Car with mounted "gun" panics Detroit suburb

boing
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Matthew says: “A Detroit man was arrested for driving an armor-plated military vehicle equipped with a World War II .50-caliber machine gun that had been converted to fire compressed gas.” READ THE REST

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There used to be a Mad Max car here in Palm Springs. It was covered in netting and gewgaws, and the whole thing was spray-painted charcoal. There could have been working artillery on it and nobody would have noticed.

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doesn’t Kyle Myers drive around rural Georgia with the real thing?

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I was on the freeway to San Diego a few years back, and there was a tank driving alongside me. With a soldier sticking his head out of the hatch. And it was going at freeway speed. That was surprising.

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Police confiscate the only non-functional gun in Detroit: populace reassured…

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To kinda be fair ,though… the article says he’d converted it to fire using gas, and made it produce bright muzzle flashes and a sound like a gun of that size being shot… and he was driving around the suburb firing it off at cars and the air and what not. I can imagine , seeing that from a distance, you might think something was amiss.

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I used to drive pretty regularly past a place that manufactured Light Armoured Vehicles. Part of their shakedown process seemed to involve driving them on the road, so every once in a while I’d see a large armoured vehicle with a turret in my rearview mirror. Even though they’re not really tanks, there’s still that “Ahhh! A tank!” thought that goes through your mind.

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Anybody else think he’ll never get it back?

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I suspect that the Civil Forfeiture Fun Time machine is already in motion and the local SWAT team is getting quotes on having it painted black and fitted with a functional turret gun…

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The local swat team in detroit might soon be owned by a private company. :smiley: Yay corporate city takeover law in Michigan.

Cause OminConsumer Products.

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It was all part of a brilliant criminal plan to spend years and tens of thousands of dollars painstakingly restoring a WWII scout car so he could someday take over the suburbs with his compressed air gun.

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If he had just put the little red tip on the barrel.

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Well, there’s there’s the gun that is a tool, then there’s the gun that’s a religious symbol.

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Ha! Had the same experience in Sydney, but on a regular road… the thing was going 60-70 kph though!

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I read the headline as “CAT with mounted “gun” panics Detroit suburb” and started thinking this is it, they make their move.

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I don’t see how they could legally confiscate it.

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Well, let’s see… Eminent domain fits, but they’d have to pay for it and prove it’s for the public good. There’s also confiscation laws in Michigan surrounding driving illegal vehicles or driving while intoxicated. There’s some menacing laws as well. HOA’s have all but run some neighborhoods up there, there could be a nuisance forfeiture. It didn’t mention whether this vehicle was stolen or why it was seized, so there’s always the “other missing aspects” to the story…

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In the 9/11 calls, sounds similar to gunfire can be heard in the background. Considering the frequency of gun attacks in the US these days, I don’t consider his arrest an over-reaction to this stunt.

I like art cars; I like explosions; I like Tesla coils; I’ve been thrilled and terrified at SRL events; when I used to see a lot of military convoys on highways, I enjoyed checking out the vehicles. But I’ve also lived in neighborhoods where gunfire made up a part of the regular night-time soundtrack.

If the guy wants to show off his dope art car, why not schedule a show with some other folks and demonstrate his ill ride in front of people who know what’s going on? Instead of terrifying people. A little respect, a little common sense… is it so much to ask? Life is stressful enough these days.

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Oh, there are so many wonderful angles on this!

  • Was he supposed to remind everyone that they need to arm themselves?
  • Did he break any copyright or trademark by messing with the gun?
  • Isn’t it hilarious that driving around in an APC firing a mock machine gun gets you in less trouble than an LED enhanced T-Shirt?
  • Maybe this was supposed to be a demo of the next upgrade to get after the ballistic kiddy backpack?

So many opportunities!

I think he’ll be ok though - unless he announced his idiocy on twitter first.

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A bit more here:
http://www.freep.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=2013307090097