Dealing With The Totalitarians At Your Door

General Counsel for Florida Carry, Eric Friday, joins Royce on the program in this info-packed episode, as they discuss how to deal with the ATF and/or other Constitutionally-ignorant public servants who may arrive at your door demanding to see your Forced Reset Triggers, solvent traps or other such items.
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Transcript

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Norm Maynor, Singing: 1:18

Turn it on, tune in, crank it up, locked and loaded on the Shooting Straight Show. Turn it on, tune in, let's go! Royce Bartlett is the keeper and bearer of truth we know! Only the facts about the 2nd Amendment (voice over:"Never ever forget that all gun control laws are nothing less than overt acts of aggression against the American people and their rights!") Exercise your rights in a safe way (voice

over: 2:05

"It stupid to think that someone hell bent on violating the law against murder will magically be stopped by a gun control law!") Politicians that infringe on our God given rights. He calls him out he's not here to play! So turn it on, tune in, let's go!! Royce Bartlett's on the Shooting Straight Show! Let's go! Let's go!!

ROYCE BARTLETT: 2:42

Yes, indeed we are locked in we are loaded on the Shooting Straight Radio Podcast. This is the podcast all about firearms, the Second Amendment and all things pertaining there too. And you know me I am Royce, your host and Professor Emeritus of Second Amendment studies, pouring it to you from both barrels with 100% felt recoil and no suppressor baby and all while being heavily, heavily saturated with gunshot residue, toxic masculinity and a faint yet also wildly tantalizing whiff of the cologne of my people, Hoppe's number nine! You know it baby. Shootingstraightradio.com If you don't have a platform to catch this program on you can do it there shootingstraightradio.com You can also email me there at Royce@shootingstraightradio.com and I will get back to you. If you have some suggestions or comments or want to call me a jerk, I don't care, hit me up there Royce@shootingstraightradio.com. Don't forget also to catch the Voice of the Blue podcast at the American police Hall of Fame in Titusville commissioned me to do for them and produce for them. It's got some very riveting stories of some people who have served to hold the thin blue line between anarchy and the people so you definitely want to check that out. Some great people that I have been interviewing on that you don't want to miss that. All right now without further ado, I'm gonna bring my guest on here today. I got a great guest for you. He's been on the program several times before he was on it when I was live on WMMB and IHeartRadio for several years. And I've had him as a guest since I put the program on the podcast too. If you've never met this man, well you're in for a treat. He is quite a character, and he is general counsel for Florida Carry he's very constitutionally active. And he is a good red blooded American man. And that will be Mr. Eric Friday. Eric How you doing brother?

Eric Friday: 4:57

I am great Royce. Always a pleasure.To be on with

ROYCE BARTLETT: 5:00

Well, man, that's a certainly a mutual you, sir. feeling. I enjoy the conversations that we have about our rights and about defending them. And I really appreciate the work that you do, especially for Florida, Kerry, you're definitely an active guy in the fight, and then you're on the legal end of things, a litigious end of things. And I can only imagine what a sewer you have to wade through. When you walk into some of these courtrooms sometime, buddy, give us a little update on how things are going for you.

Eric Friday: 5:35

Well, we are. We're continuing the fight. We've actually got some hearings coming up in Tallahassee next week on some of Florida, one case for Florida carry and one case for citizen as was improperly denied her concealed carry license for years by Adam Putnam, a Republican and then Nikki Fried, a Democrat. But we're going to be talking about some things today that are going to let everybody know that you can't trust it just because it's got an R by it.

ROYCE BARTLETT: 6:05

Amen. Brother. Amen to that I tell you what, I am sick to death of hearing people talk about "well, you need a left wing and right wing want to fly an airplane." And I tell them "this isn't an airplane. It's a constitutional republic." And if we're operating according to the supreme law, why and the blippety-blanken-blippety-blank do we need parties at all? So all they do is is basically team up to screw the American people it seems like lately, and I guess that's what the word bipartisan means so. So yeah, I don't doubt it. We've all been getting a little bit victimized by the Republican Party of Florida. And we're gonna be talking about that a little bit later, I announced that I on Farcebook that I would have you on the program today. And one of the things I was really looking forward to talking with you about, Eric, is when the Alpha Tango Foxtrot shows up at your door demanding that you turn over your forced reset triggers or your solvent traps, or they want to see both the handguns you bought recently, and that they were alerted concerning by a 3310 form. So this is going to be an interesting conversation already. Because I think you and I both know each other sentiment towards the Alpha Tango Foxtrot. That's the ATF, by the way, people I think you already know that. The Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives what are the most constitutionally illegal agencies ever to be formed. But I digress. So let's let's do uh, let's run some scenarios or talk about or and or talk about some things that have already happened along these lines there, take it away?

