Wavicle
Gold Member
- Joined
- Jul 22, 2014
- Messages
- 956
In the event that the only ruler that's available is a crummy office desk ruler, and the knife is just a hair over 3", who do you think will win the initial police encounter? Will the officer say "well, sir, all I have I this crappy ruler and even though it's a hair over 3", I will give you the benefit of the doubt and you're free to leave" or do you think the officer will make the arrest and let the court system sort it out (at the cost of tens of thousands of dollars in legal fees and lost work and nonrefundable bail bonds fees)?
If it gets to the point in a police encounter where the officer is pulling out a ruler, it's because the officer wants to arrest you. If the officer didn't want to arrest you, he wouldn't take out a ruler, because then if the ruler showed over 3", then the officer might become compelled to arrest you (depending on how much officer discretion is allowed in that legal area), and he's already decided to let you go so why bother measuring?
There's a reason why Mossberg makes 18.5" shotgun barrels when the minimum legal length must be 18" or greater. Mossberg, which is probably the second largest manufacturer of shotguns after Remington, doesn't even make an 18" barrel model. Because if a small amount of wear occurred and the barrel became 17.99", then it would become a short-barrel shotgun which is 10 years in prison. So Mossberg errs on the side of caution and adds the extra 1/2".
To extend this logic to knives, it would make sense if the law was 3" maximum length, that a knife might be 2.95" and in fact, the Small Sebenza just so happens to be 2.94". Coincidence? Maybe, but I like to think Chris Reeve himself designed the size of the small to be safe under 3" knife law locations.
While I applaud CRK for retroactively changing the blade length from 3.123" down to 3", personally, I'd like to have seen it at 2.95" or so. The 0.05" of blade length would be imperceivable during any kind of use, but could save tens of thousands of dollars in legal costs, should the official court measure it to be even 3.01". I don't think the street cop would have access to precision measuring tools, or even care, because other factors related to the encounter will determine if he wants to arrest you. But assuming an arrest is made, if you can have your lawyer compel the court to measure the knife and it's 2.95", then you can get the charges dismissed with much less effort than if it measures 3.01" and you have to spend thousands of dollars on expect witnesses to refute the measuring device and calibration the court used.
When I get my Impinda, I may asked a skilled friend of mine to sharpen it in such a way that it removes 0.05" off the tip, but not in a way that CRK would consider it modified and refuse spa service in the future. That's such a small amount of material that it should be imperceivable to me but potentially stave off a worst-case scenario in courts, if I carry it in an area with strict rules.
OK. (I said in an office work area-- big difference. People who work in those areas know what I'm talking about)
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