by Justice Stephen Breyer and his family were recently the victims of an armed robbery at his vacation home on the Caribbean island of Nevis. The robber was armed with a machete. The Second Amendment Foundation has released a statement regarding this incident.
BREYER’S ROBBERY ILLUSTRATES WHY RKBA SO IMPORTANT EVERYWHERE
For Immediate Release: 2/14/2012
BELLEVUE, WA – The recent robbery of Supreme Court Justice Stephen Breyer at a vacation home in the West Indies should hopefully cause the learned jurist to re-examine his core beliefs about the individual right to keep and bear arms at places other than their primary residence, the Second Amendment Foundation said today.
Breyer has voted with the minority twice in recent years against recognizing that the Second Amendment protects an individual civil right to keep and bear arms, in both the Heller and McDonald cases. He was robbed last week, along with his wife and some guests, by an intruder wielding a machete, according to published reports. Justice Breyer was not harmed, but the robber got away with about $1,000 in cash.
“We’re delighted that Justice Breyer was not hurt during this incident,” said SAF founder and Executive Vice President Alan M. Gottlieb, “and hopefully this case will give him a new perspective on the right to bear arms for personal safety. Police cannot always be around when you need them, even if you’re a Supreme Court justice. One does not leave his right of self-defense at the doorstep of his home when he travels.
“If this demonstrates anything to Justice Breyer,” he continued, “it is that crime does not happen just at someone’s primary residence, and criminals do not make appointments, giving someone time to unlock and assemble and load a firearm. You must be able to protect yourself, even on vacation outside of your home state, at a moment’s notice. That’s not just a civil right, but a basic human right.
“When Justice Breyer dissented in the Heller case,” Gottlieb recalled, “he expressed concerns about keeping loaded firearms in the home for personal protection. Faced with a machete in the hands of a criminal, one wonders whether Breyer might have quietly wished he had a gun with which he could have defended himself, his wife and their guests. We hope this incident gives him new insight with which to temper his views.”
I’m not sure if “machete-point” is a word or not but if I had been threatened by a robber who was wielding one, I’d definitely consider it a word. I’m sure Justice Breyer might agree.
As to the lethality of a machete, it was the weapon of choice in the Rwandan genocide. According to Wikipedia, “Even after the 1993 peace agreement signed in Arusha, businessmen close to General Habyarimana imported 581,000 machetes for Hutu use in killing Tutsi, because machetes were cheaper than guns.” These machetes were used to kill somewhere between 500,000 and a million Tutsi in an approximately three month period of time.