Eric Friday: 7:52

Well, the first thing everybody has to remember when dealing with ATF is make sure your dogs are well away from your front door, because apparently, the ATF agents are not as constitutionally. And I mean, in the in the sense of the firmness of their demeanor. They're not as, as constitutionally trained as say, postal carriers who interact with dogs every day without incident. But now we've had some problems that we specifically have had some problems in Florida, with these a gentleman showing up and ladies showing up saying, we want to talk to you about a fuel filter you bought, or a solvent trap you bought or a forced reset trigger or a polymer 80 kit or some type of 80% Lower kit, right? The simple answer is I don't "I can't talk to you without my lawyer present. I'm not answering questions. I'm invoking my right to remain silent. Do you have a warrant? And if not, please leave and contact my attorney." Okay. That is the simplest version I can give you of how to deal with that situation at met nothing. Invoke your right not to answer questions, and refuse any entry to your home unless they show you a warrant. Because anything once you give consent, anything that they find, that gives them further basis to search more, they can stop the search at any time. Hold you entertain you while they call a judge to try and get a warrant? Yes. Let me assure you if the ATF had what they needed to enter your house against your will, they would not be there without the warrant.

ROYCE BARTLETT: 9:39

Very true. When you say "show a warrant, there are multiple incidents that I have read myself, where they simply waved an envelope at the person behind the door and said we've got a warrant or even a blank sheet of paper and the person takes them at their word that that is a warrant. When you say "let me see the warrant", that means, I'm guessing, let me read the warrant?

Eric Friday: 10:07

In my mind, it does, that doesn't mean you're going to be allowed to, let's be clear about something, we can be supportive of police officers, and still be honest and clear that the courts have stated unequivocally, the police have a right to lie to you. Now they're not, they're not allowed to lie about having a warrant. That's something they're not allowed to lie about. So if they say I have a warrant, and I'm coming in, get out of my way, you can read it later. The best you can do. And all I can suggest to you is no, no physical resistance, but make very clear that you are not consenting to a search, you are standing back because they have claimed to have a warrant. And it is only based on that warrant that you're letting them in your house. Royce. Most of us have ring cameras these days, a lot of us do, or some other type of dash cam or a doorbell camera. But you need to be recording, you know, when you answer the phone, or when you answer your door, your phone or some other recording device needs to be in your hand. And you need to be recording. Yes, sir. Frankly, if somebody comes to my door and says they're an ATF agent, and wants talk to me, we're probably not talking through the door. I'm probably not even opening the door.

ROYCE BARTLETT: 11:19

Amen to that.

Eric Friday: 11:20

I'm calling one of my lawyer friends and saying, Hey, I've got ATF agents at my door. And I need I need representation. Can you come right now? Yeah, there are there are some. Yeah, we've talked a lot about some of the self defense insurance plans such as, and I'm just naming some names, for example, US Law Shield, ACLD, and USCCA. Some of these companies, some of them, if you check your coverage, they will cover a situation like that. Right. Okay. And that's one good reason to have those type of plans, if that plan covers that particular thing, right? Because I can tell you right now, if one of those companies that I'm a referral attorney for calls me and says, Hey, we've got a client in your area, or a member in your area that's got ATF at the door. It's happened before, and I've dropped everything I was doing and driven 30 minutes to an hour away to deal with the ATF. So you can have that prepared if you need it, if you plan enough. But you got to record them because they are allowed to lie to you. They misremembered exactly what was said. We've had incidences where police have come in and work warrants and taken cameras out of buildings, not to preserve the documentation of what they did, but to prevent anybody from seeing what went on.

ROYCE BARTLETT: 12:43

Yes, sir.

Eric Friday: 12:44

That's happened multiple times. Just go to YouTube. And look, you'll find plenty of it. And the video does

ROYCE BARTLETT: 12:50

That's right. That not, that non-blinking eye, not lie Royce. as they call it, it catches everything. I've seen it happen. Unfortunately, I've seen it even at the street level where some of the people that we trust in blue, have done the very same thing. And we are at a scary place in this country, when those kinds of things begin to happen. These are people that we've entrusted with a lot of power, power over us. And when they start doing stuff like that, that's a pretty scary time for us. That's all I gotta say about that.

Eric Friday: 13:22

There's an attorney in another state Royce. He's got what he calls the "creepy cop case", officers came in allegedly with a warrant, but they didn't have one, searched the guy's house, gets all caught on video. And then when he sued them for a civil rights violation, they actually ask the federal judge recently to prevent him from putting the video of their deposition up on YouTube.

ROYCE BARTLETT: 13:45

So why would they want to do that?

Eric Friday: 13:47

Right. I mean, this is a public proceeding. court proceedings are public, absolutely nothing private about a deposition, but they do not want their depositions and their testimony. When what they ended up doing, he was able to dispose, they came in and claim the Fifth Amendment. So at what point does a public servant get to claim the Fifth Amendment for searching a house and prevent that they're claiming to the Fifth Amendment from being a manner not known to the public? Yeah, I have a problem with that.

ROYCE BARTLETT: 14:15

I do too, because the Fifth Amendment is a is a right enumerated in our Bill of Rights, that protects the people, not the government. So that you kind of get things backwards there.

Eric Friday: 14:29

Well, they are they are concerned, they are concerned that they might be criminally prosecuted by the government. So to access individuals, they have those rights, but they don't get to claim it as government agents claim the Fifth Amendment and not let people know and not have people see it and see what they're doing. Right.

ROYCE BARTLETT: 14:44

Especially if the if the if they are the ones accusing us we have every right to any information that they have. You know, as I understand the law, we know

Eric Friday: 14:56

Generally speaking, yes, we are allowed that we have a right to that information.

