Second Amendment Foundation

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Tackiness

September 1, 2010 by 2 Comments

First off, I am a NRA Life Member. You will also find a recruiting button for the NRA on the sidebar of this blog. That said, for Chris Cox and the NRA to claim credit for the win in McDonald v. Chicago is just plain tacky. To not even mention the role of the Alan Gura and the Second Amendment Foundation just compounds it.

Tom Gresham hit on this in his GunTalk radio show on Sunday and he was right. It just doesn’t sit right. David Codrea has more in his National Gun Rights Examiner column from yesterday.

In terms of strategic Second Amendment litigation, Alan Gura is a master. He picks his plaintiffs with care and he crafts the case to have a narrow – but winnable – focus. One need only compare his follow-on Chicago case, Ezell v. Chicago, with that sponsored by the NRA, Benson v. Chicago. Ezell is focused solely on the gun range issue. Benson takes more of a scatter gun approach and has already been amended once.

In an ideal world, the NRA would focus on the legislative arena where they are really, really good and leave litigation to the Second Amendment Foundation and Alan Gura. The legislative arena calls for an organization that can be the 800-pound gorilla who must sometimes resort to steamroller tactics. Civil rights litigation requires a deft, strategic approach as the courts are not meant for steamroller tactics. With his wins in the Heller and McDonald cases, Alan Gura and – by extension – the Second Amendment Foundation have shown their great ability in Second Amendment litigation. The NRA is the heavy armored division to the SAF/Gura’s Special Forces A-Team. Both are needed to win the war but each should be employed where they will do the most good.

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SAF: Daley, council’s childish arrogance at root of follow-up lawsuits

August 25, 2010 by

From Alan Gottlieb and the Second Amendment Foundation:

Whatever spin Chicago Mayor Richard Daley and the city council wish to offer, it is their stubborn arrogance that has resulted in more gun rights lawsuits filed against the city following the Supreme Court’s June 28 ruling in McDonald v. City of Chicago that essentially nullified the city’s 28-year handgun ban.

The McDonald case – brought by the Second Amendment Foundation and Illinois State Rifle Association with four Chicago residents – resulted in a landmark ruling that incorporated the Second Amendment right to keep and bear arms to the states via the 14th Amendment. SAF and ISRA have now been joined by Action Target, Inc., and two local residents, Rhonda Ezell and Joseph I. Brown to challenge the city’s new gun ordinance, which appears to have been written to purposely provoke more lawsuits.

The city’s childish stubbornness is going to cost taxpayers a small fortune. Mayor Daley and his anti-gun city council adopted what amounts to a “tantrum ordinance” that essentially spits in the high court’s face. Sure, the city adopted an ordinance that – at least on paper – allows Chicago residents to own a handgun, but in reality, it is one huge “Catch 22” that was deliberately crafted to discourage residents from exercising their Second Amendment rights.

The city’s handgun law requires prospective gun owners to undergo training, including at least one hour of actual time on a gun range. However, the ordinance prohibits the operation of gun stores and ranges inside city limits. Additionally, the city requires would-be Chicago gun owners to first obtain a Chicago Firearms Permit (CFP), and an application for that document requires an affidavit signed by a firearm instructor certified by the State of Illinois.

Instructors cannot teach those courses anywhere inside the city because there is no place to conduct that training.

Earlier, the Illinois Association of Firearms retailers and a north suburban gun shop operator sued the city over this ordinance. Now, SAF, ISRA and ATI have brought legal action. Action Target is a Delaware-based company that designs and builds gun ranges, including one in Chicago, in the Federal Reserve Bank building, for use by law enforcement. The company wants to build a gun range in the city for private citizens, but the city’s ordinance makes that impossible.

This sort of thing may be “politics as usual” in the Windy City, but it does not pass the smell test anywhere else. It sends a signal that Chicago authorities believe they are above the Constitution and the rule of law as defined by the Supreme Court. It’s the kind of attitude one sees in a schoolyard bully, suggesting that Mayor Daley and his council cronies are in desperate need of adult supervision.

Perhaps when Mayor Daley was a child, he became accustomed to taking his ball and going home when things did not go his way on the playfield. Since he evidently has never grown up, he believes this conduct is still acceptable in an adult world. The citizens of Chicago have tolerated his juvenile delinquency but that doesn’t mean the rest of the country needs to.

