Bayonet Question

[williamisthe1]

I recently bought a bayonet Ultratech but in TX dagger and double edge blades are illegal to carry if I dull the back side does that make it no longer a bayonet and legal to carry? Also is this a good idea to do? Thanks

 

[zzyzzogeton]

I personally think you would be better off returning the knife and get something else that is currently else that would be legal in Texas.

To get it dull enough on the spine to qualify as "legal", you would probably need to grind off AT LEAST 1/32", most likely closer to 1/16". Even then, the rest of the "bayonet" grind would leave you open to being charged with carrying an illegal knife. Not that the charge would stick by the time it reached the DA level, but you would be out the time spent in the pokey, money for bail, money for a lawyer to fight the charge if the DA didn't drop it right away without filing. And then there would be whatever you were doing at the time the LEO decided the "some other nefarious shenanigan" you were up to that caused him to stop and search you in the first place.

Grinding off enough of the spine to get it to "Texas Legal" status would definitely void the warranty, and, if you check the GBU forum, you'll see that Microtech has a poor record on warranty work when the knife is still in warranty with no mods at all.

My recommendation is return it, and get a different knife from someone other than Microtech. Good looks don't make a good knife.

 

[killgar]

I don't know Texas law, but I think Zzyzzogeton gave very good advice.

Like my attorney has often told me regarding such hypothetical attempts to outwit the law- "We might beat the charge in court, but you'll go through a lot of crap before that happens".

I wonder, does the Texas statute just say "double-edged", or does it specifically define "double-edged" as "having two sharpened edges". When it come to the law, the devil is in the details. If the law just says "double-edged" with no reference to the edges being sharp, then one might have a tougher time beating the charge in court if both sides of the blade are ground into "edges", even if one "edge" is completely dull.

And this reminds me of another conversation with my attorney regarding whether or not there was a previous case, and case law, to define some question about knives I was asking, I asked him "Is there any case law?", and he answered "No. Do YOU want to be the case law?". My answer was a very definite NO. With the criminal justice system, sometimes, even when you win, you still lose.

If the law is at all vague, don't push your luck. It doesn't pay to test the law or the criminal justice system. The advice I have given to many is - "When your freedom is on the line, and you're facing the risk of thousands of dollars in fines and court costs, go the extra mile to stay out of trouble".

 

[zzyzzogeton]

Texas law specifies daggers, dirks, poniards and Bowie knives as being illegal in addition to any knife with a blade greater than 5.5" being illegal.

There is no legal, re: Texas law, definition of a dagger, a dirk, a poniard or a Bowie knife. Using Webster, or any other dictionary, a dagger is described (paraphrasing here) as being a double edged knife with a symettrical or nearly symettrical, blade. A dirk is simply a "short" dagger. A poniard is just the French word for dagger.

So in essence, the Texas law makes illegal any dagger, short dagger or French dagger, along with Bowie knives.

There is Texas case law that defines blade length as the straight line measurement of a blade from the tip to the guard, or where the guard would be if said knife were to be madd with a guard.

There is also case law kinda defining what double edged means - any amount, as little as 1/2 inch, of the spine being "sharpened" as making a knife "double edged", with no definition of what "sharp" means. Don't you just love the way they write laws? And judicial opinions?

With respect to "Bowie knife definitions", there are none, but 1 judge is quoted (again paraphrasing), "I can't tell you what a Bowie knife is, but I know one when I see one."

Some LEOs go by the same justification - they know "one" when they see one, whatever the "one" may be at the time.

I've only had one LEO ask me specifically if the knife I was using at the time was a dagger. It was a symettrical spear point 5"blade. I had already used it and put it up by the time he asked, so I asked him if it was alright to go ahead and pull it out again (just to make sure I couldn't be tagged with "brandishing". He said, "Go ahead."

I pulled it out, held it up and said, "Yes, it is symettrical like a dagger, but a dagger is sharp on both sides." And commenced to beat the hell out of my forearm with the spine. And then I said, "See, not sharp. Not a dagger. Not gonna do that with the other side, though."

He just laughed and said "Yep, not a dagger."

Most Texas LEOs are cool about knives, unless you are being an idiot, already being looked at for some reason, etc. They don't carry rulers with them. The ones I've spoken to about measuring blades say they use a dollar bill, which is nearly 6" long. As long as the knife is less than a dollar bill long, they don't worry about it, again unless you are being a doofus or did something else criminal.

The only dickhead LEOs I have encountered have been not Texas natives. Not saying all nonTexas native Texas LEOs have a knife problem, but the ones that do, have brought their damnyankee attitudes with them from NY/NJ/CN/MA.

And yes, damnyankee is a word in Texas, and can be used as either a noun or an adjective.