Akins Accelerator Update
Lots of background on the case here. I noted that one of the directors resigned and cited he did not think case could be won. I got an interesting email this weekend from William Akins. Here’s the text:
To the moderator of Say Uncle. Sorry, I do not know your name.
Please let me know when the registration to join Say Uncle will be back online.
I am the inventor and patent owner of the Akins Accelerator, chairman of the board of Akins Group Inc and the majority voting authority of the corporation since the recent resignation of one of our directors. . Recently Tom Bowers, one of Akins Group Inc’s directors resigned. Following his resignation Mr Bowers posted some unfortunate and ill advised public personal opinion comments on his privately owned website of subguns.com that he believed a court battle against the illegal BATFE 2006-02 ruling could not be won based upon the fact that he believed Akins Group Inc did not have the funds for such a suit. He did not base his opinions upon the fact that the case was without merit, only that he believed Akins Group Inc did not have the sufficient funds. Mr Bowers is certainly entitled to his opinion. However, since his resignation Mr Bowers’ opinions are not the opinions nor the official position of the board of directors of Akins Group Inc.
It is the official position of the board of directors of Akins Group Inc that the efforts to overturn the illegal BATFE ruling will go on. All that has occurred here is that a director of the corporation has resigned and is being replaced.
The battle against this BATFE abuse of power and violation of federal firearms law is actually only just beginning now that a major obstacle is gone that had hindered any actual effective action. I have alway been of the belief that those who would trade liberty for comfort deserve neither.
I would like to join your Say Uncle site as soon as registration is available and set the record straight for the public’s knowledge since posters at your site are incorrectly informed and are making incorrect assumptions and statements concerning Akins Group Inc when they have no idea what the true facts are.
I am in the unique position as the new majority voting authority of Akins Group Inc to know those facts and correctly inform the public in so far as I can in the best interests of the corporation.
I can assure you and the public that Akins Group Inc will continue its efforts to overturn this illegal ruling, and if at some future time Akins Group Inc runs completely out of funds, then I will continue the battle myself as the patent owner and an individual. I will do so whether I receive any help from pro firearm, civil liberty and freedom organizations (none forthcoming so far) or not. I will do so whether a civil case is filed or whether my last remaining future option is civil disobedience with my very freedom and liberty at stake.
At this time Akins Group Inc and myself are actively seeking a law firm to file a large damage suit against the BATFE on a contingency basis. I have firms I am looking into and I would welcome any contact from firms interested in taking this large multi million dollar damage case. They may contact me via my e mail address of…. Akins_Bill – at – yahoo.com
Feel free to post this at your Say Uncle site since I am unable to with your registration feature currently down. I would appreciate it if you would.
Sincerely,
William L. Akins
Note (and I told him this): I don’t really do registration here any more. And comments shut off after a post is seven days old to reduce spam.
December 3rd, 2007 at 12:28 pm
I’m not sure you’re going to be able to get a damage award because of Sovereign Immunity. The government can’t typically be sued for damages arising out of it’s functioning as a government. You can sue on the basis of law to have the determination reviewed by a court, but I don’t see how he overcomes Sovereign Immunity for damages.
December 3rd, 2007 at 8:01 pm
I don’t know if this was covered here back when the BATFE made it’s determination that Akins Accelerators were classified as a machine gun, and closed down Akins and confiscated some Accelerators, but isn’t the technical principle involved the same as bump-firing?
Unless bump-firing is ruled to be a “machine gun”, and I doubt if it could be, since it is a matter of physiology and not the physics of the weapon, the case against the Accelerator ought to be shitcanned.
The only way, physically, that BATFE can win the appeal is to prove that somehow the rulez say that the action of a weapon MUST be fully restrained in a stock, or else it must be defined as a recoil-operated weapon. To my knowledge, there is no such rule. Since the Accelerator works by having the action reciprocate within the stock, but triggering the loaded round is still a function of the finger, shot by shot, the BATFE has badly mis-interpreted the rules of what a full-auto action is.
This is where bump-firing comes in. It is exactly the same physical action as the Accelerator uses, except that the Accelerator is designed to facilitate bump-firing and a Glock is not. Design or no, the rapid-fire capability of both weapons depends on the PHYSIOLOGICAL principle of bump-firing.
As to whether any weapon that is bump-fired becomes a machine gun by definition, the answer is obvious: NO! There is no bumpfiring without the physiological manipulation of the weapon and it’s trigger, both actions of which are controllable as single-fire.
The bottom line is that the Accelerator (and bump-firing) catches the BATFE with their rulez down, and no amount of King Canute attitude will change that.
December 4th, 2007 at 2:01 pm
I’m not sure that will fly in front of a jury…but the real issue was that Atkins & Co. got a ruling from the ATF that their stock was NOT a machine gun. They invested money on that basis…and then ATF jerked the rug out from under them by changing the ruling.
It’s not the first time they’ve done this sort of thing, either.
December 4th, 2007 at 6:55 pm
Unfortunately, Mike, that’s par for the course with the ATFE. An instructive case to see how the ATFE deals with people other than gun-owners is the Tripoli Rocketry Assn. case. ATFE makes up their own testing and standards in contravention of accepted industry practice, uses people with no detectable expertise as witnesses, lies when giving testimony, and moves the goal posts when convenient for them. Sound familiar?