Chicago’s ridiculous gun law is proof positive that the city administration does not take the Supreme Court ruling seriously. The time has come to change that, and that will require the federal courts to spank the city again, since nothing else seems to get the city’s attention.

You do wonder if Hizzonor dah Mayor will deign to issue a response. There is certainly a stimulus plan in effect in Chicago – for lawyers.

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SAF and Alan Gura Go After Chicago….Again

August 16, 2010 by

From the Second Amendment Foundation announcing their lawsuit against the City of Chicago for banning gun ranges:

SAF SUES CHICAGO OVER GUN RANGE PROHIBITION ON 1A, 2A GROUNDS

For Immediate Release: 8/16/2010

CHICAGO, IL – The Second Amendment Foundation (SAF) today filed a lawsuit in federal court against the City of Chicago’s new gun ordinance, asserting that “by banning gun ranges open to the public…under color of law,” the city is depriving citizens of their right to keep and bear arms in violation of the Second Amendment to the U.S. Constitution.

Joining SAF in this lawsuit are the Illinois State Rifle Association (ISRA), Action Target, Inc., and three individual plaintiffs including a retired Chicago police detective. They are represented by attorneys Alan Gura of Virginia and David Sigale of Chicago, who teamed up with SAF and ISRA on the landmark case of McDonald v. City of Chicago, which incorporated the Second Amendment to the states, effectively striking down Chicago’s 28-year-old handgun ban.

“While the city has adopted new regulations that make it legal to own handguns,” said SAF Executive Vice President Alan M. Gottlieb, “they have crafted this new ordinance to make it virtually impossible for prospective gun owners to meet all legal requirements unless they travel outside the city for mandatory training. The new ordinance prohibits public gun ranges inside the city yet the city demands that handgun owners get at least one hour of range training time.

“This is a ‘Catch-22’ scenario,” he continued, “that seems deliberately designed to discourage Chicago residents from exercising their firearm civil rights barely two months after those rights were restored by the Supreme Court.”

Individual plaintiffs are Rhonda Ezell, a victim of three attempted burglaries who has disabilities making it difficult for her to travel outside the city; Joseph Brown, a WWII U.S. Army veteran who was among the liberators of the infamous Dachau concentration camp, and William Hespen, a retired police detective, all of whom must qualify for Chicago Firearms Permits.

Action Target, a Utah-based company, builds shooting ranges and manufactures gun range equipment and supplies. It has a long history of providing gun safety equipment and training, and has previously built law enforcement shooting ranges in Chicago. However, Action Target is prohibited from building a public target range within the city’s limits under the restrictions of the new gun ordinance.

Randy Graham, vice president of Action Target, said, “We believe that citizens have a constitutional right to use and train with firearms in a safe and controlled environment. As a leader in the firearms training industry, Action Target is committed to standing up for these rights.”

“By banning public gun ranges,” Gottlieb said, “and by banning the loan and rental of firearms at such ranges, Chicago is acting under color of law to deprive citizens of their right to keep and bear arms, and to conveniently receive the education required under the ordinance that is necessary to obtain a Chicago Firearms Permit. The city is violating both the Second and First amendments, and we are asking the court to put an end to this nonsense.”

UPDATE: Embedded below is the complaint in Ezell et al v. City of Chicago.

Ezell et al v. Chicago – Complaint

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Washington Post Covers Gura’s Maryland Case

August 15, 2010 by

In a surprisingly sympathetic article, the Washington Post examined the background of Raymond Woollard’s case against the State of Maryland over the denial of his concealed carry permit. The case, Woollard et al v. Sheridan et al, challenges the requirement of the State of Maryland that a person must show “apprehended danger” before being issued a concealed carry permit.

I examined the case back in July here. Mr. Woollard is joined in the case by the Second Amendment Foundation. Alan Gura is joined by Maryland attorney Cary Hansel as the attorneys of record. The case is being brought on both Second and Fourteenth Amendment grounds. One of the key arguments in the complaint is that “Individuals cannot be required to prove their “good and substantial reason” for the exercise of fundamental constitutional rights, including the right to keep and bear arms.”

