Press Releases

Attorneys for three civil rights advocacy organizations and three individuals have filed a petition seeking United State Supreme Court review of a controversial 2017 decision by the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals that upheld an Alameda County, California law effectively banning gun stores within the unincorporated area of the county.

In the request for an injunction, the plaintiffs argue that “they, and many others similarly situated, will suffer irreparable injury if they are forced to comply with the registration requirement in accordance with the Challenged Regulations by the statutory deadline of June 30, 2018. In essence, they and many others would either be illegally forced to register or illegally denied the ability to register their firearms.”

The case, captioned Jeff Silvester, et al. v. California Attorney General Xavier Becerra, seeks to overturn a Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals decision and clarify the standards that all lower courts should use when reviewing Second Amendment lawsuits. Since the Supreme Court’s landmark McDonald v. Chicago decision, state and federal courts throughout the country have used wildly different approaches in scrutinizing laws that burden or eliminate the right to keep and bear arms.

The lawsuit argues that the State’s “bullet-button assault weapon” regulations are largely unlawful, should have been subject to the Administrative Procedure Act process, waste taxpayer dollars, and should not be allowed to stand.

“We are grateful to these amici organizations and their counsel for their support of this case and standing up for constitutional principles,” concluded Combs.

Last Tuesday, the court released a new decision in the case of Teixeira, et al. v. County of Alameda which held that “the Second Amendment does not independently protect a proprietor’s right to sell firearms.”