Tragic School Shooting in Texas and the 2nd Amendment

This week on the Outlaw Lawyer, Josh and Joe will discuss the top legal news, including the school shooting in Texas. They'll talk about the Second Amendment. As always, Josh and Joe tackle the big legal questions we are facing. Why do lawyers use so much Latin? That's a great question. Why would a homeowner's association have a problem with doggy snack stations?

And what if citizens stop listening to the federal government? There's a lot on the program today. It's all coming up next on the Outlaw Lawyer. And now Outlaw Lawyer. Welcome into the Outlaw Lawyer. Josh Whitaker and Joe Hamer, Whitaker and Hamer Law Firm, the power behind the program. They have offices in Raleigh, Garner, Clayton, Goldsboro, Fuquay, Verina and Gastonia.

They're the managing partners of the firm and they are practicing attorneys here in North Carolina. I'm Morgan Patrick, consumer advocate. We're going to get into the legal topics and there's a hot story right now. Everybody's talking about it. Again, the school shooting in Texas. We'll talk about the Second Amendment.

That is coming up on the program. If you've got a legal situation that you are facing and you've got questions, I have a number for you. 800-659-1186. That's 800-659-1186. You can also email your questions to the Outlaw Lawyer. Questions at theoutlawlawyer.com. Again, when you call the number, 800-659-1186. Just leave your contact information briefly what the call is about and an attorney will call you. We'll be in touch.

And as always, check out the website, theoutlawlawyer.com. Gentlemen, we've got just a sad, sad story to start off with. On Wednesday morning and of course Tuesday, we had the shooting there in Texas, the school shooting.

So that was just yesterday afternoon. So we've been reading about that just like everybody else's and then watching everybody comment on that. But obviously, no matter what side of the political spectrum you sit on or what you feel about the Second Amendment, obviously a tragedy and not something you want to see. That's right, Josh. It's super somber, man.

We usually come in and try to keep it pretty light when we start off and, you know, talk about talk about a lot of kind of irrelevant things and get the show started. But it's tough to do that, man, in light of something like this. And it's like you said, it's just there's few things that that really hit you as hard as something like this does. And it's just it's it's it's it's just incredibly unfortunate.

Well, just to give the background, you've all day, Texas Elementary School there. Right now, the death toll is 19 children, two adults, the gunman, 18 year old Salvador Ramos, and he was a high school student nearby. And apparently there was an incident with his grandmother shot his grandmother. His grandmother is in critical condition. That's that's the latest.

But it it kind of hit the sports world. Head coach for the Golden State Warriors. They are in Texas. Steve Kerr is the head coach for the Warriors.

They are in Texas. His father back in 1984 was killed by Islamic extremists when Kerr was 18. He has been outspoken before. They had media availability yesterday afternoon before their game. Again, this is Coach Kerr. I'm not going to talk about basketball. Nothing's happened with our team in the last six hours. We're going to start the same way tonight.

Any basketball questions don't matter. Since we left shoot around 14 children were killed 400 miles from here. And a teacher. And in the last 10 days, we've had elderly black people killed in a supermarket in Buffalo. We've had Asian churchgoers killed in Southern California.

And now we have children murdered at school. When are we going to do something? I'm tired. I'm so tired of getting up here and offering condolences to to the devastated families that are out there. I'm so tired of the excuse. I'm sorry. I'm tired of the moments of silence.

Enough. There's 50 senators right now who refuse to vote on HR 8, which is a background check rule that the House passed a couple years ago. It's been sitting there for two years. And there's a reason they won't vote on it to hold on to power. So I ask you, Mitch McConnell, I ask all of you senators who refuse to do anything about the violence in school shootings and supermarket shootings, I ask you, are you going to put your own desire for power ahead of the lives of our children and our elderly and our churchgoers?

Because that's what it looks like. It's what we do every week. So I'm fed up.

I've had enough. We're going to play the game tonight. But I want every person here, every person listening to this to think about your own child or grandchild or mother or father or sister, brother.

How would you feel if this happened to you today? We can't get numb to this. We can't sit here and just read about it and go, well, it's a moment of silence. Yeah, go dubs. You know, come on, Mavs. Let's go. That's what we're going to do.

We're going to go play a basketball game. And 50 senators in Washington are going to hold us hostage. Do you realize that 90 percent of Americans, regardless of political party, want background check, universal background, 90 percent of us. We are being held hostage by 50 senators in Washington who refuse to even put it to a vote, despite what we the American people want.

They won't vote on it because they want to hold on to their own power. It's pathetic. I've had enough.

All right. That's Steve Kerr, head coach. Golden State Warriors yesterday before their game against the Dallas Mavs. Again, they were in the state of Texas. And at the time of that press conference, there were 14 fatalities at the elementary school.

There are now 19 and there are two adults. Again, the shooter's grandmother is in critical condition. He shot her before he went to went to the school. So and there's a background for Coach Kerr.

Obviously, his father was basically assassinated by Islamic extremists in 1984 when he was 18 years old. He's obviously very emotional about it. But that that clip right there has been played everywhere. And yeah, it's everybody's talking about it, guys. So I know you want to chime in. Yeah, I think I think today, you know, we have a little we have a little script.

