Meramec River Shooting

[lee G.]

you been drinking terrierman, i think you are failing the field test?

[Guest]

Deleted

[strangercreek]

Alot of aspects here sicken me, the fact that his wife and son(stepson?) saw him shot....and what is the guy who was wielding the rocks feeling? I would sure as hell feel like I had a huge part in escalating the situation and contributing to getting my friend shot. That would be a difficult pill to swallow for the rest of one's life....really sad.

I still can't get through the fact that there were probably children around (in a group of 50 there had to be), they will have that image in their heads for life also. I know I remember major stuff from when I was really young, something like that sticks with you.

[Feathers and Fins]

Here is a question for you:

If you come home one night to what should be your empty quiet house and see that there is someone in your home... You can see through the window that they are alone and are robbing you.

You have a handgun, know how to use it, and carry all the proper certifications for it. What do you do?

If your answer is anything besides get the heck out of there and call the authorities, then you have a problem... I've posed this question to a lot of gun carriers and you would be surprised at the answers. It is just property, cowboy.

The correct answer is Call law enforcement, and wait outside for them. But the problem in your scenario is most do not leave their windows open, criminals avoid lines of sight so the odds of it happening that way are astronomical. So what do you do if you walk in on a criminal invasion? Odds are he will run you will be shocked and you will be calling 911 and not have a good description. Even with a high amount of training and preparation the shock still causes the flight response in most people. But worse those who have the macho streak in them and do pull the weapon will likely fire very inaccurately and possible strike an innocent.

I have trained and worked with trained people on scenarios like this and when startled not expecting something even some of the most highly trained shooters have a 3 to 5 second reaction delay. Now once they settle in something will die. It is not like you see in Hollyweirds movies! People think of it like they see in tactical breaches and the two scenarios are so different, in a tactical they are expecting and ready for it and trained for it. In a surprise home encounter the person is not.

Not sure what all this had to do with the subject at hand though!

The more I have read online and heard on news accounts the more I have questions about the entire situation. Why did the floaters remain? Why did the guy not just call LEO? What are the clear laws on property rights? I think this case may open some serious questions on several issues.

[hank franklin]

If protecting the serenity of this theoretical family's gravel bar is that important to them, then THEY should have bought that farm to keep the outfitter away. If they can't figure out how buy that farm and the next, then maybe they can't afford what they wish they could.

If the outfitter wants a gravel bar for his hordes to congregate on, the outfitter should buy the gravel bar.

[Justin Spencer]

If the outfitter wants a gravel bar for his hordes to congregate on, the outfitter should buy the gravel bar.

I don't care if they have it or not.

[Al Agnew]

Guys, you can't lay all this on the outfitters. Outfitters rent boats the same way Avis rents cars. Once the person takes possession of the car, it's their responsibility, not Avis. The outfitter can't be on the river with the dorks. They can make them sign stuff saying they won't litter or whatever, they can give them litter bags, they can warn them about testy landowners (as most of them do), but they can't police them.

The ONLY thing that could be done concerning the outfitters is to limit the number of watercraft they can put onto a given stretch of river each day. That is most certainly done in some states on some waterways, so it's apparently legal and constitutional. But for the most part it's only done on a few select stream sections. Montana does it on the Smith River, but as far as I know that's the only stream in Montana to have such restrictions. Most of the restricted streams are probably run by the federal government as national parks, such as the Colorado through the Grand Canyon. With the kind of political climate we've always had in Missouri, that would be a tough thing to do on any of the rivers except the Current, Jacks Fork, and Eleven Point.

When we talked about a lot of this before, I and others suggested a tax of some kind on rental watercraft, added as a surcharge to the customers, the proceeds going toward a much greater water patrol presence. There was a lot of opposition to that on here at the time. But I suspect that's the only way to get a handle on the undeniably horrific behavior of a very significant portion of the renters on some streams, unless somebody can come up with another, more palatable way of raising the funds necessary to effectively patrol the rivers. I think there are probably enough laws already on the books to allow a real patrol presence to settle things down...drunk and disorderly, possession of alcohol by minors, lewd public conduct. Also, although many canoe rentals already have this, make it a law that each rental watercraft be very clearly marked with the name of the outfitter and the number of the watercraft, AND have the outfitter match up the renter of record (the one who signs the waiver at the top) with the number. And publicize that this is happening, and that anyone who sees illegal conduct by somebody in that watercraft will be able to report it and it will be traced back to the person who rented it. Now this won't really solve a whole lot, but it might make some of the river dorks behave a bit better if they know that they could be reported. I'll leave it to the outfitter guys on here to say whether that's at all feasible...it may not be.

[id10t]

If the outfitter wants a gravel bar for his hordes to congregate on, the outfitter should buy the gravel bar.

So if this could happen and the outfitter bought the gravel bar from the land owner and the next flood moved the gravel bar to the next land owners property would the outfitter still own it ? Would the gravel bar not have the same assumed risk of loss for both the landowner and the outfitter. Could the outfitter sue the landowner for a piece of real property since he lost the gravel bar he bought. Better yet could he file theft charges against the land owner he bought the gravel bar from when mother nature steals it? Kinda makes you go HMMMMM what if?

I may be wrong but the whole point of the high water mark ruling has something to do with the fact that a river bed does not nor will it ever stay the same.

Rivers are always in a state of change.

We just had a case in Arkansas where the property line was the river. During the 2008 floods the river changed course. One land owner felt the line should have stayed where it was when he purchased the property thus cutting the other landowner out of river frontage. The other landowner wanted his river frontage back. Fences went up fences got torn down by both parties. So in the end the second landowner not only gained land but kept his riverfront because the deeds used the river as a property line. Maybe during the next flood it will go the other way.

HUMOR FULLY INTENDED AGAIN

[Justin Spencer]

Most of those things Al suggested are already in place in areas that are in Mark Twain forest, and I don't believe any more permits will be issued to new operations. I am limited to 120 boats at our main put in site in National Forest, but I can put in as many as I want from my campground to my take out. National Scenic Riverways are all limited, although the limits are obviously pretty high. We are required to have outfitter stickers and numbers on each vessel. We know our picky landowners on this river and have told them to get a number from any problem floaters and we will deal with them, water patrol also uses these numbers to keep track of illegal activity so they can issue tickets.

On rivers with only private put ins and takeouts, or on MDC areas I don't think there are any regulations,

[Fishslayer88]

I really do not like the idea of more law enforcement on the rivers, more patrol less privacy IMO there is nothing more annoying then getting half way through a shoal and being forced into the bank by a water patrol jetboat just to check licenses and poke around in a cooler. Unless a patrol boat was at that gravel bar i don't think things would have went any different.