Sunday, December 7, 2008

Judge upholds domestic violence gun ban

From the Wisconsin Law Journal:
The federal statute making it a crime for a person subject to a domestic violence injunction to possess a firearm does not violate the right to bear arms.

U.S. District Judge Lynn Adelman distinguished the ban from the Washington D.C. gun control law, struck down by the U.S. Supreme Court’s decision in D.C. v. Heller, 128 S.Ct. 2783 (2008).

“Heller held only that the federal government may not forbid possession of handguns for self-defense in the home,” Adelman wrote in a recent decision.

The case involved Kenneth Luedtke, who was charged with a violation of the statute, 18 U.S.C. 922(g)(8). Luedtke moved to dismiss the complaint on Second Amendment grounds, but Judge Adelman denied the motion on Nov. 18.

Adelman relied primarily on the following language in Heller: “Nothing in our opinion should be taken to cast doubt on longstanding prohibitions on the possession of firearms by felons and the mentally ill…” Heller, 128 S.Ct. at 2816-17.

Article here, along with analysis of the judge's decision.

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