We have some materials that we always put together before we sit down and talk. And we're going to push some of that aside. I think we're going to just kind of review the Second Amendment and just in general talk about the legislation.

You know, a lot of the news outlets are talking about stalled legislation in the in the Senate for for some kind of for background checks and things like that. And and always a slippery slope. And it's horrible. It's horrible situation.

You know, I think Steve Carr has made similar. He's one of those sports sports guys who like to leave the realm of sports and talk about what's going on in the news. And obviously, he's got a lot of personal reasons to be emotional about it. But, you know, anytime something like this happens, you know, I think the folks who were able to look at it, you know, what this has happened. You know, you know, what do we need to do? We have a we have a we have a habit in this country of getting really outraged about something. And then, you know, five days later, we'll be outraged about something else.

And and the cycle just keeps keeps moving. And sometimes we get some stuff done and sometimes we don't. But the Second Amendment is always going to be, you know, kind of an area where you have people on both sides. Yeah, that's true. You do have people on both sides. You've got passionate people on both sides of the issue. But I think I think that if there's if there's one thing that everybody can agree on, you know, there's so much disparity between what people believe. And there's, you know, like we said, the the passionate nature of people on both sides that can't be discounted or denied. But I think we can all agree, no matter what side of this issue that you fall on, that, you know, these these repeated mass shootings and these tragedies that continually keep occurring are just incredibly unfortunate things that something needs to be done to prevent from occurring and what that measure needs to be, how exactly we go about doing that.

I think that that's where the disagreement comes into play. But I think anybody, any reasonable person is going to going to have the opinion that there needs to be something done because the frequency with which this occurs, these things taking place. It's like you said, like we have the tendency to get real fired up about something and then kind of move on to the next thing. And unfortunately, a lot of folks, I think, kind of we see this happen so much. And it's and it's almost unfathomable to even think about how hard this would affect you if it was you that was actually personally impacted by the situation, if it was one of your kids, if it was one of your family members. But you almost get desensitized, I think a lot of folks, just because we've seen it so much.

And that's it. It's incredible to think about that, because how could could you get desensitized to something like this? But we see it happen so much.

But but then you listen to someone like Steve Kerr going and how much passion he's got. That's really that's really how we all should feel as far as the passion we have for doing something to prevent this from occurring. And it's just crazy, man, because it doesn't seem like there's ever any any kind of appreciable change that occurs in the wake of these events. We know it's interesting right now. Again, we're we're we're talking Wednesday morning, so we don't know a whole lot about the shooter.

I think some I think they found his social media accounts. I think he was a high school student who didn't graduate, who, you know, had obviously had some some issues. I don't know about diagnosed or whatever, but, you know, there's a lot of raw emotion here. But I think it's always important to look at, OK, well, what assuming we have a Senate that's not stalemate, right, assuming we have a way to address this, what should what would have stopped this? Right. I always look at a situation, you know, because we have a we have a tendency when something like something terrible like this happens to kind of do this big picture. And you got people on one side who want to repeal the Second Amendment and people on the other side who don't want to do anything. And so I always look at like, hey, this this situation that happened was horrible. What could have what could be done to have prevented this specifically?

And I think that's always a good guide. You know, I think it's Sandy Hook. The shooter had some had some mental, you know, mental issues, issues, but it was a legally acquired gun. And I don't think people looked enough at like what would have prevented this guy from doing this at this time. I think that's what people have to do is is instead of looking at the big picture, which is always not helpful, a lot of people get stalled out, is look at smaller things that would have prevented this kind of thing.

But I know we're up against a break after the break. I thought it'd be good to look back at the Second Amendment, just generally talk about gun laws here in the in the U.S. of A. The outlaw liars, Josh Whitaker and Joe Hamer. It's a heavy topic to start off the show again, the shooting in Texas. You've all day, Texas, 19 children now confirmed dead, two adults also deceased.

This gunman is 18 year old Salvador Ramos from that area, high school student, obviously disgruntled. And we're finding out more information as the show is being taped in the midweek. And by the weekend, we'll have more for you there as well. But the outlaw liars, it's always legalese. We talk about the different issues and this is a big one. It's a heavy one.

Stay with us. We're going to talk about the Second Amendment. If you've got a situation that you are dealing with and you need some legal advice, I've got a phone number for you. Eight hundred six five nine eleven eighty six.

That's eight hundred six five nine one one eight six. Just leave your contact information briefly what the call's about. And an attorney with Whitaker and Hamer will be in touch. And you can always email your questions to the program and we'll answer those on future broadcasts. Questions at the outlaw lawyer dot com and the Web site. Check it out. The outlaw lawyer dot com. We're back right after this.

Welcome back into the outlaw liars. Josh Whitaker and Joe Hamer, your hosts. They are the managing partners at Whitaker and Hamer law firm.

The power behind the program. They are practicing attorneys here in North Carolina office is located in Raleigh, Garner, Clayton, Goldsboro, Fuquay, Verina and Gastonia. And if you've got a legal situation you're facing and you've got questions, I have a phone number for you. Eight hundred six five nine eleven eighty six.