ROYCE BARTLETT: 14:59

Mm. So yeah, that puts us in a little bit of a quandary doesn't it? When they start wanting to have their stuff withheld, but use everything against you, that don't fly with me.

Eric Friday: 15:11

Me either. And that's that's that's one of the reasons why this fight is so important, right?

ROYCE BARTLETT: 15:15

Yes, sir. It absolutely is. So let's, we've all seen video of the Alpha Tango Foxtrot, flanked by a couple of state cops walk up to the guy's door. He recorded everything they wanted to simply see both of the handguns that he purchased recently, which they were notified by the FFL turning in and 3310 form. And they said we just want to see the guns. That's all it seems so harmless, seems so innocuous, and to someone who doesn't understand their own rights. It would be easy to go okay, no problem. I'll comply. I'll help you out. But let the I want. I would love for you and your litigious mind to explain the dangers of that to the American public.

Eric Friday: 15:59

Sure. So I had a young man pulled over in a traffic stop. And they seized his lawfully possessed rifle from his car, arrested him for carrying concealed firearm in his car, even though it was completely legal for him to have a rifle in his car. He's at Biola, he was a active duty service member of guardsmen or guardsmen reservists on active duty at the time. And they put down that the gun didn't have a serial number on it.

ROYCE BARTLETT: 16:31

Okay,...

Eric Friday: 16:32

....well, you can imagine that guy, his bond jacked up a little bit. Uh huh. But the fact is, the officer just didn't know where to look for the serial number.

ROYCE BARTLETT: 16:42

Isn't that something?

Eric Friday: 16:44

Now, that's one example. Let's use another one. Officer gets one digit wrong on a serial number. So the officer, you hit trace your guns over, he wants to verify. And he runs the serial number, but he gets a digit wrong. Or maybe the guy that put something into the system earlier, got a digit wrong, and the gun suddenly comes back stolen. There is no obligation for them to do further investigation, double check the number do anything, they can just put you in cuffs like them for a stolen firearm, and you have no understanding, you can beat the case. But you're not going to have a civil rights lawsuit against them because it was arguably good faith, they didn't mean to do it. And as long as it was arguably in good faith, you don't get to sue them for civil rights violations. Or let's let's just say that there's a, you scratched it when you dropped it one day, and they decided that's an attempt to deface a serial number, they can charge you with that. And again, you have no civil rights lawsuit later. They believed in good faith that that's what it looked like to them. And so that's what they're doing. These types of things Royce are the types of things that get people arrested all of the time. And they sort them out later. Yeah. And I promise you, you don't want to be sitting in a jail cell overnight, or for a week, while you get while your attorney gets your bond reduced.

ROYCE BARTLETT: 18:06

Yeah, man, and that's a scary proposition. That's a scary thought. It's a scary thought that way you could be arrested and not even really understand why you were being arrested. You say, Oh, no, that's just a scratch. I me and my buddies were out, we were out in the woods, we running around shooting, I tripped. I dropped my gun at clattered on some rocks, blah, blah, blah, no matter what we have, well, "I think you attempted to deface the serial number and therefore, I'm gonna go ahead and arrest you for that."

Eric Friday: 18:35

Royce. To give you a real life real world example. I had a client this week who pleaded no contest to improper exhibition of a firearm. So misdemeanor withhold adjudication time served $300 court costs, that's it. Okay. He did that because the state kept him on an ankle monitor for weeks. Because what he was originally accused of was a road rage incident that involved him brandishing a firearm at another vehicle in the middle of downtown Jacksonville. So that's a that's a pretty serious crime that they're all of a sudden pleading. Now, why did they plead it down? Because the guy had an alibi. But we were we couldn't prove his alibi until they actually filed formal charges and various things happen. And in that time, he was spending hundreds of dollars to stay on an ankle monitor. He couldn't afford me to do a full trial. And just to get his life back, he decided to take a plea and move on with his life because he couldn't afford to go forward. And nobody would listen to him about his alibi. I will tell you that one of the judges involved in this case that would not deal with his ankle monitor situation is actually trying to become one of our new appellate judges when the first in the fifth when someone Duvall county moves to the fifth DCA At the end of the year,

ROYCE BARTLETT: 20:01

He doesn't belong on the bench as far as I'm concerned. That's just my two cents. Well,

Eric Friday: 20:04

She did come out of Angela Corea's offices that tells you anything.

ROYCE BARTLETT: 20:09

Nuff said. Right there. Wow.

Eric Friday: 20:11

So, you know, that's the thing. That's what we have to deal with Royce. And that's, that's kind of thing we have to keep very close eyes on.

ROYCE BARTLETT: 20:19

Yes, sir. Absolutely. Because people, I say this a lot, I tell people, I don't think you understand just how active you should be in your constant vigilance and constant fight to preserve your rights,... preserve YOUR rights, preserve the rights of others, because preserving theirs is preserving yours, whether you like them or not, doesn't matter. We,.. what, what I'm afraid the even I don't really understand the depths of is all the cases just like this, that affect us. Because once that, that precedent is established, where we're having to, what should I say, defend ourselves against frivolous charges, or go through this idiotic process that this man had to go through in order to just get the ankle monitor off? These are the daily fights that we have in order to preserve our rights in this country. Our founders had a lot more insight than we could possibly ever understand, man, I'm telling you what, that's scary.