The Washington Post article describes how Mr. Woollard was the victim of a home invasion on Christmas Eve 2002 and how long he had to wait for police assistance. Mr. Woollard has consistently said it took police 2 1/2 hours to arrive. The Baltimore County police dispute this but did acknowledge it was over an hour. They blamed the rural location, holiday staffing, and bad weather for the slow response time.

Woollard was initially granted a concealed carry permit after this incident which was renewed again in 2005. The intruder turns out to have been his son-in-law who, as the article notes, had “a history of depression, drug and alcohol abuse, and domestic violence.” They do not say whether the intruder is still married to Mr. Woollard’s daughter but do acknowledge that he had served time for violating his probation after the 2002 home invasion. Mr. Woollard said he had not previously publicly identified the intruder as he wanted to protect his daughter.

With regard to the need for concealed carry and response time of the police, Mr. Woollard notes:

“It’s up to me. Do you have to show a reason to have a driver’s license?” Woollard said. Under current law, the only people likely to carry guns are criminals who do not follow the law anyway, Woollard said. “And the police, as good as they are, show up after the fact.”

When asked for comment on the case, the Maryland State Police declined as it was an active case. However, the gun control group CeaseFire Maryland blew off the challenge to Maryland’s concealed carry law saying:

“Good luck to him,” spokesman Casey Anderson said. “I would have a hard time imagining that the Supreme Court is going to say you have a constitutional right to hide a firearm on your person.”

I seem to remember that Mayors Fenty and Daley made similar statements about constitutional rights and the Second Amendment before losing in Heller and McDonald cases respectively. I recommend reading the whole article to get more of the human details of this case.

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Next Gura Target – Westchester County, New York

July 15, 2010 by 2 Comments

Less than two weeks after Alan Gura and the Second Amendment Foundation sued the State of North Carolina, they are back. This time they are suing Westchester County, New York over its enforcement of the State of New York’s handgun carry permit process which requires the showing of “good cause.”

Alan Kachalsky and Christina Nikolov, both residents of Westchester County, were denied handgun carry permits when they applied.

Kachalsky’s denial was because he could not “demonstrate a need for self protection distinguishable from that of the general public.” Nikolov’s was denied because she could not demonstrate that there was “any type of threat to her own safety anywhere.” In addition to Westchester County, Susan Cacace and Jeffrey Cohen, both serving at times as handgun permit licensing officers, are named as defendants. The lawsuit was filed in U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York, White Plains Division.

 The case is Kachalsky v. Cacase, U.S. Dist. Ct. S.D. NY 10-05413.

I will post the complete complaint as soon as it is available in Pacer.

Way to go Alan and Alan! Taking it solidly into unfriendly territory takes guts.

UPDATE: Mr. Kachalsky first sued in New York state court on this issue. It reached the NY State Court of Appeals (the highest level in the state of New York). His appeal was denied in February 2010. The case, In the Matter of Alan Kachalsky v. Susan Cacace, SSD 4 (2010), was dismissed by the Court sua sponte (without a request for a motion) saying there was no substantial constitutional issue involved . However, one of the judges dissented.
 
In his dissent, Judge Robert Smith said:

Petitioner’s argument, rejected by the courts below, is that Penal Law
§ 400.00 (2) (f), which requires “proper cause” for the issuance of a license to carry a concealed pistol or revolver, violates the Second Amendment to the United States Constitution. Two constitutional questions are directly involved: (1) whether the Second Amendment limits the powers of the states, as well as of the federal government; and (2) whether a prohibition on carrying concealed weapons without a showing of proper cause is consistent with the Second Amendment. I make no comment on the merits of either issue, except to say that neither is insubstantial.

He went on to say that the first question was substantial enough that the US Supreme Court had accepted the McDonald case and the second question was undoubtedly substantial due to the Heller decision.

Judge Smith’s dissent in the matter was considered a relatively rare occurance. Joel Stashenko analyzed his dissent for law.com here and includes comments from other legal scholars.

UPDATE II: The full complaint in Kachalksy v. Cacace, U.S. Dist. Ct. S.D. NY, is here. The case has been assigned to Judge Cathy Seibel, an appointee of George W. Bush.

I have embedded the case filing below. It includes the case number and judge assignment on it.

Kachalsky Et Al v. Cacace Et Al – Complaint With Judge Assignment