That's eight hundred six five nine one one eight six. Leave your contact information briefly what the call's about. An attorney will be in touch and you can email your questions to the show. Questions at the outlaw lawyer dot com. We'll answer those on future broadcasts. Second Amendment.

Gentlemen, Morgan. So, you know, anytime you're talking about gun laws to get to the present of where we're at now, you got to always start in the beginning. And of course, we had a show a couple of weeks ago where we talked about abortion as a as an implied constitutional right. And we talked about how in the Constitution, you know, we have enumerated rights and abortions, not one of them. The court, the Supreme Court over years read in a bunch of privacy rights, like implied rights, like we we think the Constitution should protect this.

And we think that would would have been their intent. And we talked about how the Constitution is, you know, some people interpret it as a breathing living document that changes as the times change. And that's kind of, you know, when we talk about the Supreme Court leak and abortion maybe being overruled as a as a constitutional right. The big thing to think about, because I've seen some people juxtapose what's going on in the abortion debate with what's going on in the in gun laws.

I've seen that a couple of times already. But abortion is not an enumerated right in the Constitution. It was an implied right the court found. Now, when you talk about gun rights, you're going back to the Second Amendment. And the Second Amendment is is pretty short and sweet.

And I'll I'll read it because it won't take very long. The Second Amendment of the U.S. Constitution reads a well-regulated militia being necessary to the security of a free state. The right of the people to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed.

And that's it. That's that's the Second Amendment. So all our all our gun debates, gun law debates all go back to that Second Amendment. And I've never thought the Second Amendment was very confusing. I think it's pretty clear that the founding fathers, the drafters of the Constitution, it's very clear how they felt about everyone's right to own a firearm. And, Joe, I know we've talked about this before time or two, but always been pretty clear to me that that's that's kind of where we're starting from.

Yeah, it's it's it's strange, man. You think about these you think about these amendments to the Constitution and especially the Second Amendment that that we're talking about here. And like you said, you've got you've got one sentence, not even a super lengthy sentence at that. And from that, that one short statement, you get all of this debate, you get all of this conflict, you get all these varying opinions.

And it's just it's just kind of nuts to think about that and everything. You know how all of this kind of flows from this just when you boil it down, like you said, it's a it's a very it's a straightforward and it's a very simple statement that that, like you said, the intent and what the founders when drafting the statement had in mind. I think I agree with you, Josh. It seems abundantly clear. But but as we move through history, as society changes, as you have the evolution of our society, you know, you see changes to the way that this is and you see clarifications, you see cases that come out and interpret it differently.

And you just it it just it kind of blows your mind thinking about how much, you know, interpretation there has been and how much debate there has been over something that is, you know, such a short statement that, like you said, is just a very it has a very clear intent. And Joe, I would, you know, would add again, I think I think the amendment reads pretty clear. But the right of the people to keep and bear arms and arms.

You know, what does that mean? You know, rights can be regulated. Right. We have the First Amendment, the right to free speech. And that's limited. You know, that's regulated. You can't you know, there's dangerous speech. You can't, you know, shout theater. You know, there's things you can't do.

And so that always ends up being the argument. Well, this is an unlimited arms. Right. You can't own a nuclear weapon. Right. You shouldn't be building bombs in your your house.

That's a danger to everyone around you. And so there's, you know, the court, all the the court regulates this right when cases come before the Supreme Court and different states regulate firearms different ways. And we've talked about the New York case. We've got people who are alleging in New York possible to get a concealed concealed carry permit to carry a firearm concealed. And that's what for the Supreme Court this session that's already been argued, I think.

And we're just waiting on an opinion. But, you know, concealed weapons, every state treats that different. I mean, there's ways to regulate it.

I think the stalled Senate bill that Steve was talking about on that clip is about, you know, longer wait times. You know, universal background checks and things that seem reasonable. Right. It's always a slippery slope when you're talking about limiting regulating a right. And so people are always concerned.

This is, you know, once you start going down that hill, you'll keep on going. And obviously, you know, the intent of the Second Amendment is, you know, that law abiding people who who are able should be able to own firearms unless there's a reason they can't. Right. And so, you know, everybody's going to point to the stalled Senate legislation and say, you know, I think in that clip, Steve was blaming him. He said the 50 senators, but I'm assuming he's talking about the way I took it. He's talking about the 50 Republican senators who, you know, wouldn't support the legislation. But that legislation, would that have stopped? Maybe it'll stop something in the future. Right.

But I don't know. You know, I was looking at this situation, this shooter. You know, he was 18.

I had read and I haven't had a chance to follow up, so I don't know if this is even true, but I had read that Texas had recently reduced the age where you could buy certain weapons. I don't know if that's true. I probably should have given it a Google age limits on certain things. That's that's something people could look at.

That's not too intrusive to the right. You know, maybe maybe an 18 year old shouldn't be able to legally buy multiple AR-15s. You know, maybe that's something that we we should look at. But there's a lots of there's lots of ways you can regulate a right. You know, for a long time, you couldn't buy automatic or semi-automatic weapons in certain states under certain laws. And so there's always been regulation.