Eric Friday: 21:29

Well, Royce, let me let me tie that back into something that a lot of our Republican politicians are clamoring for. And look, even even people that you and I know, and maybe one of us ourselves have said things like, these awful district attorneys instituting these no, you know, these policies of letting people out without a cash bond. I mean, that's something that a lot of us look at, and we say, why was that guy out on bond? Why would that guy not have a cash bond? That sounds like a great conservative Republican leaning type talking point. Until you are the guy who is charged by a police department that doesn't like self defense. You're hoping that that judge has the authority to let you out on a low cash bond or no bond. You're hoping that there's a state Attorney, District Attorney in that courtroom at first appearance, who says judge, police arrested him but this looks like it could be self defense. And we think this guy needs to be released on his own recognizance because, Royce, money paid for a bond is to make sure you show up, it does nothing to protect the community.

ROYCE BARTLETT: 22:36

Exactly. Well, that's a good point. I never looked at it from that angle, because I am one of those people that looks at Gascon out there and Los Angeles/San Francisco area, all these other Soros-backed district attorneys and attorneys general, and how they do seem to be lending to massive spikes and violent crime in their respective cities and areas and stuff. And I, I'm gonna imagine that you would probably agree that that is a problem. But then again, I never looked at the flip side of that coin. What if it was me standing there? Well, in that case, I probably do. Like you said, well, "thank you, Lord."

Eric Friday: 23:17

Give you another example, a lot of us supported 10-20-Life laws back in the day, because we thought that 10-20-life would mean that when somebody took a gun and went and robbed a bank or robbed a liquor store or robbed a convenience store, they would go to jail for extra time because they decided to take a gun and commit a crime with it. None of us realized that when they wrote it, to make sure that they were also able to prosecute two gang guys going at it over a piece of turf on a street corner, they wrapped in a couple of other laws, so that when you and I use a gun in self defense, if we're not exactly dead on perfect, or just because the jury gets it wrong, we're now facing 10-20-life because of,.. not because we intentionally took a gun to do bad things to bad the good person, but because we misunderstood or mistook a particular situation. And we took that discretion away from judges. So we all have to be very careful and think about how that law might be used against us one day when we're supporting some type of new criminal law.

ROYCE BARTLETT: 24:24

Well, you know, that's an excellent point and I forget which founder said it but he stated that "an avidity to punish should not be an attitude, and I forget how he phrased it, but it said it basically should not be the attitude of the American public because that would be very destructive to our American system.

Eric Friday: 24:46

Absolutely. I always I liken it back to the the government powerful enough to give you everything you want is also powerful enough to take everything you have.

ROYCE BARTLETT: 24:55

Amen to that! And they're certainly trying right now, aren't they? Yes, sir. Man. And so if the ATF, the Alpha Tango Foxtrot shows up wanting to see your forced reset trigger or your solvent trap, or both handguns you bought recently at a gun show, your best advice is to make sure that you're recording. What if all you have is a voice recorder and you don't have a camera that you can turn on real quick?

Eric Friday: 25:26

That's all you got use it.

ROYCE BARTLETT: 25:28

Then now is that,...do you have to inform them that you have a voice recording on?

Eric Friday: 25:34

So, and understand legal advice is very specific to the specific circumstances, so we need to be careful here. But my advice is, in that circumstance, it is you being obvious and upfront that you're recording. Don't stick your phone up in their face, but if you're holding up your phone in a way that makes it very clear, you're recording or if you just say, to say, you know, "I'm recording". Now, I'll back up. And I'll say one other thing about this. In Florida, one of the primary considerations is did the person being recorded had a reasonable expectation of privacy in the circumstances? I would say that if the officers themselves are wearing body cameras, it's going to be pretty hard for them to claim that they had a reasonable expectation that they were not being recorded when they themselves were doing the recording. Got it. Okay. So that is that is how I would defend that if it ever became an issue that I needed to address with a court. Unfortunately, we recently had a judge in St. Johns County determined even though there is a constitutionally established by the 11th,...and by the 11th circuit court of appeals, even though the Court of Appeals has unequivocally said that people have a right to record public officials and the public performance of their duties. We had a judge in St. Johns County that thought it was improper that a citizen recorded the FHP records custodian while doing a public records request over the phone.

ROYCE BARTLETT: 27:06

Okay, public records request,..you can't make this stuff. I don't think I could, because my my brain doesn't work like that. Again, I'm glad that people like you that are wading through the cesspool known as the American judicial system on a daily basis because I don't have the patience for it. Eric, even if I was trained in the fine arts of of the legal profession, I have a very low tolerance for willful ignorance for maliciousness for the bullies and the people that try to you know, force, their will upon you and things like that. And I get a sense that that happens a lot, you know, in your profession.

Eric Friday: 28:00

Absolutely. Yeah. So we happens all the time.

ROYCE BARTLETT: 28:03

Is a contest of egos sometimes involved here?

