Assault Weapons Are WMD?

That's how possession of an AR-15 is described in the Wilmington Star News (h/t Anti-Idiotarian Rottweiler).

A 17-year-old Swansboro High School student was in jail Friday on $1 million bond after being charged with having a weapon of mass destruction - an assault rifle - on the school's campus.

North Carolina General Statute 14-288.8 (c) states that a weapon of mass death and destruction is:

(1) Any explosive or incendiary:
a. Bomb; or
b. Grenade; or
c. Rocket having a propellant charge of more than four ounces; or
d. Missile having an explosive or incendiary charge of more than one-quarter ounce; or
e. Mine; or
f. Device similar to any of the devices described above; or

(2) Any type of weapon (other than a shotgun or a shotgun shell of a type particularly suitable for sporting purposes) which will, or which may be readily converted to, expel a projectile by the action of an explosive or other propellant, and which has any barrel with a bore of more than one-half inch in diameter; or

(3) Any firearm capable of fully automatic fire, any shotgun with a barrel or barrels of less than 18 inches in length or an overall length of less than 26 inches, any rifle with a barrel or barrels of less than 16 inches in length or an overall length of less than 26 inches, any muffler or silencer for any firearm, whether or not such firearm is included within this definition. For the purposes of this section, rifle is defined as a weapon designed or redesigned, made or remade, and intended to be fired from the shoulder; or

(4) Any combination of parts either designed or intended for use in converting any device into any weapon described above and from which a weapon of mass death and destruction may readily be assembled.

Now, from what I remember, the standard AR-15 is about 40 inches in length (more than a foot over the 26 inch length requirement in the statute), and the barrel would be either 20 inches or 24 inches (either being over the 16 inches mentioned in the statute). Also, the bore of the barrel of an AR-15, even if customized to a new caliber, would still be under the one-half inch requirement. If the rifle had been customized with a shorter barrel, then an AR-15 may meet the legal definition of a weapon of mass death and destruction, but I'm not sure how a normal AR-15 would otherwise meet the definition as it exists currently in the North Carolina statutes.

And, of course, as soon as I saw the quote from the Wilmington Star News police blotter page, I had the same thought as Emperor Misha I:

We may be going out on a limb here, but we feel fairly certain that Saddam had more than just a modest amount of "assault rifles", so it would seem that he DID, indeed, have WMDs.

At least according to the Idiotarians at The Wilmington Star.

Check out the press releases at Multi-National Force - Iraq or U.S. Central Command regarding the weapons caches found on a regular basis by our forces in Iraq. I'm telling you, according to the definition of North Carolina GS 14-288.8 (c), we are finding WMDs all over Iraq.

USMC 9971 OUT