I know our Congress right now isn't known for forgetting things done, but it seems like maybe some limited regulation is is maybe is maybe in order. But I guess that's up for debate. It depends on what side you fall on.

Yeah, and that's the thing, man. You know, there's I think one of the issues we see is you got a lot of folks who just have distrust of our government, you know, regardless of which side of the coin. You know, whether it's the a Republican or a Democrat, that's that's going to be in office. You're going to have folks on the other side that are going to distrust that person.

You know, sometimes solely based on just the the name, you know, the fact that they are a Republican or a Democrat. And through that distrust, you see folks who are going to be wildly resistant to any kind of regulation, especially if something like this that people hold to be so important. You know, there's people who this is the most important thing in the world to them, you know. And it's like you said, Josh, you know, we you got to kind of look at it from the perspective of what would have actually prevented this.

Would you know, would this bill that Steve Kerr is talking about have have been able to prevent this? But I think it's more of I think, you know, regulation is one piece of that. And like you said, any there any right can be regulated in a reasonable manner. And, you know, we as a society have a vested interest in a lot of these rights being regulated to an extent.

And now you never want to see overreach of that or abuse. But, you know, we shouldn't we should question regulation, but we shouldn't be, you know, completely, you know, diametrically opposed to any kind of regulation whatsoever, because there's regulations that are definitely in the interest of the greater good and the public welfare. But I think it's more than just regulation. You know, I think this is a multifaceted issue. And, you know, background checks may not have prevented a lot of these things from occurring. You know, there's other pieces of the puzzle and I don't have the answers. Don't get me wrong. I do not have I do not have the solution, but I think it's a multifaceted solution that that goes beyond just simple legislation to to kind of start really curbing.

Well, you know, Joe, I always get put off I get really put off with like people who are like far, far, far right. You know, we don't need we don't need to do anything. We need to do less, you know, and then the people on the far, far left who are like repeal the Second Amendment because neither one of those is really the way to go. I don't think in America anytime soon, not appealing the Second Amendment. And I wouldn't advocate for that either.

I don't think that I don't think that's the way I don't think that's the way to go. But I think when people can take a tragedy like this and then reasonable people can sit down, I mean, there's reasonable small scale things that can be done to start to take steps to kind of prevent this. But, you know, I always go back to, you know, I can't remember who I was hearing say this, but, you know, what he did is is illegal, right? I mean, it's a murder is illegal, you know, and, you know, you try to deter crime, you make it illegal. But it's always weird for me to think about what else do you have to do to prevent crime? Right.

It's already illegal, right? You know, you have to take the step to prevent, you know, things happening. But but anyway, I know I know we're up against the break and we won't spend the whole show talking about the Second Amendment. I figured like we need to spend at least some time. So we're probably going to move on to some new topics after the break. Maybe that aren't quite as quite as heavy, but it doesn't mean the tragedy is any less less important.

But we do have some other things to talk about today. Morgan. Yep. The outlaw lawyers, Josh Whitaker and Joe Hamer. You can find them at Whitaker and Hamer Law Firm. They're the managing partners there. They're practicing attorneys here in North Carolina and they host this radio show.

They've got offices in Raleigh, Garner, Clayton, Goldsboro, Fuquay, Verina and Gastonia. If you are facing a legal situation and you've got questions, I've got a phone number for you. It's 800-659-1186. That's 800-659-1186. Leave your contact information briefly what the call is about and an attorney with Whitaker and Hamer will be in touch.

And you can always email your question to the show will answer it on a future program. And that's questions at the outlaw lawyer dot com. Again, questions at the outlaw lawyer dot com. And check out the Web site, the outlaw lawyer dot com.

We're back with more right after this. Welcome back into the outlaw lawyer. Josh Whitaker and Joe Hamer, Whitaker and Hamer law firm. They're your hosts. The power behind the program is the firm. And remember, Josh and Joe are managing partners of that firm and they're practicing attorneys here in North Carolina.

They have offices in Raleigh, Garner, Clayton, Goldsboro, Fuquay, Verina and Gastonia. If you've got a legal situation you're facing and you've got questions, I've got a phone number for you. 800-659-1186. That's 800-659-1186. And just leave your contact information briefly what the call is about and an attorney with Whitaker and Hamer will be in touch.

Also, you can email your questions to the program questions at the outlaw lawyer dot com. All right, gentlemen, we're we're off the heavy and we're into the show. I know you guys want to start off with some sports. I know the Hurricanes are there in it, but the Rangers are back in it. In a game last night was rough. Joe, do you see that game? I saw part of that game in and I was I had my kid that my two boys both had baseball games. So I was at the baseball field, got there at like five thirty, had a game, had a second game that lasted, went to like four sets of extra innings. We left at like ten thirty. It was a barn corner of a little league playoff game.

But so I was keeping up with it on my phone and I'm kind of glad that I I'm kind of glad that I didn't get to watch it very closely, because I think as a Canes fan, I would have been incredibly frustrated by the way that that game went. So let me ask you this, Joe. So in a little league baseball situation, what inning do they cut off beer sales? Yeah, so they inning zero.