Eric Friday: 28:08

You know, Royce, one of the problems is, yeah, and I grew up with with family and law enforcement, you obviously back to blue. I think part of the problem is, so many of our prosecutors get so in involved in working day in and day out with law enforcement, that they fail to remember that one bad apple spoils the bunch, and that there's more than a few bad apples in some certain agencies.

ROYCE BARTLETT: 28:41

Yes, sir.

Eric Friday: 28:42

We had, yeah, there was an officer couple years ago that got caught out in Jackson County planting evidence on person after person.

ROYCE BARTLETT: 28:50

Yes.

Eric Friday: 28:50

The drug raid in Texas where we've had, you know, what, three detectives now sent to jail. And they would, you know, Royce, they would have gotten away with that 10 years ago. Yeah, 10 years ago, those officers would have gotten away with that. But for they actually, you know, it only took it took a few family members and one good person to stand up and say, Hey, wait a minute, these guys did something wrong. Right? They all shouted in Jackson County, the state attorney figured it out and turned him in. So as a prosecutor doing the right thing and doing justice instead of "winning". She's no longer state attorney. The, she was made, IT was made clear to her that she didn't need to stay there anymore. She's not the kind of person they want a state attorney because while she would turn against an officer.

ROYCE BARTLETT: 29:36

Oh my. So are we,... am I sniffing a good old boy system here?

Eric Friday: 29:42

Well, it's not just a good old,.. I would say a good ol boy system as much as, you know, it's if you're not going to back the blue and always at all times, you have no business being a prosecutor" was kind of how she was treated. Oh, well, when they're doing wrong and that's problem. That's scary.

ROYCE BARTLETT: 30:01

I say this all the time. And I've said it on this program. And I'll say it again, even though I host a program called Voice of the Blue, and I have met some of the most honorable men and women of the profession since starting do it well, actually long before that, but I will back you as long as you do not step outside the Constitution to begin violating the supreme law, I have no problem with you enforcing, you know, various laws for for the sake of, you know, true public safety. But when the violation of the supreme law, especially the Bill of Rights comes into play, and it becomes institutionalized in an agency, and I think you can agree with that some agencies do have that kind of garbage institutionalized within them, then I've got a problem. And not only do I have a right to speak up, I have a duty, I believe, to speak up, and I will speak up, I have no problem calling out a dirty cop. And what I really appreciated some of the cops that I've interviewed, they said, "Oh, yeah, I'll arrest a dirty cop quicker than arresting a drug dealer on the street selling to kids, it's because they ruin the bond between the public and the police. And he said, we can't have that I really appreciate when an agency will investigate their own and haul them off the street, Because that does, as I said, that certainly increases their credibility in my sight.

Eric Friday: 31:29

Absolutely. Right. And I will tell you, so there was actually a department up northeast somewhere, who recently brought in one of the First Amendment auditor guys. So one of these guys who's constantly accused of being anti police, even though he isn't. One of these guys is constantly being arrested for things that are not arrestable and the charges will be dropped. And then he has to say, there was a department that actually brought this guy in and said, Hey, you understand what's going on. You understand how this works. Will you come train our department so that we don't want to bow of your rights and so that we don't get sued by somebody like you? Because we wanna' know what we're doing, and we wanna' know how to do it. Right? Awesome.

ROYCE BARTLETT: 32:06

I'm glad to hear that.

Eric Friday: 32:07

Imean, this was a this was just such a huge step. As far as we know, it's the first time anybody like this has ever been invited to do something like that. Wow,

ROYCE BARTLETT: 32:15

Was that guy's initials M.T.?

Eric Friday: 32:20

Is his..... [if you don't] mind me telling his YouTube channel, it's the Long Island auditor,... is the guy's YouTube channel. And he was invited, but he was invited by a department to come in and do this.

ROYCE BARTLETT: 32:31

Wow. That's, you know what? I'm glad to hear that. That means, you know, good. What I hate is the some agencies will look at the general public is if we are their enemy, but we're not. And then at the same time, the general public views cops as well, "You're the enemy". At no, that's not the way this thing is supposed to work. And so I'm glad to hear that.

Eric Friday: 32:56

Yeah, I mean, look, we all I think, well, starting to age myself. I grew up watching Andy Griffith reruns.

ROYCE BARTLETT: 33:04

Yeah, I did too brother. I've had 60 trips around the sun.

Eric Friday: 33:07

But, you know, we are, you know, CHIPs, one of my favorite shows as a child. We always saw the police officers as working with their communities. There was always a bad guy. Yes. Yeah. And but they were working with their communities. And the communities worked with them. What we saw in 2020, yeah, we can debate how that should have gone what it should have liked, but will look like but what we saw was we saw a segment of our society, whether right or wrong, having a great distrust and frustration with law enforcement in their community. And I have tried to tell officers for years that they've got to rebuild this. They've got to, they've got to fix that problem. Well, we know the excuses are myriad and varied. But now, you know, they've turned, law enforcement in many cases, turned on gun owners as well. Are we certain segments of law enforcement? Yeah. Yeah, we actually had a situation where somebody was protesting in a public park a couple of weeks ago, outside of a local Republican executive committee event. And that person was arrested and taken to jail and spent the night in jail for nothing more than holding a sign quietly outside of a outside of a building while standing in a public park.

