[Laminar]

Really?

Lil Wayne To Be Sentenced, Begin Jail Term Today // Current

Ultimately, what Lil Wayne pleaded guilty to amounts to him being able to have access to a gun. Police did not find a weapon on the rapper when his tour bus was searched. Rather, the gun — registered to his manager — was in a bag located near the rapper, hence the attempted charge.

Who did he piss off bad enough that they'd search his tour bus and convict him on such a bullshit charge?

[SpaceMonkey]

"He'll be housed with inmates who are classified in his category, and he'll be able to be a regular inmate," the guard said. "He'll be able to watch television, go into the day room and congregate with people of his classification."

Racist!

[The Final Dakar]

Yeah, I read this somewhere and figured there must be more to it.

[olePigeon]

There's probably more to it. I read a headline about a guy who got 7 years in prison for stealing cheese. What they didn't tell you was he also stole someone's wallet, already had 2 prior felony convictions (including assault with a deadly weapon), and 13 prior misdemeanor convictions. 2 of the 13 misdemeanors were felony convictions that were reduced on plea bargain because they were non-violent 3rd felony (felony grand theft.) He was supposed to be in prison on a life sentence two felonies ago.

The judge in the case, again, reduced the felony charge and assigned a maximum prison sentence for theft. These were facts left out in the news paper article, I guess to get people pissed off over someone "simply stealing a bag of cheese" getting 7 years in prison.

[mduell]

How many firearm related priors does he have?

[Captain Obvious]

Originally Posted by mduell 

How many firearm related priors does he have?

at least one plus g-d knows how many drug related arrests.

I don't see why there's any surprise to this story

[ghporter]

Any convicted felon, once released, is prohibited from having access to a firearm of any type at any time. Having a gun "kind of close to" him is prohibited, whether he did it or someone did it for him.

[turtle777]

Originally Posted by ghporter 

Any convicted felon, once released, is prohibited from having access to a firearm of any type at any time. Having a gun "kind of close to" him is prohibited, whether he did it or someone did it for him.

Uhm, wouldn't the court have to prove some intent or knowledge of it ?

-t

[ghporter]

Originally Posted by turtle777 

Uhm, wouldn't the court have to prove some intent or knowledge of it ?

-t

The prosecution would only have to show that a reasonable person would reasonably expect that the defendant knew that the gun was there. Nobody can prove anyone ever "knew" anything, but you can show how all indications can point to something. Such as "my friend has guns," "my friend carries a gun in his briefcase" and "my friend's briefcase is next to me" adding up to "there is a gun in that briefcase that is right next to me."

Felons are required to avoid this sort of situation-actively and quickly. If they don't take steps to ensure that the people around them are not in a position to "make a firearm available" to them, then they have failed to prevent a violation. Yeah, it's a goofy situation, and it doesn't matter if the felony conviction was for burning down an orphanage or for neglecting to pay so many parking tickets that you get put in jail for it. A felony is a felony, and the felon almost always loses lots and lots of rights. Forever.

[ThinkInsane]

It's a pretty poorly researched article you linked. It mentions New York State having some of the most stringent gun control laws in the country and that only those in law enforcement and affiliated with law enforcement can have firearms, and that's ridiculous. A pistol permit is fairly easy to get here, it's just a matter of applying and going thorugh the process. They are referring to the Sullivan Act which is specific to NYC, not the state. If I remember, the gun was found in his "bedroom" on the bus, so even though he wasn't the registered owner of the weapon, a weapon that he wasn't licensed to posses was in his personal area. Again, if I remember correctly, no one on the bus had a permit to have a handgun within the City of New York. Another rapper got arrested for weapons possession after the same show, but in that case everyone in the vehicle was charged because the pistol was in a common area. Lil Wayne had his gat in an area that was private to him alone.