But if you come prepared with your Yeti cup, it was I tell you last night, you know, I know you know, we got a lot of little league baseball fans on the show, but high stakes, man. High drama for a little league baseball game. You know, I've never my kids are just getting into the age where they keep score. You know, you have several years of your life of your kids lives, rather, where there's just no one really cares.

They don't keep score. You're just out there to have fun. And so, you know, you get to little league and that kind of goes away.

Everyone cares. And man, as a person who's competitive and has that competitive fire in me, it's so much more entertaining to watch than just the game. You know, kids need to have fun.

It's not that serious, et cetera, et cetera. But it's a lot more fun when there are some stakes to it. And there were some stakes to it. I'm happy to report my kids team pulled out the victory.

And I think it was like the fourth set of extra innings. And it was a good time, man. It's a real good time. Little chest thumping going on on the program. I like it.

You know what is cooler than the Canes game, at least. Yeah, Joe, what age group is that? That is I'm going to say my kids nine. I think it's from I think it's like nine to eleven.

I think that's roughly what it is. Yeah, my boys came up through baseball, but in the end, basketball and football won out. They kept getting they got to the age where you get being all the time. You know, where kids are just learning to to pitch and they they didn't they didn't make it through it, man.

They didn't persevere. Yeah, my own kid gets me. He's I think he like his first like six at bats.

He got hit with the ball. And so, yeah, that is a that is a factor. That's a factor you have to consider. And those games can be slow, man. Like you said, the kids are just learning.

But beats beats the heck out of T-ball. Joshua, I'll tell you that much. Now, that hurricanes game, we were at the house and we turned it on and it wasn't going real well. And then we ended up moving over to Holy Moly.

You know, I'm a big Holy Moly fan. And so I came on at eight. So I didn't even it's the first playoff game. I don't think I've watched to been there or, you know, if I was at home, watched it to completion. So but yeah, it definitely didn't go good. And I didn't see what happened at the end. I saw some penalties handed out there at the had a lot of.

So there were several fights at the end. But so there they'll be moving back again. We're in the studio on Wednesday, so they'll have a game.

I guess Thursday, they'll be back for you. We'll have gone better. They always play good at home, though.

They find it at home. Yeah, very different team on the road. I was going to say they played extremely well at home undefeated to this point. And, you know, they can't win a game on the road. And so the fisticuffs and the rough stuff at the end of that Rangers contest is, you know, a message that the canes are saying they're not going.

They're not going away. And it's the same thing for the Rangers. They say, well, we're coming to your house now. So by the time this program airs on Saturday, they will be building up for a game in New York because certainly they'll play the game on Thursday here in Raleigh. And then they'll head up to the Rangers Madison Square Garden for a Saturday contest. And depending on how it goes this week, I mean, I mean, to me, the canes are on the ropes, guys. I mean, they they need to figure out a way to win on the road. They do have home ice. So if they keep holding that, you know, they'll win this series.

But, man, you know, who's waiting? Whoever gets out of this series gets Tampa. Yeah, and Tampa looks scary.

Good. Well, hopefully, hopefully they'll make it there. The Rangers are tough. And if you've been watching these ESPN games, you know, the ESPN guys, they love the Rangers. They want the they want the New York team to win. It's so maybe they'll maybe we can upset the Rangers and up and get to the finals.

And I think it's interesting and this will be the last thing I comment on. But, you know, the Hartford Whalers before they came down to be the Carolina Hurricanes, that was the home team for ESPN. And so when they left, a lot of people at ESPN at that time, not happy about it. And I remember, you know, 2000, 2001, when they made that cup run, ended up losing to Detroit and ESPN came down to cover it.

They were pretty you know, they they weren't happy about it. They were very much talking about the hurricane whale, the Carolina whale. They kept doing that franchise was upset about it. The league had to step in and talk to ESPN about it.

And then 06, 07, they make the run and win it. And boy, I tell you, it was like pulling teeth for some of the ESPNers to talk positively about the hurricanes because they're the former whale. And so that seems like it's lingering to me.

How long have we been here? There's there's remnants, you know, in the in the commentary, you know, and you always I mean, I think we as fans, we're always guilty of assuming like commentary is biased against your team. But but but I think so. There's some lingering. I don't know if that's just I don't know if that's ESPN based or if it's if it's the folks calling the game for ESPN have like Ranger.

I don't know what it is exactly, but I don't really like it, man. Well, teams move and we all need to move on from that. And, you know, let's let's hope that the hurricanes can right the ship or have righted the ship on Thursday. And they're they're headed into a Saturday matchup where they can close out the Rangers.

We'll have to wait and see. Well, guys, I had originally planned to talk about or spend some time discussing. I try to read a lot of different especially for the show. I try to read a lot of different news outlets. I read more traditional newspapers, even if I don't have the newspaper in my hand. That's the that's the things I gravitate towards. But I was reading an opinion piece, an editorial out of Missouri.

