore local LE… I wouldn’t mind seeing a repeat performance punctuated throughout with “Eh!”
[Via bondmen]
We’re the Only Ones Transnational Enough
This appears similar to the Massachusetts State Police and New York State Police staking out New Hampshire fireworks stand state run liquor stores.
https://www.wcvb.com/article/massachusetts-state-police-seized-illegal-fireworks-june-2022/40460128#
https://www.wbur.org/news/2018/05/08/new-hampshire-liquor-stores-bootlegging
https://www.npr.org/sections/thesalt/2018/03/08/591568943/hennessy-hauls-raise-concerns-about-new-hampshire-s-tax-free-liquor-business
New Hampshire State Police even arrested Massachusetts tax agents conducting surveillance at a NH state run liquor but released them when they could not identify what laws were broken:
https://www.washingtonpost.com/archive/business/1978/08/25/the-great-liquor-war/a3147daa-b038-4d38-877c-bef38837bd65/
Yup. Back in the ’70s when all liquor sales in VA had to be from state-government-owned “ABC” stores, the VA SP used to have one team staking out 14th Street Liquors in DC for cars with VA plates, and another team on the 14th St. Bridge pulling them over. DC did arrest them, and found a charge that stuck, to boot.
I’m told Ohio cops look at who is buying whiskey in Kentucky and CA cops are looking at who buys fireworks in Pahrump NV.
Here in Washington State, the, uhm, “people whose ancestors were here before Columbus sailed the ocean blue” have gotten “creative” with the signficance and meaning of their”soveriegn nation” status. The first meaningful outcome of this was when the state first legalised the “unsafe and insane” classes of fireworkd. Normal folks could head to the stands as the Fourth of July approached and buy the stuff I had as a kid in California, but long since banned as “unsafe and insane”. That mainy left sparkers, stinky black snakes, and some benign and boring fountains. Ho hum. Why bother.
Well, we all decided that having the “good stuff” year round would be great fun, but state law only allowed sale of those “items’ during a narrow window of time starting in late June.
Here we Come to Save the Daym the Indians said, and they opened huge sales shacks on “the rez’ selling not only the newly legal in Washington More Fun stuff, but a couple BATFE classes of goods above those classes. There are quite a few small reservations scattered liberally throughout the state, so we’d just stop by on our way through those pieces of “sacred ground” and buy what we wanted.
UNTIL state police and county sheriffs began staking out the parking lots, typically in “closet” cop cars, They’d be running a make on the number plates in the car park, then relaying a description of the cars to marked cruisers just off the rez. Folks would get “contacted” on the lamest of excuses, luggage boots searched, and folks arrested for unlawful transport, goods stolen by the coppers.
There were some work-arounds developed, but what really quenched this game was that the “indigenous peoples” also realised they could, being “sovereign nations” legally set up huge gambling casinos on the sacred rez dirt, and they grew far more interested in taking out money whithin those hallowed walls. The fun pyrotechnical devices faded somewhat. Now there does not seem to be much attention given to off-rez possession of those fun pyrotechincal devices. Ive not heard of any activities focussed upon busting non-natives shopping at the stands, some of which continue to do busieness year round..
Funny how laws can be “stretched” to “allow” or at least enable previously prohibited activities. And how LE, whom are SO faithful to enforce the law as written no matter how trivial the consequences of not doing so might be. Amusing, at least, to observe such antics.
Of I were visiting somewhere I could buy “stuff” not legally or readily available in my residence jurisdiction I’d want to travel to the transaction location in a vehicle with a number plate that is from that jurisdition, and transfer it then to mine elsewhere.
A similar situation exists at the California/Oregon border northbound, where the all but non-existant taxes on hootch makes the stuff cost less than half what it does in Oregon, and a third of normal cost in Washington.
The trick is (and I’ve heard of some sheriffs working to quash this trade inbound to their state) to either make your purcases when southbound, leaving them in car till your return a week or two later when they’ve lost track of you, or purchasing deeper into California.
Smuggling will never be totally eradicated. And can be profitable.