CA "safe gun list" lawsuit

[subdjoe]

SAF, CALGUNS FOUNDATION CHALLENGES CALIFORNIA HANDGUN BAN SCHEME
For Immediate Release: 4/30/2009
BELLEVUE, WA and REDWOOD CITY, CA – The Second Amendment Foundation, The Calguns Foundation and four California residents today filed a lawsuit challenging a California state law and regulatory scheme that arbitrarily bans handguns based on a roster of “certified” handguns approved by the State. This case parallels a similar case filed in Washington, DC, Hanson v. District of Columbia.


California uses this list despite a ruling by the U.S. Supreme Court last summer that protects handguns that ordinary people traditionally use for self-defense, and a recent ruling by the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals that the Second Amendment applies to state and local governments. The California scheme will eventually ban the purchase of almost all new handguns.


Attorney Alan Gura, representing the plaintiffs in this case, noted that California “tells Ivan Peña that his rights have an expiration date based on payment of a government fee. Americans are not limited to a government list of approved books, or approved religions,” he said. “A handgun protected by the Second Amendment does not need to appear on any government-approved list and cannot be banned because a manufacturer does not pay a special annual fee.”


“The Para Ordnance P-13 was once approved for sale in California,” Peña noted, “but now that a manufacturer didn’t pay a yearly fee, California claims the gun I want to own has somehow become ‘unsafe’.”


“The Glock-21 is the handgun I would choose for home defense, but California has decided the version I need is unacceptable. I was born without a right arm below my elbow and therefore the new ambidextrous version of the Glock-21 is the safest one for me. The identical model designed for right hand use is available in California, but I can’t use it,” said plaintiff Roy Vargas.


Added SAF founder Alan Gottlieb, “The Supreme Court’s decision is crystal clear: Handguns that are used by people for self-defense and other lawful purposes cannot be banned, whether the State likes it or not. California needs to accept the Second Amendment reality.”


Co-counsel Jason Davis remarked, “The California Handgun Roster has always been about making the possession of handguns for self defense more difficult by imposing arbitrary and unconstitutional restrictions that limit choice and increase the cost of exercising a fundamental right.”


Joining plaintiffs Peña and Vargas are Doña Croston and Brett Thomas. Doña Croston’s handgun would be allowed if it were black, green, or brown, but her bi-tone version is supposedly ‘unsafe’ merely based on color. “I didn’t realize that my constitutional rights depended on color. What is it about two colors that makes the gun I want to purchase ‘unsafe’?”


Brett Thomas seeks to own the same model of handgun that the Supreme Court ordered District of Columbia officials to register for Dick Heller. However, that particular model is no longer manufactured, and its maker is no longer available to process the handgun’s certification through the bureaucracy.


“There is only one model of handgun that the Supreme Court has explicitly ruled is protected by the Second Amendment and yet California will not allow me to purchase that gun,” said Mr. Thomas.


“The so-called ‘safe’ gun list is just another gun-grabbing gimmick,” said co-counsel Donald Kilmer. “California can’t get around the Second Amendment, as incorporated, by declaring most normal guns ‘unsafe,’ and gradually shrinking the number of so-called ‘safe’ guns to zero.”


The Second Amendment Foundation (www.saf.org) is the nations oldest and largest tax-exempt education, research, publishing and legal action group focusing on the Constitutional right and heritage to privately own and possess firearms. Founded in 1974, The Foundation has grown to more than 600,000 members and supporters and conducts many programs designed to better inform the public about the consequences of gun control. SAF has previously funded successful firearms-related suits against the cities of Los Angeles; New Haven, CT; and San Francisco on behalf of American gun owners, a lawsuit against the cities suing gun makers and an amicus brief and fund for the Emerson case holding the Second Amendment as an individual right.

-END-

[The Big Dog]

This suit was lined up and ready to go just waiting for Nordyke to give us incorporation within the Ninth Circuit.

This may take a few years to litigate, but the first nail has been driven into the coffin of that damnable list. The work that the Calguns Foundation, led by Gene Hoffman, has done for all of us California gun owners over the past few years has been simply astounding.

For all you firearm owners out there I strongly encourage donations to the Calguns Foundation, which you can learn more about at www.calguns.net.

[subdjoe]

May 12, 2009 20:12:50 GMT -5 @1 said:

I don't get why they are "safe" for police, but not for regular citizens. Logically, wouldn't you want to keep "unsafe" guns OUT of police hands to prevent lawsuits?

I wish those that came up with this law could explain why these guns are "safe" for police to buy.