ROYCE BARTLETT: 34:35

Yep. And you know what, I want you to talk more about that. We're going to take a brief commercial timeout, Eric, I'm familiar with the case. As a matter of fact, Mr. Luis Valdez, a mutual friend of ours was on the program a couple of weeks ago, and talking about that issue that the man was protesting. And so we'll be right back with more Eric Friday, general counsel for Florida carry and fine American man, got a great litigious mind. He's a constitutional activist also so stick around. We've got more to go here on the shooting straight radio podcast and don't forget that Captain Rob and Sergeant Spalding with their respective [listener] retention squads are on standby so don't go anywhere. Be right back

COMMERCIAL: 35:23

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ROYCE BARTLETT: 38:44

Mega thank you's to WJS Guns, shootingclasses.com and also Counter Strike Tactical in Melbourne. Thank you guys for keeping this program rolling. By the way. Happy birthday, Bruce Cory. Bruce Cory is one of the founders of shooting classes.com. And if you're a member out there, whether you're an instructor or a student son, Bruce, I'm happy birthday greetings, if you would. And with me, still, on the phone, holding patiently is Mr. Eric Friday, general counsel for Florida Carry, we've been talking about a quite a myriad of subjects thus far. Most of it focusing though on not just the infringement against our rights by law enforcement agencies, whether they be local or federal, but also, people, I think this is good information for all of us, that we be reaffirmed in our rights, understand what our rights are. If we are ever faced with these types of situations, it's vital that we know how to respond when it happens that way we don't end up in a worse problem than we already are. So Eric, I appreciate you holding through the break, brother. Before the break, we were talking about a man who was arrested for standing on a sidewalk holding a sign, not making any noise not doing anything other than just standing there. And he was arrested, as I understand it, that was outside of a Ron DeSantis event. And he was protesting Mr. DeSantis's no gun policy that Luis Valdez and myself discussed several episodes ago, it was that the same episode the same issue.

Eric Friday: 40:26

It is the same issue. I want to be clear, though, part of the problem that we've had is nobody wants to admit it was it was a actually an event by the local Republican executive committee. And nobody wants to admit exactly whose no gun policy it was,

ROYCE BARTLETT: 40:43

right? Well, we did that with Luis Valdes. And you know, we called them out, just because you have an R after your name, and just because you've done a lot of very good things for our state, and just because I do respect you as our governor, and I really do hope you continue to be our governor, when you step out of line and out of the constitutional boundaries set around you, I'm gonna speak up and say something. So that's what we did.

Eric Friday: 41:10

And so here we are a little over a week and a half, two weeks later. And apparently the police department just does not seem to be able to get the body cam to the State Attorney's Office for them to investigate this case.

ROYCE BARTLETT: 41:24

I'm sure it's just you know, some minor issue involved there. No?

Eric Friday: 41:31

Royce. Would you like my oceanfront property in Arizona that I'd like to sell?

ROYCE BARTLETT: 41:34

Yeah, yeah, man, how much, 10 bucks?

Eric Friday: 41:37

I mean, listen, it does not take anything for a police department, especially a smaller police department to get body cam footage over to a state attorney. Right. This is not a department that's dealing with hundreds of arrests every day. They're not running 30 or 40 people through first appearance twice a day like we are here in Duvall County. Now, yes, we've got more resources here in Duval County, but this day everybody involved with this case knows it's a political hot potato. Everybody in this case does not want that body cam coming to light before Tuesday. Yep, that's that's what I believe is going on here. Nobody wants that body cam footage to come to light before Tuesday.

ROYCE BARTLETT: 42:24

Yeah, could be, and understandably so.

Eric Friday: 42:29

You know, we have government in the sunshine in Florida for a reason. Right. Sunshine is the best thing to sanitize, our best sanitisation there

ROYCE BARTLETT: 42:38

Yes, yes, sir. The best the best exposure of dirt to and I tell people this often. The more light you have, the more dirt you see. Turning on a bedroom light, you'll see dust on the table, but you open the shades and you'll see the dust in the air that you're breathing, and couldn't see it before. So I'm with you there.

Eric Friday: 42:58

There's a there's a virus going to Tallahassee and there are some RPOF people, Republican Party of Florida people, who are carrying that virus from one person to the next. And, and I think that's part of what's happening here. And I think that's why we don't have this body cam yet footage yet. Because I think it's going to expose exactly who in the Republican Party of that county or the Republican Party of Florida, or who in a campaign staff made a decision that denied people a right to in the first place and then arrested somebody for calling it out publicly.

ROYCE BARTLETT: 43:35

Well, for one thing, as I understand it, a group of police officers met with the man and then they broke contact. In other words, they felt they didn't have any right or reason to detain the man and walked away and then another group walked up to him and those are the ones that arrested him. Is that Is that how that went?

Eric Friday: 43:55

That is my understanding of the situation Royce. But you know what? body cams? A little bit of sunshine with clear the question for everybody, wouldn't it?

ROYCE BARTLETT: 44:06

Oh, yeah, absolutely. My goodness. Well, speaking of pouring sunlight on things, our mutual friend, I call him the constitutional Cuban. Mr. Luis Valdes does that. Man, he is a pit bull and I love him. I tell you, he does not mind calling a spade a spade, calls things what they are. And he is the one that exposed a lot of that stuff. But he also recently exposed more, what should I say, skullduggery? From the RPOF, the Republican Party of Florida, a man who heads up the Second Amendment committee. Is that not correct?