I don't know how I found it or got to it, but it had some it had some interesting it had some interesting pieces in there. But basically, the the editorial, the the opinion they put out there is, you know, what if it was in light of the, you know, the abortion leak? I think that's what kind of kind of drove the the the the writer, the author to this conclusion. But it could just as easily have to have a gun rights overtones. And they do talk about gun rights in here.

But it was like, what if what if the states what if the citizens just stop listening to the federal government? And so they laid out a couple of things like one, many states are legalizing marijuana. The feds haven't decriminalized it. Right. It's still a federal criminal charge.

Certain is that you shouldn't in the states where they've legalized marijuana sales. You know, that's all that's a whole industry. Right. You know, it sprung up all over the place.

And and I don't know if you ever read, Joe, I've read that lately. But, you know, in Colorado and some of the first states that legalized not even medicinal marijuana, just, you know, marijuana sales to the general public. These marijuana retailers. Right. They they couldn't use banks. Right. Banks were afraid to do business with them since it was, you know, federal profits from a legal activity, at least in the eyes of the federal government.

And so I think a lot of these folks had like warehouses full of cash with private security and things like that. But definitely has one example where states have just said, we don't care what the federal government says in our borders. This will be legal and we're not in not enforcing it. And the feds have allowed that. Right.

The feds don't really enforce this, but yet the law hasn't changed. And that's kind of we're kind of gotten used to it. When that first happened, that was kind of a novel situation. I don't know if you remember that. I don't know how old you were when that happened. Josh, I'm not a young child boy to this day. I do remember.

I do remember that. And, you know, you mentioned, you know, folks dealing in marijuana, even folks even more recently. You know, some of the folks that are dealing in CBD and hemp and things like that have faced some of the same issues where there's just some kind of uncertainty there. And like you said, the by and large, the federal government not enforcing a lot of those prohibitions, but they're still inherent at any point. They could, you know, and and like you said, you know, I know folks who are kind of in the industry that were just like you said, they didn't want to use banks.

They couldn't use traditional methods of payment just because they were worried about some kind of seizure of those assets of the money they were making. And it was a I think it was a real problem for folks. And I think to a lesser degree may still be somewhat of a problem for folks.

But it's it's an interesting thing to think about, you know, what if if you just have states that basically just say, screw this, I'm not going to we don't care anymore. You know, how does that how does that play out? All right, Morgan, what I know we're again coming up against the break. I want to continue this discussion when we when we get back because it goes into a couple of other things and it's kind of relating to some of the bigger news stories of the day. So we'll we'll keep going here after the break.

All right. The outlaw lawyers, Josh Whitaker and Joe Hamer, Whitaker and Hamer law firms, where you can find them. They're the managing partners there and practicing attorneys here in North Carolina offices in Raleigh, Garner, Clayton, Goldsboro, Fuquay, Verina and Gastonia. If you've got a legal situation and you've got questions, I've got a phone number for you. Eight hundred six five nine one one eight six.

That's eight hundred six five nine eleven eighty six. Just leave your contact information briefly what that call is about. An attorney with Whitaker and Hamer will be in touch. You can also email your questions to the program questions at the outlaw lawyer dot com and we'll answer those on a future program and check out the website. The outlaw lawyer dot com.

We're back right after this. Welcome back into the outlaw lawyers, Josh Whitaker and Joe Hamer. Managing partners at Whitaker and Hamer law firm are your hosts. They are practicing attorneys here in North Carolina.

They have offices in Raleigh, Garner, Clayton, Goldsboro, Fuquay, Verina and Gastonia. I'm Morgan Patrick, consumer advocate. And we continue the discussion and we'll get into a little bit more of what we just got out of.

Go ahead, guys. Yeah, you know, this was an interesting editorial out of a Missouri newspaper and I didn't write down the title. I didn't write down the author.

I usually like to give people credit when we talk about what the ideas that they kind of put out there. But this one, the author proposes, you know, what happens when states and citizens just stop listening to the federal government. So we spent some time talking about legalized marijuana sales because that's a good example. Feds are very clear. It's illegal. They're not enforcing it. And states have kind of just run with it as something that they just govern on their own. So here in North Carolina, marijuana sales is not something that we're seeing.

But we've got some neighboring states that are are getting into that. And the feds haven't reacted. The feds haven't enforced their laws that prohibit that kind of thing. And so this is one good example of where we're just not listening to the to the federal government.

We just decided, hey, it's OK. And the federal government will either catch up or they won't. And and this editorial was in light of the abortion issue and the possible reversal of Roe v. Wade. Because, again, like we talked about on our show, Joe, the Supreme Court, they say there's not a constitutional right to abortion. That's different than saying abortion is illegal. That's very important distinction. That that is it's a very, very important distinction.

And like you said, we talked about that. We talked about the perhaps the better avenue to tackle some of these abortion related issues being that that legislative piece, as opposed to, you know, going the route of this is just a constitutional right that folks have. But but again, that makes that makes some folks upset because there are a lot of folks who believe strongly that it is, you know, it is an innate constitutional right that that shouldn't be infringed upon, regardless of whether there's legislation that allows it.

