If you're calling a skateboard a weapon I'm going to take everything you say with a mountain of salt.
Fists can do just as much damage as a skateboard.
My normal desktop items could break skulls too, I'm pretty sure. And the pens, oof...
If you use an item in a manner that can reliably kill people then you use a deadly weapon even if it wasn't intended to be a deadly weapon. Is a pair of scissors a deadly weapon? Yes. Is a heavy hard blunt object (like a statue) a deadly weapon? Yes.
It's not productive to argue about definitions, even if they don't make sense to me. My intent wasn't a semantics argument.
I'm not saying it's right, I'm just offering my observations of precedent.
> “Dangerous weapon" means any firearm, whether loaded or unloaded; any device designed as a weapon and capable of producing death or great bodily harm; any ligature or other instrumentality used on the throat, neck, nose, or mouth of another person to impede, partially or completely, breathing or circulation of blood; any electric weapon, as defined in s. 941.295 (1c) (a); or any other device or instrumentality which, in the manner it is used or intended to be used, is calculated or likely to produce death or great bodily harm.
I would say a skateboard, wielded as a weapon, is likely to produce death or great bodily harm. Getting hit in the head with a skateboard even once seems likely to cause a concussion or maybe even internal bleeding.
You probably do have a good number of items that could be classified as deadly weapons on your desk, depending on how they were used.
This conversation is getting ridiculous.
A skateboard held in your hand can't use much of the mass of your arm to help, it's mostly impacting with its own weight. Your hand can impact with a lot more weight behind it even though the swing radius won't be as big.
How many people, if you asked "Do you have any weapons in your backyard?", would say "Yes, several rocks."
This isn't about possession but about a confrontation. A person with a rock wont get caught by police and taken to court over owning a weapon. But a person swinging the rock around and charging at people will get charged for attacking people with a deadly weapon. And in this situation the question is "Was it reasonable to fear for your life?", then the second definition is used.
And I'll point out that the original post I responded to was saying that they were armed. To me that implies the object needs to be a weapon in a vacuum.
As a general rule, I think that the legal experts know more about this than you do.
But sometimes things get interpreted in ways that really stretch the meanings of words. I think anyone that has looked at legal history can agree with that.
And sometimes legal definitions are dumb, which isn't even a court thing.
Also even if it's correct inside its realm, if enough objects count as deadly weapons then "he had a deadly weapon" loses most of its impact and gets misleading. I'm reminded that technically a bare receiver is a gun...
If we were evaluating how valuable someone's opinion is on all this stuff, your opinion would be way down the list, compared to legal experts.
And if we compared a random ununiformed opinion, such as from you, and compared it to the opinions of the legal system, it is way more likely that you don't really know how any of this works, as opposed to the actual legal experts.
Aluminum bats don’t weigh much either but I’m not going to go out of my way to have my head in the path of one.
weapon, n: a thing designed or used for inflicting bodily harm or physical damage.
Does a skateboard have other innocent purposes, to which it is generally put to use? Of course — that’s generally why skateboards are brought to riots.
It provides plausible deniability during the times when you’re not using it to hit people in the head with a deadly weapon.
Why is this crazy to you? This is why someone can be charged for assault with a deadly weapon while trying to run someone over with their car.
Do you think that’s crazy just because cars are usually meant to be used for driving?
> This is why someone can be charged for assault with a deadly weapon while trying to run someone over with their car.
A car is at least in a medium category where it's not a generally safe object.
Remember that my original objection was saying someone was "armed". If we used the definition you gave to figure that out, I think almost everyone is armed. Or they transform from unarmed to armed when they smack someone??
If you used it as a weapon, it's a weapon. There aren't generally enhanced criminal charges for non-deadly weapons, however — that's usually just charged as assault.
> With 'serious', does that mean you're suggesting a different definition from the one you quoted?
No, I'm tying this question back to the actual law.
> Remember that my original objection was saying someone was "armed". If we used the definition you gave to figure that out, I think almost everyone is armed.
You're treating the law like it's some sort of extremely idiotic expert system that implodes anytime someone grabs their child's baseball bat with the intent of murdering someone — or actually does so.
Google "mens rea". You're not going to beat a charge with the argument of "It was a little league baseball bat!".
