Leland Yee

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Using Sen. “Gun Runner” Yee’s Arrest To Call For More Gun Control

April 7, 2014 by 5 Comments

Let me see if I have this straight. Federal law requires a license to deal in firearms. Federal law also requires both a license and permits to import firearms into the United States. Leland Yee was arrested and indicted on charges that he conspired to violate both these Federal laws. Therefore, we need an executive order banning the import of “lethal assault weapons” so says Yee’s Congresswoman Jackie Speier (D-CA).

From an email response Speier sent to Guns.com:

“This FBI investigation of Leland Yee reveals how easy it is to import lethal assault weapons that were previously banned,” said Speier in an emailed statement from the Representative’s office to Guns.com.

“This case should be a warning to us all that even the most trusted appearing among us are ready to do real harm,” she said.

Her solution to fix future instances of potential gun running such as in the Yee case? Call on the White House to ban the import of “assault weapons.”

“Since Congress can pass no meaningful gun-control laws, even after the mass killing in Newtown, President Obama should use his pen to slow the import of these weapons, which have no place in our homes,” wrote Speier.

Just when you think you’ve heard everything…

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NRA News On Gun Runner Yee

April 3, 2014 by 1 Comment

You have to wonder if Sen. Leland Yee has a cool tong/triad nickname like Raymond Chow has in “Shrimp Boy”. My suggestion is that he should now be know as Gun Runner Yee. That has a strong masculine ring to it and should fit in with his activities on behalf of Wo Hop To and the Hop Sing Boys.

Ginny Simone of NRA News takes a more serious approach to Gun Runner Yee than I do and interviews the NRA’s longtime attorney in California, Chuck Michel, regarding his arrest.

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Standards For A Conviction On Arms Trafficking

March 28, 2014 by 2 Comments

The Sacremento Bee ran a story this morning on St. Sen. Leland Yee (D-San Francisco) and his alleged involvement with international arms trafficking. The article reviews the criminal complaint against Yee and then discusses the evidence necessary for getting a conviction.

Albert Y. Dayan is the attorney who represented convicted Russian arms dealer Viktor Bout. Mr. Dayan is a criminal defense attorney located in New York City who has successfully tried a number of cases involving fraud, murder, money laundering, etc. He was interviewed as part of this story about the evidence necessary to obtain a conviction against Yee on arms trafficking charges.

The evidence necessary to secure a weapons-trafficking conviction depends on the arms involved, according to Albert Y. Dayan, an attorney who represents convicted arms dealer Viktor Bout. When air-to-surface missiles are being sold, all prosecutors need to prove is the existence of an agreement, he said.

More proof is required with small arms like rifles and pistols, Dayan said. There, the government must establish an “overt act” advancing the transaction. Intent alone is not sufficient.

“Accepting money is an overt act. Going out and purchasing a truck to deliver (weapons) is an overt act. Going on a plane to go to the meeting is not an overt act,” Dayan said.

The description of Yee’s reluctance to move aggressively on an arms deal does not necessarily expose the FBI to an accusation of entrapment, Dayan said – and if Yee were to pursue an entrapment defense, it would require him to acknowledge that he had agreed to broker a purchase.

“Even if the senator says ‘I’m not interested,’ the agent can and is allowed by law to keep asking and that would still not to rise to the level of entrapment,” Dayan said.

Given this, I think Yee is in a heap of trouble. It sure looks to me like Yee had an agreement regarding the shoulder fired missiles (see p. 84 of the criminal complaint.) Given that Yee accepted money from the undercover FBI agent, I think that might also constitute the overt act necessary according to Dayan needed for proof. Of course, I am not an attorney so this is all speculation on my part. It will be very interesting to see what happens when it comes to trial.

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Priceless!

March 27, 2014 by 1 Comment

This tweet from State Senator Leland Yee (D-San Francisco) is absolutely priceless given his arrest yesterday on charges of conspiracy to deal in firearms without a license and to illegally import full automatic firearms  from Russia and/or Muslim extremists in the Philippines.

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Comment Of The Day

March 27, 2014 by

The comment of the day comes from Tam. It is about State Senator Leland Yee (D-San Francisco) and his arrest yesterday for public corruption and arms trafficking. It is deliciously snarky in a way that only the Mistress of Snark could do with her skill and aplomb.

This guy ranting about the dangers of the criminal misuse of firearms is like Jerry Sandusky railing against the touching of little boys.