They can't. Never could. It was an end run around the Second Amendment, designed to force manufactureres to ship fewer firearms to CA. The real irony is that POS guns like Ravens, Brycos, Jennings, and such, the ones that are most used in crimes, are so poorly made and machined that they could pass the tests with ease. But many of the well made dependable ones couldn't, the tolerances of the machining were too tight.

Plus, why would the finish, blued v. stainless, make a difference in the safety? Same for barrel length (if a model was produced with 2, 3, 4, 5, 6 and 7 inch barrels, each one is considered a different model and the manufacturer has to submit three of each for testing. And, the testing costs somewhere between 600 & 1500 bucks for each - might be more now, been a while). Plus the feel paid to the state of CA and renewed every two years to keep the model on the list.

This was just one of many ways that the liberals who run CA were attempting to disarm average honest citizens and concentrate power in the hands of the State.

[subdjoe]

Big Dog, check me on this, but I think that there were exemptions written into the law to prevent such lawsuits. The way that LE is exempted from many of the regs about guns in CA.

[The New Guy]

uh, er, duh, cuz um, we ain't not as smart as uh, er, dem fancy politshuns, er, like um, nancy pelosi and uh, harry reid, and uh, da police so, um we can't not um ah be as trusted um as much.




btw, i was back at the range this weekend. tried out the springfield XD. pretty nice!

took my daughter. it was her first time shooting. she was a bit nervous at first because it was a .45 but she absolutely loved it. she now has a healthy respect for gun and isn't afraid of them as so many of the gun grabbers are.

[harpman1]

If we win the suit, can we buy the fabulous Russian Makarov in Ca. again?

Great pistol, that "failed" the "drop test".

[The Big Dog]

No such exemption to suit exists that I know of. What would need to happen is for a LEO to blast someone with a non-rostered handgun that he purchased himself or that the department purchased for him, and have that blasting be found to be some fault of the weapon, rather than the LEO.

Even when I was a LEO and could purchase off roster, I no longer can, I argued that it was a ridiculous ploy and a violation of equal protection.

Apparently some people agreed with me.

[The Big Dog]

Interestingly enough, and on the subject of suits, I learned this morning that there was a suit recently dismissed under PLCAA where the family of a boy killed by a department issued Beretta 92 wielded by the son of a sheriff's deputy, was suing because the weapon did not include a magazine disconnector. The case was from Illinois.

The magazine disconnector is a device that makes a pistol inoperative when the magazine is removed. Some makes and models have it, some don't. LEOs and LEAs tend to not want that feature because you can't fire the weapon in an emergency with the magazine out. While it seems trivial, if you are in a position where you need to fire that one shot and you can't... it's a problem.

In California, LEOs and LEAs can buy handguns without that feature. The rest of us can not. The state mandates that we must buy weapons with magazine disconnectors, loaded chamber indicators and (of course) holding magazines with no more than ten shot that the manufacturers have paid a fee (extortion) once every couple of years to have it remain on the list.

So if the handgun is deemed "unsafe" because it is not on the roster, how or why is it that LEOs and LEAs can or should buy it?

[The New Guy]

LEOs should be able to buy weapons w/o disconnectors for the reason the BD pointed out. you and i should also be able to buy the same weapon for the exact same reason.

if you find yourself in the exact situation that BD implies you are going to say to yourself , "damn, too bad i'm not an LEO" just before you get shot because you cannot return fire without a mag.

[The Avenger]

I've just about had it with these pansy ass liberals. Before yo know it they will want us to have guns laws that require you to send a written request signed by the local sheriff and two witnesses to Sacramento and wait for approval via the US mail system before firing a single round.

[The Big Dog]

The case in question is Pena v Cid, in United States District Court for the Eastern District of California.... aka Sacramento.

Since the decision by the Ninth Circuit to take Nordyke v. King to an en banc hearing before a panel of 11 judges, Pena v. Cid has had to stand aside a bit as it relies heavily on Nordyke's holding that Amendment Two is enforceable against state and local government. The en banc hearing for the Nordyke case is, I believe, scheduled for September. The review was not asked for by either party, but rather by one of the judges on the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals. Presumably we could have a yay or nay on Nordyke by the end of the year. Until that happens, the holding of Nordyke is in suspense and can not be cited as case law.

The Pena case is in it's very early stages. Nowhere near trial yet. What is interesting is that the District of Columbia was able to summary judgement out of a mirror suit to Pena against the District by admitting that their use of California's list was ridiculously crafted on face, was pretty much indefensible post Heller and re-wrote their own regulations yet again.

That move by DC no doubt made a few buttholes in the state DOJ's Bureau of Firearms slam shut reflexively.