Time for a FIGHT

[Flash]

Just got a letter from HM Revenue and Customs 

That "Endura" I won from pocketgecko (in a trade) has been CONFISCATED on arrival in England 

The reason stated is that its a "GRAVITY KNIFE"

are they flipping kidding me 

This knife can be brought legally in Britain....no law against it as it is NOT a gravity knife.  Even the lock on it does not make it illegal per say.

Trouble is, I reckon it will be a looooooooong fight as they will only respond to a legal challenge in court.

Ah well, time to represent myself......(again  )

(Thats the trouble with non-police practitioners of the law.....they obviously do NOT know how to apply it properly)

[Mr. Whippy]

Y'all have GOT to get control of your government over there.

No guns
No knives
Surveillence cameras everywhere
Computer generated traffic tickets
No foxhunting.

Seriously, y'all are being taken over by flower hugging vegans.

[Medic82]

First of all, what’s a gravity knife??

Now, why the hell do they want too take you’re knife?? Give me a call if you need backup!

DING-DING Round 1

[Flash]

A gravity knife is a knife which opens by the forces of inertia or gravity. Similar to a switchblade, they are made as side folding blades and OTF blades (out-the-front or telescoping). However, instead of being spring driven, the knife needs to be manually "flipped" out of the handle

Now my only worry is that if the pivot springs/nuts are loose then technically they might be right.  However this would apply to ALL knives of a similar construction. 

[Pacu]

That's just not right. Can you ship stuff to Scotland and pick it up over there..as in a PO box?  

That's how people in California, New York, and Maryland skirt the law with certain items. Just send it to a neighboring post office box in the next state.

[Gareth]

I hate to say it Flash but this seems to be happening more and more.  Check out the Law forum over on BB there are all to many such incidents being reported.

http://www.britishblades.com/forums/forumdisplay.php?f=39

[Flash]

Yes I know BUT

"All it takes for evil to exist is for good men to do nothing"

[Gareth]

Don't get me wrong I am in total agreement with you but I rather think you are in for a real argument.  Knowledge of the Law doesn't seem to have helped others, but the very fact of what you do for a living might.  Best of luck. 

[pocketgecko]

WOW!  Ok, thats totally not right, I am very sorry that happened.  Just so you know that knife is in no way loose.  Its about as tight as can be.  I think the only way to open it via "gravity" would be to hold the blade and swing hard.  If there is anything I can do to help please let me know.

[Flash]

Don't get me wrong I am in total agreement with you but I rather think you are in for a real argument.  Knowledge of the Law doesn't seem to have helped others, but the very fact of what you do for a living might.  Best of luck. 

Thing is, my job should have nothing to do with it.  

Yes, I enforce the law BUT I am not above it and whats more...THEY should not treat me better than anyone else because of it.

[Flash]

WOW!  Ok, thats totally not right, I am very sorry that happened.  Just so you know that knife is in no way loose.  Its about as tight as can be.  I think the only way to open it via "gravity" would be to hold the blade and swing hard.  If there is anything I can do to help please let me know.

Thanks mate....I will keep you updated....oh please see the feedback forum in about 5 minutes 

[Dunc]

I think someone at Customs is on a personal crusade  to get knives off the streets   And anything with Spyderco on it is automatically classed asa gravity knife  
  Good luck Flash I'm sure you would win . Someone needs to do something about them .

Dunc

[Sean]

That is really a shame.  I rather suspect in a lot of cases it just depends who at customs is doing the checking.  Spyderco is a pretty popular brand of knife.  They sell them everywhere don't they?
In Canada it used to be and probably still is that if you could flick it open while holding the handle and the blade would snap out into the lock position it was considered to be a gravity knife and illegal.
What confuses me to no end is a few knives that walmart carries like the gerber gator and some of the buck units are capable of gravity opening.  I remember when the gator first came out walmart stopped carrying them because of the way they were shipped from the factory (loose) but then later on they started showing up at their stores again.
 Ballisongs are illegal up here in Canada as are switch blades yet you can buy blade assisted knives and spyderco type opening blades that are alot quicker opening than those "dreaded switchblades and ballisongs" are.
Technology in the knife industry is ever advancing forward like most others too bad laws aren't to support it.  It looks like someone at Customs thought wow neat knife, decided to play with it and decided that they better check it out further and discovered gravity.
Well my friend, if I was the customs officer doing the check I would have tightened it up for you and included a note along with it stating what I had done with respect to the law.  What a waste of material and resource to confiscate it.

Sean

[BIG-TARGET]

Just "bend the truth" and declare the knife as "A TOOL"

[Mike, Lord of the Spammers!]

Tough break that ole son, and sadly not too uncommon atm

Keep us updated though mate, and good luck

[jzmtl]

That's the trouble with "gravity" knife law, it's too vague and pretty much any OH knife can be gravity dropped open unless you really tighten the pivot down.

Man that sounds awfully like laws here, but at least we can still carry locking knives.

[gafftapegreenia]

Seriously, y'all are being taken over by flower hugging vegans.

Or operatives of the new world order who must first disarm the public before than can subdue it.

[Neil]

That is SO smurfing annoying    Bunch of smurfs!

I'm very pleased to hear you're going to take them on 

Neil

[Mr. Whippy]

que?

[Neil]

que?

I probably should have quoted the original post  

Sorry for any confusion. 

