I'm fascinated that this isn't grounds for immediate arrest and, after your stint of several months or years in prison, permanent loss of your right to own firearms. What a country we live in.
I'm fascinated that this isn't grounds for immediate arrest and, after your stint of several months or years in prison, permanent loss of your right to own firearms. What a country we live in.
We don't do "permanent loss of your right to own firearms" without someone being committed or the like, or being convicted of any felony (a bit silly given how many things have been felonized now) or a domestic violence misdemeanor.
My home state of Missouri is like California in having both serious urban and rural areas, and per the law (http://www.moga.mo.gov/mostatutes/stathtml/57100000301.HTML) this sounds like a "Class D" felony, modulo case law I haven't checked that might not count the initial accident as "Discharges or shoots a firearm into a dwelling house...." vs. doing it deliberately at closer range.
But if it did, it would be about as serious as you desire, although I note "immediate arrest" for the first incident doesn't sound like it would necessarily be in the cards, given the potential difficulty of proving the crime. I.e. you can't allow the hammer to come down so precipitously for an action the complainant might himself have caused, i.e. make the hole in whatever fashion and then claim a particular neighbor did it at long range without your witnessing it.
Then I, in turn, am fascinated about that other particular fact of your country.
If that was a reasonable fear, then there would be tens of thousands of police shootings every single day. Every single cop would have to shoot somebody a couple of times a week, versus in reality where most will never fire a gun in anger in their entire career, and will probably be off for weeks after a shooting even if it was squeaky clean.
In reality, driving a car to work is many times more dangerous than pretty much anything else you could ever do, yet most of the US does it every day without a second thought. Maybe try applying some rational skepticism to the news?
Getting shot, let alone killed, is a very unlikely outcome (although a lot more likely for your dogs, if you have any), but there are so many bad outcomes calling the police should still be avoided.
You might want to read Arrest-Proof Yourself: An Ex-Cop Reveals How Easy It Is for Anyone to Get Arrested, How Even a Single Arrest Could Ruin Your Life, and What to Do If the Police Get in Your Face; I did after a cop in my fairly small home city played a game of chicken with his car and my body. Best guess, as suggested by the book, is that he was trying to generate arrest and charge statistics; the book's thesis is that with the sharp downturn in crime, what I call the police-judicial complex needs a steady diet of "the clueless" to run through the system, else there would be widespread layoffs.
Pedestrians are uncommon here, and I guess he thought I might be an easy mark, the moment he saw me he jerked his steering wheel towards me and kept the new heading. Having learned to be a pedestrian in the Boston area, the sort of thing I'm pretty sure is not true for most of the other pedestrians in the city, I could tell his car and side mirror would miss me by a foot, less for the mirror, and successfully stared him down (probably makes a difference that while not part of the official South, this bit of SW Missouri is part of the cultural south, and my mom is Cajun).
To me, this sounds completely crazy. If a person was standing by the door or window they could have been injured or killed!
I have found urban cops to be less responsive and more prone to take a police report over the phone (for insurance purposes) then to actually deal with robbery or other "minor" offenses. Had my car broken into in a underground parking lot with cameras and video of the person who did it (portable drills are wonderful things). Didn't show up but we got a case # for insurance.
When I asked if they wanted to examine my damaged car, they cop looked at me as if I'm asking him something stupid, told me to stop by the station and file the report for insurance. When I asked if they are going after the others, he told me "you have insurance, don't you? Then what are you worried about?". So much for going after crime...
This is ridiculous. Just because the crime involves firearms doesn't mean the person being arrested is a cold blooded murderer. Being afraid of arresting someone who has a gun but shows no intention to kill or hurt anyone is like refusing to drive because there are other cars coming in the opposite direction. Oh sure, they might switch into the wrong lane and kill me, but there's nothing to gain from that. It's stupid.
"3004. (a) It is unlawful for any person, other than the owner, person in possession of the premises, or a person having the express permission of the owner or person in possession of the premises, to hunt or to discharge while hunting, any firearm or other deadly weapon within 150 yards of any occupied dwelling house, residence, or other building or any barn or other outbuilding used in connection therewith. The 150-yard area is a "safety zone."
(b) It is unlawful for any person to intentionally discharge any firearm or release any arrow or crossbow bolt over or across any public road or other established way open to the public in an unsafe and reckless manner."