Eric Friday: 44:52

That is correct. His name is Mr. Gasperini. Yes. Gasperini.

ROYCE BARTLETT: 44:55

And when I heard the audio that Luis posted on Farcebook. I was kind of gobsmacked and like, "Are you kidding me who put this guy at the helm of the Second Amendment committee, especially when he is blasting, and he is very anti constitutional carry here in Florida taken away?"

Eric Friday: 45:22

Well, so the interesting thing about this gentleman is he wants to rely on his NRA instructor credentials. Well, last time I checked, the NRA has come out very clearly in support of open carry and constitutional carry. He also wants to rely on His law enforcement credentials. Well, if you're a law enforcement officer, who doesn't believe in the Second Amendment and the right of open carry, and the right to constitutional carry, or at least right to open carry, I questioned whether or not you ever should have been allowed to be a police officer in the first place.

ROYCE BARTLETT: 45:55

Yes, sir. That's correct.

Eric Friday: 45:56

I mean, to me, this is a litmus test. And I, you know, unfortunately know, there's certain states and counties where that's never going to be a litmus test, but it should be. So I questioned him on that grounds. Third, he is the chairman of a Republican Party Committee. And the platform, the current platform of the Republican Party, is to support constitutional carry. Yep. That's in the Republican Party platform. So why are you allowed was the Party of Florida, allowing the person to chair a committee on a subject that is addressed to the Republican Party platform and allowing him to take a contrary position?

ROYCE BARTLETT: 46:36

Great question.

Eric Friday: 46:37

That's unacceptable. And this is not the first time this gentleman has made these comments. It's just the first time they've gotten recorded and released publicly.

ROYCE BARTLETT: 46:45

Exactly. And the think about the damage he's doing up there infecting other people with his comments. He unfortunately, he is someone who carries some weight, because you thought, okay, he had a law enforcement career, or he's a certified instructor, or surely he knows what he's talking about. And if this is his opinion, well, that's where we start finding out that his opinion does carry some weight, and it will infect other people. It's very insidious, mind you, of course, because how many other people sat there when he was making these comments nodding their head and silent

Eric Friday: 47:20

And look, criticizing pro-gun approval? organizations, for their honest, good faith work to try and push a bill to get us our rights back? That's a problem.

ROYCE BARTLETT: 47:38

Yes, it is. It's a big problem, especially when you have such an elitist mindset that you feel that you're above the public, and you feel that your opinion should hold sway, and you feel that they are beneath you. And they, the public, we the people cannot be trusted to, you know, carry deadly force on our persons openly or concealed without the state's permission. That bothers the living crap out of me. And I hope this is going to be something done about this guy.

Eric Friday: 48:08

Well, I do too. And my understanding Royce is that he is also, he has a LEOSA status, so he law law enforcement officers Security Act that allows them to basically, it's the type of Interstate, interstate recognized concealed carry license, right, that allows them to cross carry carrying states where we can't or the rest of us aren't allowed to carry. I also understand that he might be working as a reserve sheriff's deputy. And I'm wondering if that status is going to be yanked also, because if he's working for a sheriff that claims to be a pro gun sheriff in the state, that man has no business working for that department anymore as a reserve deputy or any other kind of deputy.

ROYCE BARTLETT: 48:43

I wonder what department he might be working for? I'd love to give, give the sheriff a call to find that information out and talk to that sheriff? Yeah, I think so I'd like to be one of the people to send them a politely yet firmly worded email about why he should not be there with his department because he can't be trusted to safeguard the rights of the people that he's serving. That's the issue here. No matter what position, you're in a public, you know, as a public servant, whether the chairman of the Second Amendment committee for the RPOF or as a sheriff or as a deputy, or even as a reserve deputy. We are entrusting these people with the not just a defense of the public, but they must also help safeguard our rights. And that's been lost, especially in federal agencies, in many state agencies, local agencies and things like that. And I do believe that is a huge part of the issue that we've been talking about this entire time. Eric, would that be a safe assessment?

Eric Friday: 49:49

I'd say that's an absolutely accurate assessment which because of what we've been saying there, Royce, I do need to make a point for everybody listening. All right. I do want everybody get out and vote. Early voting today, early voting tomorrow. If it's available in your county, voting on Tuesday, I encourage everybody out to vote. I encourage everybody to vote for pro gun candidates, I encourage you, at least this time, one last time at least, to vote for the lesser of two evils if you have to when it comes to pro gun candidates, because look, I you know, there are certain people running who have voted against your gun rights in the past, and they are on the ballot with an R beside their name in elections around the state. Yep. But the alternatives are even worse. Yep. But if you have to hold your nose when you're voting for somebody this Tuesday, the only way you can have any hope of voting next time without holding your nose is to get involved locally, get involved in your local party, get involved in getting pro gun people to win the primaries instead of anti gun people winning the primaries for certain parties. That is the only way we are going to make this shift. Remember the Republican Party establishment, two years four years ago, wanted to give us Adam Putnam instead of Ron DeSantis. Yeah, Adam Putnam at the time was engaged in a direct assault on your rights to get a concealed carry license. And we finally fixed that last year with thanks to Florida carry. Well, we won a court case on it, it's still going on even despite winning the court case. And we're continuing to fight that fight. But we have got to send a message to the Republican Party of Florida that gun owners are no longer going to sit by and take the lesser of two evils and that we're not going to sit by and tolerate people like Mr. Gasperini in powers of position in the Republican Party. And if people like the persons we had as president, the Senate and Speaker of the House last year, are no longer welcome to be leaders in this party, if it wants to continue to get the votes of gun owners.