Neil

[Mr. Whippy]

Are you implying you don't like the word, y'all?

I'm originally from the Left Coast of America and so it was foreign to me as well.  However, over the last decade or so, I've come to the conclusion it is sorely missing from the standard lexicon.

Y'all is extremely handy when referring to a numerically vague, but distinct group of people in a less than all inclusive way.

[BIG-TARGET]

Seriously, y'all are being taken over by flower hugging vegans.

Or operatives of the new world order who must first disarm the public before than can subdue it.

Along with upgrading their Black helicopters

[DaveK]

Good luck Flash.

It's obvious who is right and wrong here, let's hope you can get them to see sense.

[BIG-TARGET]

Good luck Flash.

It's obvious who is right and wrong here, let's hope you can get them to see sense.

In the eyes of a govt. bureaucrat, there is NO right, wrong, just, and/or fair. 

ONLY POWER RULES!!

[Pacu]

We Americans could be headed down the same path. Every year we gotta fight Sarah Brady and her merry bunch for gun rights. Knives can come soon after.

[pocketgecko]

I sure hope not....seems wrong that we have to fight for a documented right.

[Poncho65]

Sorry to hear it Flash Hope everything goes your way in court

[Benner]

This is exactly what I was talking about over in the UK legal thread http://forum.multitool.org/index.php/topic,8384.120.html .  Like I said in there, this is just happening so much now that anything even remotely "tactical" should be purchased from within the UK and Europe.

Tough break mate, I hope you get it all sorted. I don't think I have seen anyone challenge their decision so it will be interesting to see the outcome.

[Grant Lamontagne]

That is really a shame.  I rather suspect in a lot of cases it just depends who at customs is doing the checking.  Spyderco is a pretty popular brand of knife.  They sell them everywhere don't they?
In Canada it used to be and probably still is that if you could flick it open while holding the handle and the blade would snap out into the lock position it was considered to be a gravity knife and illegal.
What confuses me to no end is a few knives that walmart carries like the gerber gator and some of the buck units are capable of gravity opening.  I remember when the gator first came out walmart stopped carrying them because of the way they were shipped from the factory (loose) but then later on they started showing up at their stores again.
 Ballisongs are illegal up here in Canada as are switch blades yet you can buy blade assisted knives and spyderco type opening blades that are alot quicker opening than those "dreaded switchblades and ballisongs" are.
Technology in the knife industry is ever advancing forward like most others too bad laws aren't to support it.  It looks like someone at Customs thought wow neat knife, decided to play with it and decided that they better check it out further and discovered gravity.
Well my friend, if I was the customs officer doing the check I would have tightened it up for you and included a note along with it stating what I had done with respect to the law.  What a waste of material and resource to confiscate it.

Sean

Yes, but.... 

Canadian knife law is basically a footnote to firearms laws, and is quite basic.  No gravity blades (not well defined), no automatic blades (more on that in a minute) and no balisongs.

Bear in mind that I am no great lover of laws or lawmakers, but I have to say that for the most part, Canada has it right.  We have no length restrictions on blades- you can legally wear a 4 foot English broadsword slung on your back in Canada, provided it isn't concealed.  Concealing any blade makes it illegal.  However, since Canadian law is based on mens rea or a "guilty intent" you are protected against having a fixed blade on your belt, then putting a long coat on if it's snowing.  Basically, if you weren't purposely concealing it then you still haven't broken a law, even though the blade isn't visible.

However, the minute you use that blade to threaten, injure or kill someone, it becomes classified as a weapon, regardless of how "legal" it was moments earlier.  The benefit here is that any instrument used to injure, kill or threaten someone is automatically classified as a weapon, whether it be a knife, broken bottle, pipe, chain etc.  In short, something is only a weapon if used as a weapon and assuming it doesn't correspond to any "weapons" as defined by the Canadian Criminal Code.

On to "Automatic Knives" which actually gives me some hope that the government hasn't completely lost it.  Inspired by the US laws against switchblades, which were in turn inspired by Hollywood's early gangster films, switchblades were made illegal because they scared the hell out of people.  The law states that automatic blades are illegal:

"(a) a knife that has a blade that opens automatically by gravity or centrifugal force or by hand pressure applied to a button, spring or other device in or attached to the handle of the knife"

The phrase "hand pressure applied to a button, spring or other device in" is the key.  Technically since there is no button or lever to activate the spring, assisted openers are not illegal, and I have somewhere a document from Canada Customs and Revenue Service that states that.  Usually I send it to whomever I am buying an assisted opener from to print off and include with the knife to guard against overzealous Customs Officers.

Someone high up in CCRA actually put thought into this and realized that an assisted opening knife is no more dangerous than an X-Acto knife and that the hands holding it are the real problem, and decided to take action to not screw over the general populace.

Sorry that's so off topic... Flash, please let me know if there's anything at all I, or the various sites I represent can do to help you out.  You can't let the small minded and membered bureaucrats take away the few rights we all have left, regardless of what flag you live under.

Def

[Grant Lamontagne]

Oh, and I'd consider contacting www.kniferights.org to see if they can offer any support.  They probably can't, but they are good people to know, and besides, the site was designed and built by MondayTech, a company started by our own Esteban "Mcniac" Soler!    In fact, it was on my recommendation and the success of both Multitool.org and SOSAKOnline that Esteban got that contract! 

Def