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Sen. Leland “Bullet Button Loophole” Yee Arrested On Corruption Charges (Updated)

March 26, 2014 by 9 Comments

California St. Sen. Leland Yee (D-San Francisco) who has led the fight to close the “bullet button loophole”  was arrested by the FBI today on public corruption charges including bribery.

From the AP:

A California state senator who was lauded for his efforts to make government more transparent was arrested Wednesday along with a onetime gang leader known as “Shrimp Boy” during a series of raids by the FBI in Sacramento and the San Francisco Bay Area, authorities said.

FBI spokesman Peter Lee confirmed the arrests of State Sen. Leland Yee and Raymond Chow, but declined to discuss the charges, citing an ongoing investigation. Yee was scheduled to be arraigned in federal court in San Francisco later Wednesday.

Yee was one of three Democrats running to be California Secretary of State. One of his opponents blamed the arrest on the need to raise money for campaigns.

Democrat Derek Cressman, who is one of several candidates also running for secretary of state, released the folowing statement:

“Coming on the heels of the corruption charges of Senator Calderon and the conviction of Senator Wright, today’s actions need to be a wake up call. We are clearly beyond the point of looking at one bad apple and instead looking at a corrupt institution in the California senate,” Cressman said. “The constant begging for campaign cash clearly has a corrosive effect on a person’s soul and the only solution is to get big money out of our politics once and for all.”

Corrosive effect on a person’s soul? Oh, please. As for his confederate who was arrested at the same time, Raymond “Shrimp Boy” Chow, he was indicted in the 1990s for racketeering involving both teenage prostitution and trading in heroin. He later served 11 years of a 25 to life sentence on gun charges.

UPDATE: It gets better. What could be the worst charge that you could think of for an anti-gun politician like Leland Yee? Yep, arms trafficking.

In addition to being charged with wire fraud of honest services, Sen. Yee, along with his political consultant Keith Jackson and Wilson Sy Lim, are being charged with violating Sec. 922(a)(1) and Sec. 922(1). They are charged with conspiracy to deal firearms without a license and to illegally import firearms.

According to the criminal complaint, Yee told an undercover FBI agent that he would introduce him to an arms dealer he had known for many years. Yee went on to say that the weapons would be sourced from Russia. He asked the undercover agent if he wanted automatic or semiautomatic firearms. When the agent replied “automatic”, Yee said that wouldn’t be a problem. (see p. 84) The smuggled firearms would come through the Port of Newark, New Jersey. Yee was to get $100,000 for facilitating the first transaction valued at somewhere between $500,000 and $2.5 million.

All I can say is that Leland Yee is a hypocrite of the worst sort.

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Quote Of The Day

September 27, 2012 by 2 Comments

California Senator Leland Yee’s SB249 has officially died for this session of the California legislature. The finger pointing has begun between Senator Yee and Attorney General Kamala Harris. The so-called investigative journalists at KCBS who did the original story that let Senator Yee think he could ride the issue to fame and glory have more on it here.

The quote of the day comes from Senator Yee bemoaning the fact that people let their voice be heard:

State Senator Leland Yee, who sponsored the bill, said the campaign
became ugly fast. “We got emails, we got phone calls. We even had
billboards along 101,” he said.

Dude, that’s the way it is supposed to happen in America. Citizens can and should make their voices heard. I imagine that is one of the reason’s Sen. Yee’s family (including him) emigrated in 1951or ’52 to America from Red China.

As to the billboards, props to the gun rights activists in California!

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SB249 Gets Even Worse

August 8, 2012 by 5 Comments

California State Sen. Leland Yee’s SB 249 has been through many iterations. As you may remember, the bill was introduced in response to a San Francisco TV station’s breathless report about “bullet buttons”. The bill originally banned all “bullet buttons” and then was changed to only ban the use of the MagLock. Now it has been amended again and would ban the possession of all bullet button and/or MagLocked firearms.

The CalGuns Foundations and CalFFL are fighting this tooth and nail. They sent out an update late last night which I’ve put below. It looks like all the major anti-gun politicians in California are piling on as co-sponsors of this terrible bill.

SAN CARLOS, CA, AND MADERA, CA – In an egregious and deliberate move to ban hundreds of thousands of legal firearms and harm law-abiding California gun owners, California Senator Leland Yee (D-San Francisco) has amended his bill SB 249 to make possession of all Bullet Button, or “maglocked”, firearms a criminal act as of July 1, 2013. Sen. Yee’s chief-of-staff, Adam Keigwin, has said that California should ban all guns, even bolt-action hunting rifles.