If this still isn't clear, maybe it'd help to see how Colorado defines a "deadly weapon":
> (I) A firearm, whether loaded or unloaded; or (II) A knife, bludgeon, or any other weapon, device, instrument, material, or substance, whether animate or inanimate, that, in the manner it is used or intended to be used, is capable of producing death or serious bodily injury.
If you can figure out how to use your ice cube as a deadly weapon, then congratulations, at the moment you picked up an ice cube with the intent to use it as a deadly weapon, you armed yourself with a deadly weapon.
> Or they transform from unarmed to armed when they smack someone??
They transform from unarmed to armed when they arm themselves with an object they intend to use as a weapon.
You know you could just google this stuff, right? This is very simple, well-established law.
That makes sense if they intended to use it as a weapon.
What if they didn't?
> This is very simple, well-established law.
Mens rea makes sense for certain crimes.
I would not say someone is 'armed' or 'not armed' based on intent.
> Google "mens rea". You're not going to beat a charge with the argument of "It was a little league baseball bat!".
> (II) A knife, bludgeon, or any other weapon, device, instrument, material, or substance, whether animate or inanimate, that, in the manner it is used or intended to be used, is capable of producing death or serious bodily injury.
A baseball bat at least is pretty dangerous when used as intended. So is a car. A skateboard isn't, and an ice cube isn't.
> You're treating the law like it's some sort of extremely idiotic expert system that implodes anytime someone grabs their child's baseball bat with the intent of murdering someone — or actually does so.
The legal system wouldn't implode if it was just 'assault'.
If you claim to not see the similarity between a skateboard and a baseball bat in terms of the potential for serious bodily harm, you're either lying to us to keep this tepid, boring argument on life-support, or just lying to yourself.
> The legal system wouldn't implode if it was just 'assault'.
You don't think assault with a deadly weapon is a more serious crime than simple assault?
So you'd charge and punish a shove identically to hitting someone with a skateboard?
Fascinating. I don't believe you.
It says "intended to be used" right there in the law.
> So you'd charge and punish a shove identically to hitting someone with a skateboard?
Would you charge a shove exactly the same as stomping on someone's face?
Same crime category doesn't mean same punishment. I would charge a big skateboard swing as worse than a shove, and I would also charge a solid punch as worse than a shove.
You're extrapolating from my posts in an extremely uncharitable way.
It also says "in the manner it is used or intended to be used".
> Would you charge a shove exactly the same as stomping on someone's face?
In Colorado, a simple shove would be third-degree assault, while stomping on someone's face would be first-degree assault.
> Same crime category doesn't mean same punishment. I would charge a big skateboard swing as worse than a shove, and I would also charge a solid punch as worse than a shove.
Guess what? Both a fist and a skateboard can be classified as assault with a deadly weapon!
> You're extrapolating from my posts in an extremely uncharitable way.
You don't need a law degree to wrap your head around any of this. Even the most basic googling would suffice, but you're clearly not even doing that. What you are doing is ignorantly pontificating about something you clearly know nothing about, while making not even a modicum effort to learn.
Yeah but I'm worried about the part before any misuse.
> Guess what? Both a fist and a skateboard can be classified as assault with a deadly weapon!
Cool, then saying someone was 'armed' is extremely meaningless.
Which is what I really cared about here. I commented specifically because I didn't like the description of 'armed'.
I don't care about what label is put on a criminal charge. That's why the things you want me to google aren't helpful to me.
‘Armed’ means they were carrying a weapon. That’s not meaningless. How have we come full circle here?
You’re welcome to disagree with the dictionary, the law, and the rest of the world, but there’s absolutely zero point in us debating your unique, novel, pedantic, and most likely disingenuous position further.
Pointing that out is not disingenuous!
And it's not disingenuous for me to earnestly use the definition of weapon I'm being told to use, right? Nobody seems to like my definition of weapon.
I swear I'm arguing in good faith.
A skateboard can certainly be a weapon but I believe this is conjecture.
If you go back to the 1999 Seattle WTO protests, you mostly see people using short, concealable weapons, such as wooden clubs.
At some point, the gear of choice evolved towards the plausibly deniable, including skateboards, umbrellas, etc.
2020 example:
https://mobile.twitter.com/TheGunzShow/status/12668514068222...
https://skatenewswire.com/jesse-vieira-black-rock-security-g...