David Gregory Violated DC Gun Laws After Being Denied By DC Police — Magazinegate — Update 4: Verified by DC Police

“From: “DC Police (imailagent)” <customerservice.mpd2@dc.gov>
Subject: Email from DC Police (Intranet Quorum IMA00519327)
Date: December 24, 2012 4:13:12 PM EST
To: –

The Metropolitan Police Department is in receipt of your e-mail regarding David Gregory segment on “Meet the Press.” MPD has received numerous e-mails informing us of the segment. NBC contacted MPD inquiring if they could utilize a high capacity magazine for their segment. NBC was informed that possession of a high capacity magazines is not permissible and their request was denied. This matter is currently being investigated. Thank you for taking the time to bring this matter to our attention.

Customer Service – Metropolitan Police Department”

Update 4: Legal Insurrection verifies relayed email with DC police.

Officer Aziz Alali of the MPD Public Information Office further confirmed the authenticity of the e-mail, and gave me this statement by telephone:

“NBC contacted the Metropolitan Police Department inquiring if they could utilize a high acapcity magazine for thie segment. NBC was informed that that possession of a high capacity magazine is not permissible and the request was denied. This matter is currently being investigate and I cannot get into any further specifics on this investigation.”

The email was sent to me by an individual who received it in response to his own inquiries, and I also saw it posted in an ongoing discussion of the David Gregory case.  I’m no longer waiting for the DC police to get back to me via email with a few answers to questions I sent, as they’ve started an investigation, and there’s probably little more to say until it’s completed.  Looks like was their standard response for at least a day  – apparently they were bombarded with emails.

The question mark went away because I got another confirmation of the original DC police message above, and now another copy of the DC message, and it looks like the DC police have changed their story.  And as noted in the above update, Legal Insurrection has verified what was sent to me yet again.

From: “DC Police \(imailagent\)” <customerservice.mpd2@dc.gov>
Date: December 24, 2012 16:13:15 EST
To: XXXXXXX
Subject: Email from DC Police (Intranet Quorum IMA00519327)

The Metropolitan Police Department is in receipt of your e-mail regarding David Gregory segment on “Meet the Press.” MPD has received numerous e-mails informing us of the segment.  NBC contacted MPD inquiring if they could utilize a high capacity magazine for their segment.  NBC was informed that possession of a high capacity magazines is not permissible and their request was denied.  This matter is currently being investigated.   Thank you for taking the time to bring this matter to our attention.

Customer Service – Metropolitan  Police Department

On calling the DC police just to see if the email was their official statement, the officer who I spoke with was only able to inform me that the issue had been pushed well up the chain of command.

Update: Breitbart says the DC police have started an investigation.

Update 2: Another individual contacted me and showed me they got the exact same response from DC police.  It’ll be interesting to see where this goes now.

CNN Politics is now reporting that DC police are investigating whether David Gregory broke the law.

It’s not known whether the magazine Gregory had in his hand was authentic or a prop. D.C. police spokeswoman Gwen Crump told CNN the department is investigating the matter and would have no further comment at this time.

That’ll probably be the excuse they run with later.  But the problem is, the way the statute is written, it also includes:

or similar device that has a capacity of, or that can be readily restored or converted to accept, more than 10 rounds of ammunition

So it doesn’t even matter if it is a prop.  A prop can be readily converted.  There have been asinine comments galore about how he was just holding up an empty magazine body.  Wouldn’t matter under the statute.  A USGI magazine like the one he held up is composed of only four parts – a magazine body (the boxy main piece), a spring, a follower (a piece that is pushed up by the spring and pushes cartridges up to the top), and a floorplate (the bottom piece that holds the spring in on the other end of the magazine body).  There’s not really much to be said.

Let me make this very easy for you guys, since I know somebody from NBC is going to see this:

NBC, you got caught.  NBC, own up to the fact that you’re pushing for gun laws you don’t even follow.  NBC, if you lie, you know the police will be concerned about what else is in your studio – and you know if anything you have walks off and finds its way to the street, you have very deep pockets to sue.  NBC, if you tell the truth, you can probably clear this up.

NBC, do you really want this to become “Magazinegate”?  Or a replay of your 1993 scam that you pulled on Chevy pickup trucks?

The reputation of a thousand years may be determined by the conduct of one hour.

– Japanese Proverb

—

Over at The Hill, they report the same thing, but it looks like either they know less than zero about firearms, or they’re in dire need of an editor (and that’s coming from somebody who sometimes has to update because of missspeled wurds):

While interviewing National Rifle Association (NRA) CEO Wayne LaPierre on Sunday, Gregory held up what appeared to be a 30-round magazine to ask if it should be banned. The cartridge is illegal in Washington, D.C., where “Meet the Press” is filmed.

And Politico has the same:

The Washington Metropolitan Police Department is investigating whether any city laws were violated when NBC’s David Gregory displayed what appeared to be a 30-round gun magazine on NBC’s “Meet the Press” on Sunday, a spokesman confirmed to POLITICO.

“The Metropolitan Police Department is investigating this matter,” said police officer and spokesman Araz Alali in an interview Tuesday.

