From: tarrall@Colorado.EDU (Captain Neon)
Subject: Re: Drivers here are better than average!
Organization: University of Colorado, Boulder
Date: 14 Dec 92 04:22:35 GMT

fcrary@ucsu.Colorado.EDU (Frank Crary) writes:

>In article <tarrall.724189741@qso> tarrall@Colorado.EDU (Captain Neon) writes:

>>  OK, how's this then:  I absolutely guarantee I can miss you with a
>>decent rifle.  So: what if I set a target across the highway from me and
>>start shooting at it with, say, a nice Lee-Enfield bolt-action .30 caliber,
>>across all the lanes of traffic?  I wouldn't hit anyone.  I can say that 
>>without a shadow of a doubt.

>You are, however, very wrong. You could easily hit someone. As a result

You could easily hit someone with your car, too.  I say, I can do this
shooting just fine, coming rather close to cars without hitting them.

>I think this should be illegal (as it is) by the above mentioned logic.
>If, instead, you put your target against a hillside (e.g. a good backstop)
>and were not firing towards anyone, this really would be safe and is
>(again, as I think it should be) legal (at least on private property outside 
>of city limits and on federal BLM lands.)           ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^

You're not driving your car on private property, you're driving it on
public property.  Driving your car while intoxicated is perfactly legal
too - at least on private property...

>That would be fairly easy: The prosecuter would ask you if there were
>any cars between you and your target; if you had ever missed your target
>(if you claimed no, an expert witness or two would make you look like
>a liar. The jury knows everyone would occasionally miss) and if you
                  ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
>could control where your missed shots went (by definition impossible: If
>they were going where you intended, they wouldn't have been misses.)
>From this, it would be clear (beyond any reasonable doubt) that there
>were people who could have been hit by your missed shots. That is, you
>were endangering them. 

  I claim I can keep all my shots from hitting the passing cars, and I'm
willing to place my target on a hillside so all bullets will be stopped
after they've crossed the highway.  I want to do this on public land: the
right-of-way property associated with the highway.  I can, without any doubt,
keep all my shots within a 10-foot diameter circle at a range of 50 feet
with the above-mentioned rifle.  So, as long as I never shoot when a car
is within 5 feet side-to-side of the intended path of the bullet, I've
never endangered anyone.  I can easily prove beyond a reasonable doubt my
ability to keep all the shots within that circle (court better buy the
ammo, though, or perhaps the prosecution... Would 10,000 rounds be
sufficient?)

  What I want to do here is illegal.

  Driving a car with a BAC > 0.05% is illegal too.  If I protested
a drunk driving charge, saying that I wasn't endangering anyone, the
prosecutor might ask me if there was anyone else on the road.  [Were
there any cars between you and your target?]  He might ask me if I've
ever been in an accident [Do you ever miss your target?]  As it happens,
I haven't ever been in an accident.  However, I certainly can't claim
that I never *will* be in an accident; if I did an expert witness would
make me look pretty darn uninformed.

						-Robert.-
Newsgroups: boulder.general,co.general