ROYCE BARTLETT: 52:04

Amen to that. And that's exactly what we need to do. I've said it many times on this program that we need to every person, every single America needs to be involved in their government because their government is certainly involved with them and their lives. And I'm a little bit put off when people tell me "Well, I'm just not all that political." And I tell what your government is, and they're taking a very active interest in us, you need to be involved. I tell people all the time also to join Gun Owners of America, because they have chapters in all 50 states also join Florida carry people that are out there fighting in the make it easy to be into the fight. God sends out alerts, Florida Carrie, I believe also sends out alerts. And they let you know, hey, here's an issue, put your voice to it. God makes it really easy to be in the fight, they just simply hit that take action button up there in the email, they can take you over to an email already filled out. Or you can write your own words, simply fill in your address name and everything, and it gets sent to your representative. That's excuse me, that's getting your voice heard. And we need to be loud. We need to be active. And I can't stress that enough on this program. I really can't. Give us the last two cents for you.

Eric Friday: 53:28

Royce. Yeah, again, big thanks to GOA for getting the message out. You know, they they do what they do and they do it very well. Florida carry does what it does. We do it very we think we do it pretty darn good. Yes, you do. We there's national organizations, their state organizations and you know, fortunately, we we started Florida carry because we felt that sometimes the national organizations, at least at that time weren't paying enough attention to Florida, or but but some of that shifted because I think I think some of the national organizations have come to realize Florida is a dangerous place it wants the gun grabbers get a foothold and what they did to us in 2018. We got to compete. We've got to peel it back. Yes, sir. Have to peel it back.

ROYCE BARTLETT: 54:14

Yep. Yeah, I love that, you know, the government failed at all levels and enabled That little punk to do what he did. And so now, the answer was to strip more our rights away from the law abiding citizenry. People don't understand the gravity of that, you know,

Eric Friday: 54:33

Royce, you know what we let him do it after 911. So why not do it after Parkland?

ROYCE BARTLETT: 54:38

Yes, we have set precedents have we not?

Eric Friday: 54:41

We the people that that precedent happen, we we've got to start standing up when those events happen. We have to stand up and say not one more inch, not our rights. Government either do it right or get out of our way? Royce. It's not the government that stopped all the hijackings after 911 It was citizens that took down the shoe bomber the government Let him on the airplane.

ROYCE BARTLETT: 55:00

Yes, absolutely. Well, we've we've established precedents with our compliance to unconstitutional laws. And I posted a meme recently on Farcebook with two hands bound with chains on them. And as it says, "governments do not create tyranny, your obedience does". And if we had the antithesis of obedience going on, we would still be constitutionally run Republic. We should have been speaking up a long time ago and as we know, literally, you know, decades and decades and decades ago back all the way back to 1934. If we had all stood up as a country and pointed FDR and everybody else and say "You're not passing that crap here, you're not going to punish us for the actions of gangsters." Just think where we'd be right now. It'd be a lot different I think.

Eric Friday: 55:57

Yeah, from here my grandparents tell it around that time they were just trying to survive.

ROYCE BARTLETT: 56:02

Yeah, we up and that's the problem. We get there and we don't, we get fatigued and we've been fatigued by multiple wars, we've been fatigued by many things. And unfortunately governments are crooked as the day as long as they have a history of violating the supreme law and we just roll over and take it, I think, and it stinks.

Eric Friday: 56:26

So might I add to that Royce, thank you for all you do.

ROYCE BARTLETT: 56:30

Well, I appreciate what you do to Eric and I'm hoping we're gonna have you back on the program again soon brother.

Eric Friday: 56:37

Would love to do it sir.

ROYCE BARTLETT: 56:39

Okay, man, well, listen, that's gonna do it for if you would hang on the phone for a couple of minutes, Eric while I sign off and we'll be right back with you. And that's gonna do it for this edition of the shooting straight radio podcast. Huge thank you to the sponsors and to my distinguished guest. If you're not a member of Florida carry and you're a Florida resident, you can go to I believe Floridacarry.org on the... (bring Eric back real quick), Eric, how do they get there?

Eric Friday: 57:05

Floridacarry.org. You had that right, to go there and join and become a member.

ROYCE BARTLETT: 57:11

Yes sir. And join GOA and also, you just stay active. Stay in contact with your representatives. Keep a loaded handgun on your person when you are out and about outside your home and get plenty of good training whenever you can, you can find it at shootingclasses.com, and, you know that,... and keep your head on a swivel and I'll catch you on the next episode. Never forget incoming rounds always have the right of way. Royce and Eric Friday out of here.