When pressed on what the police department was investigating, Alali added, “The ‘Meet the Press’, David Gregory incident.”

“There are D.C. code violations, D.C. code restrictions on guns, ammunition. We are investigating this matter. Beyond the scope of that, I can’t comment any further,” he said.

Except they already did comment further.  See above.

Legal Insurrection notes that they’ve confirmed part of the email and will be following up on it.

It may be even worse for Gregory and NBC News.  According to an e-mail received by The Patriots Perspective website, which originally broke the Gregory story, NBC News had inquired whether it was permitted to use the magazine and was told that it was not permitted.  The authenticity of the email has not been verified.

Update 7:20 p.m. — As to the purported email from the MPD stating that NBC’s request to use a high capacity magazine was denied, I have not received any official response from the MPD, but a source who requested anonymity, but who I was able to verify as working for D.C. government, provided the following information: “… the Metropolitan Police Department email reply you received is genuine. DC Government uses “Intranet Quorum” software designed by Lockheed to manage general inquires. The email address and the subject line of the email you received are consistent with that software.” I will be following up with MPD about this tomorrow.

Update 2: Hmmm…  Something I just found Behind the Green Door.

“From: DC Police (imailagent) <customerservice.mpd2@dc.gov>
Subject: Email from DC Police (Intranet Quorum IMA00519327)
Date: December 24, 2012 4:13:12 PM EST
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Delivered-To: <edit>
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Received: from unknown (HELO ODC2IAPPIQ1vm.clusters.dc.gov) ([10.1.154.11]) by smtp4-13.dc.gov with ESMTP; 24 Dec 2012 16:14:10 -0500
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X-Originalarrivaltime: 24 Dec 2012 21:13:12.0671 (UTC) FILETIME=[7B7286F0:01CDE21B]

The Metropolitan Police Department is in receipt of your e-mail regarding David Gregory segment on “Meet the Press.” MPD has received numerous e-mails informing us of the segment. NBC contacted MPD inquiring if they could utilize a high capacity magazine for their segment. NBC was informed that possession of a high capacity magazines is not permissible and their request was denied. This matter is currently being investigated. Thank you for taking the time to bring this matter to our attention.

Customer Service – Metropolitan Police Department”

—

Legal Insurrection points out that it’s actually important to prosecute David Gregory:

…as Gregory stated, that the magazine was for an AR-15, then why shouldn’t Gregory and the staffers to and from whom the magazine was transferred, be prosecuted?  Particularly in light of Gregory’s aggressive demand for more guns laws.

Certainly, if LaPierre had shown up with that magazine, there would be howls of gotcha, and widespread media demands for prosecution. Why should NBC News and its star be above the law?

There’s another lesson here.

Gregory’s possible violation of the law was exposed by the conservative blogosphere, which also pointed out that Gregory sends his kids to a school with armed security at the same time he was mocking the NRA suggestion of armed security in schools.

Update 3: Legal Insurrection points out that they must be playing a game of hot potato with the radioactive mag, as anyone who holds it is violating the law.

Possession or transfer of a high capacity ammunition magazine, or one that could be “readily restored or converted to accept” more than 10 bullets, is a violation of D.C.’s gun law.

So I imagine that if the magazine waved around by David Gregory last Sunday was real, or even a disabled version of a real magazine, it is sitting on a desk someplace at the Meet The Press studio, with no one willing to pick it up.

Because to pick it up would be a potential violation. To transfer it to someone else might be another violation.

NBC, I’ve got an idea… why don’t you go toss it in a Chevy CK pickup?  When it explodes, as those are wont to do when they belong to you, NBC, then your problem will be solved… Aside from the videotaped admission and expert witness across the table from your criminal, you’ll have nothing to worry about.

—

Update 5: From the Washington Post:

After the show, people contacted D.C. police asking whether they would charge Gregory with a crime. A response from the department’s customer service section sent to a group called Patriot Perspective, and confirmed as accurate by a police spokeswoman, said “The Metropolitan Police Department is in receipt of your e-mail regarding David Gregory segment on ‘Meet the Press.’

My handle is ShortTimer.  The blog is called The Patriot Perspective.

It was unclear from the segment how the apparent clip used was obtained or who obtained it. Authorities declined to say who at NBC asked for permission to use a clip, citing an ongoing investigation.

And:

The other question, the attorney said, would be how NBC obtained the magazine, whether it actually had the capacity to hold 30 bullets and whether the host knew that D.C. police had rejected a request from the show to obtain one from the department’s evidence room.

Doesn’t even matter.  Statute says anything that can be converted or restored to becoming a large capacity ammunition feeding device.  That’s the rub.  Write totalitarian laws, get snared in them.

“I presume David Gregory didn’t go out on the street and get a 30-round clip himself,” said Benowitz, a partner in the law firm of Price, Benowitz LLP. He said that if an NBC staffer brought in a clip — from Virginia, for example — that would also be illegal.

I think this is known in stoner circles as the “those aren’t my drugs, I was just holding them for a friend” defense.

—

CBS is running the story now, too.

—

H/T OODA_Loop

Magazinegate term coined at 6:57AM CST, 12/26/2012.  Just to see if it takes off.