All right. So you'll see some states, you know, New York and California will be a lot of states where it's it's going to be legal. You know, abortion is not going to be a crime. It'll be legal to to seek out and receive an abortion.

And then you have states like Texas and other states that are going to be, you know, no abortions under any any circumstance. And and but but it was just it was fascinating to look at this and especially, you know, Missouri. So this was this person was out of Missouri. And I didn't know this, but they said, Missouri, they don't enforce.

And I'm just relying on their opinion. I don't live in Missouri. I don't know the laws of Missouri, but Missouri does not enforce federal gun laws that don't have a corresponding state law.

And I don't have a good example of that when one wasn't provided. But they, you know, I haven't heard that before. But, yeah, they're just, you know, if they're they're enacting tougher, tougher gun laws, the state's just not not enforcing those. And so, you know, there may come a point, you know, I think a lot of states, you know, the New Yorks and the Californians of the world, they have very strict, very tight gun regulations. And then there's other states where, you know, and again, this the tragedy that we talked about earlier, of course, happened in Texas. And Texas is known to have kind of more lenient gun laws. But again, the big thing being that, you know, I just hadn't thought about it this way, even though marijuana sales have been legal in a lot of states for a long time and the feds aren't doing anything. There could come a time with, you know, depending on how your state predominantly feels about abortion and gun laws, where we just stop, stop listening to the federal government, stop listening to the Supreme Court.

You know what happens, right? Because the Supreme Court doesn't have an army, right? The Supreme Court doesn't enforce its decisions. That's up to the executive branch. And if the executive branch doesn't enforce those things, I don't know, it was just an interesting take. And I hadn't thought about it quite that way before. No, and it'll be that that that presents an interesting situation, like you said.

And, you know, you've seen it. We can't say it's not going to happen because we've seen it. Like you said, we've seen it happen with the way that states are handling marijuana. And if that if that state kind of if that attitude among the states, you know, was expanded, I can't predict what would even happen in that situation.

You'd be looking at a very strange thing, to say the least. It's very important. You know, I always kind of try to think of on a local level. You know, we're just we're just people living our lives in North Carolina. And we've got these big issues going on. And, you know, you've got war and in Europe and you've got this tragedy in Texas.

And for me and Morgan and Joe, there's really only so much you can you can do. Right. We're not going to change federal law. We're not going to change what's going on on the international stage. But, you know, you can there's a lot we can do locally.

Right. So local elections are way more important now than I think they've ever been. You know, who you're voting to represent you. We talked about judge judicial elections and how important they can be even on a local level. And your senators and your you know, just it's just very important, I think, to do what you can on a local level. And I know a lot of people believe that. But I think the more you see these tragedies, the more you see these things happening. And they're kind of brought into your living room like and coaching rec teams and, you know, making sure, you know, you get some time to be in your kids school and and just doing the best you can with the people around you. There's a I don't know what else you really do. But but anyway, the whole editorial just it just hit me in a way where I was like, well, I really haven't thought about that before, because they're kind of they're kind of saying, you know, the state of Missouri. All we can do is do what we think is right.

And anyway, I think that's all we can any of us can really do. The outlaw lawyers, Josh Whitaker and Joe Hamer, you can find them at Whitaker and Hamer law firm. They have offices in Raleigh, Garner, Clayton, Goldsboro, Fiquet, Verina and Gastonia. They are the managing partners of the firm.

They are practicing attorneys here in North Carolina. And folks, if you've got a legal situation you are facing and you have questions, well, I have a phone number for you. You can call it.

You can get some answers. Here it is. Eight hundred six five nine one one eight six.

That's eight hundred six five nine eleven eighty six. And just leave your contact information briefly what that calls it about. And an attorney with Whitaker and Hamer will be in touch.

And you can always email your questions to the show. Questions at the outlaw lawyer dot com. Well, we're back to wrap up the program for this week.

Coming up. Welcome back in for the final segment of the outlaw lawyers this week. Josh Whitaker and Joe Hamer, your host there, the managing partners at Whitaker and Hamer law firm. I'm Morgan Patrick, consumer advocate. And I want to remind you that Josh and Joe are practicing attorneys here in North Carolina. Offices conveniently located.

Raleigh, Garner, Clayton, Goldsboro, Fuquay, Verina and Gastonia. And if you have a legal question of your own, you can always call and get an answer. Eight hundred six five nine eleven eighty six.

That's eight hundred six five nine one one eight six. Leave your contact information briefly what the calls about and an attorney with Whitaker and Hamer will be in touch. And you can email the question to the show.

Questions at the outlaw lawyer dot com. Gentlemen. Well, you know, we we we didn't we didn't hit all of our teaser questions this week, Morgan, because we had so much to talk about. But one thing I did that I always like to end on a on a lighter note. But one of the things I did see, I saw I saw an article I was just talking about how, you know, Latin, how attorneys always use Latin. I remember before I I wanted to be an attorney back in high school days and people like, oh, if you want to be an attorney, you need to take Latin. And that'll be super helpful to you. And I did.