Joining Senator Yee in his effort to take away hundreds of millions of dollars of currently-legal guns are co-authors Senate President pro Tem Darrell Steinberg (D-Sacramento), Senator Kevin de León (D-Los Angeles), Senator Loni Hancock (D-Berkeley), Senator Ted Lieu (D-Torrence), Assemblyman Anthony Portantino (D-La Cañada Flintridge), and Assemblyman Mike Feuer (D-Los Angeles).

Explaining his support for the gun ban, Senator Steinberg told the Sacramento Bee that “no one will convince me it’s anything other than a joke to say that having multiple clips and semi-automatic weapons that can shoot 100 or more bullets at a time is necessary in this state or in this country. It’s ridiculous.”

Also on record as supporting SB 249, the Los Angeles Times reports Attorney General Kamala Harris as saying, “I applaud the Legislature’s interest in addressing this problem and support efforts to pass legislation needed to” [ban Bullet Button firearms].

SB 249, if it were to become law, would categorically ban all “maglocked” semi-automatic firearms that are in common use, such as those which use the Bullet Button device. SB 249 does not provide for any grandfathering of existing firearms nor does it have a method of compensating gun owners for the firearms the proposed law would require to be destroyed or removed from California. The net effect would be what is perhaps the single largest unconstitutional government taking in California history.

More, SB 249 would subject gun owners to criminal liability as of July 1, 2013, for the mere possession of firearms that Senator Yee and Attorney General Harris have both said are legal under current law. Ex post facto laws, such as SB 249 would create if passed, are expressly unconstitutional.

Interestingly, however, SB 249 would create a de facto requirement that gun owners , hunters, and competitors in California use only “featureless” firearms, such as AR and AK-style guns employing compliance parts like the Solar Tactical KYDEX Grip Wraps, MonsterMan Grips, or Exile Machine’s Hammerhead Grip, which not only allow for the lawful use of factory magazine releases but large-capacity magazines as well. California does not ban the possession of large-capacity magazines. Wes Morris, owner of Ten Percent Firearms, demonstrates this is an excellent YouTube video you can view at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qhC8LpHPbRQ.

Senator Yee’s bill is currently before the Assembly Appropriations Committee and is expected to be heard on August 15, though it could be heard as soon as August 8. The bill must pass both the Assembly and the Senate by August 31.

The Calguns Foundation and Cal-FFL, through their pathbreaking grassroots initiative platform StopSB249.org, have created many free, easy-to-use tools for you to help combat this massive gun ban. Please forward this message to your friends, family, favorite gun dealers and manufacturers, and your social networks, like Facebook and Twitter. Working together, we can Stop SB 249 – but we need you to TAKE ACTION NOW!

The SB 249 Fact Sheet is available for download at http://stopsb249.org/wp-content/uploads/2012/06/sb249_fact_sheet1.pdf.

Donate to The Calguns Foundation and help Stop SB 249.

Stop SB 249’s Take Action page with many free tools to fight SB 249 can be found at http://stopsb249.org/take-action.

Crap like SB 249 is not only a California problem. Unlike Las Vegas, what happens in California doesn’t always stay in California. This is especially true when it comes to gun control initiatives such as microstamping which almost passed again in New York State and has been introduced in other states. It is all too easy to say “I live in a free state” or that California gun owners ought to just move.

It is best to think of SB 249 as a festering sore that could infect the rest of the body. It needs to be stopped and stopped hard before it spreads to impact all of us.

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A Politician Worthy Of Parody

July 17, 2012 by 2 Comments

California Democrat State Sen. Leland Yee introduced a bill, SB 249, that would have outlawed the “bullet button”. This is the device that converts a detachable magazine to a fixed magazine so that a semi-automatic firearm remains in compliance with California’s assault weapons (sic) ban. Sen. Yee has since amended his bill to only prohibit conversion kits such as the “Mag Magnet”.

Yee was prompted to introduce the bill after seeing a breathless report on the evil bullet button by a San Francisco TV station. California gun groups such as the CalGuns Foundation are fighting back. They have set up a website, StopSB249.org, as well as starting an ad campaign to defeat the bill.

One of the more amusing push-backs against Sen. Yee and SB 249 by CalGuns is this parody mash-up seen below. They’ve taken a CBS 5 report produced last week and added their own special touch to it.

Sometimes ridicule is the best way to deal with pompous politicians such as Sen. Yee.