I fell for it. I took Latin for two years in high school. I don't know that it really helped me that much as an attorney, though. Joseph, did you ever get did you ever take Latin as a foreign language? I did not take Latin, but, you know, it may not have helped you be a better attorney, but I think you're a fantastic attorney without having regardless. But yeah, I mean, a lot of Latin terms pop up in the day to day of an attorney's life. So having some familiarity with that, it does not hurt. But again, there's there's but so much Latin that can be inserted into the legal world at the end of the day. Two years of study, man.

I'm proud of you for that. But yeah, I don't know that it's it's it's overly helpful. Well, I don't know that it that it was. But I want to go over a couple of legal terms that we see are that come up a lot anyway. But I think the one I was starting in the one I see the most often, I think the one I see most often is a reference to something being ex parte emotion, an argument, a filing, but something being ex parte. You know what that means, Joe? I'm a quiz you. Do you know what that means?

I do, Josh. And, you know, it's it can it can actually mean a couple of things depending on the way that it's being used. But in general, ex parte really refers to something that is is of the benefit of one party in a legal case. So it's usually a decision that's made in favor of a party without really waiting for an opinion from the other side. It can also refer to improper contact with a party or judge. So like if you have an attorney meeting or someone meeting with a party or a judge without a lawyer from the opposing side being present, that can be referred to as ex parte as well. So it has a few different meanings depending on the context.

Yeah. And then then one we've seen we've talked about this one a lot because I think when we first brought it up, we had we had to think about it because we don't deal with it every day. But remember when we talked about a writ of mandamus mandamus.

That was one of my favorite ones as well. So the word mandamus literally meaning we command. It's basically an order from a higher court to really any public official or government agency or a lower court to complete a specific action. And it can't be used to make a court or that official do something that's against the law, but it can be used to order lower courts into making a decision or ruling when they've basically previously refused to give any kind of a ruling or judgment on it. Yeah, we talked about that in connection with the Leandro case.

There was a judge that that was speculating that they could write a writ of mandamus and order funding for for schools, even though that's a legislative function. So we have talked about that one a time or two. When you hear a lot in everyday practice is de novo. And so de novo is a common one for sure. Yeah. So that just means you're in a situation where a court's going to look at everything all the way back to the beginning.

Right. So they're going to reevaluate the facts. You're basically putting on a new case. A court's going to hear something de novo, meaning from the news.

They're just going to just going to start over. So that's when you hear a lot. And then pro se comes up a lot. And as pro se can be good or bad.

But that's one when we see a time or two, Joe. Yeah, that's one that that you see a lot of the a lot of non attorney folks may be familiar with that term because, you know, pro se basically meaning on one's own behalf. It can also be translated to mean for oneself. And it refers to basically when you have a litigant or a person who has has been charged with something who decides to represent themselves in court without the assistance of an attorney. So, you know, any defendant or party in a legal case, they do have the right to refuse legal counsel and self represent yourself. Although we we as attorneys can't don't necessarily advise that to be the way you go. Yeah, and there's some there's some statutes in North Carolina where you can't be pro se.

Right. So if you're in certain situations, if you're an entity, if you're a corporation, you're an LLC and you're being sued or suing someone, then there's certain times that you can't be pro se. You need to you need to retain counsel. But, you know, small claims court, a lot of times you see a lot of pro se folks, plaintiffs and defendants representing themselves. It's kind of what, you know, to a large extent, small claims is designed for.

So you'll see those evictions and the he said, she said and breach of contracts under a certain amount. So that's usually where the you see most of the pros say language. And then I think I had one more on this list, habeas corpus, which is one that you don't hear very often. But when you use that one, Joe, is that that one didn't come up in your day to day practice very often. I don't think it does not come up in my day to day practice very often. The literal translation is that you have the body.

So I feel like that can describe me. But it usually refers to a writ of habeas corpus, which is something that's used by courts to determine whether or not the detention of a prisoner is valid. So when a court issues a writ of habeas corpus, that prisoner or detainee, in the case of someone who's admitted in like a mental health facility. Will be will be brought before the court and their cases is reviewed. Good stuff, gentlemen.

The outlaw lawyers. We have another one in the books. We've got a Latin lesson right there at the end.

But very interesting because we do hear those terms all the time. If you've got an issue that you are facing legally and you've got questions, call this number. Eight hundred six five nine one one eight six.

That's eight hundred six five nine one one eight six. Leave your contact info and briefly what that calls about. An attorney with Whitaker and Hamer will be in touch. And you can also email your questions to the show. Questions at the Outlawlawyer.com. We're back next week with more of the Outlaw Lawyer. Lawyer is hosted by an attorney licensed to practice law in North Carolina. Some of the guests appearing on the show may be licensed North Carolina attorneys. Discussion of the show is meant to be general in nature and in no way should the discussion be interpreted as legal advice. Legal advice can only be rendered once an attorney licensed in the state in which you live had the opportunity to discuss the facts of your case with you. The attorneys appearing on the show are speaking in generalities about the law in North Carolina and how these laws affect the average North Carolinian. If you have any questions about the content of the show, contact us directly.