Richards v Prieto answering brief filed

[RKV]

"THE SECOND AMENDMENT IS INAPPLICABLE TO PUBLIC AREAS IN CITIES"

Didn't see that exception in the 2nd Amendment - maybe you guys can point it out to me? /s

"INTERMEDIATE SCRUTINY WOULD ALSO BE MET"

"The very enumeration of the right takes out of the hands of government—even the Third Branch of Government—the power to decide on a case-by-case basis whether the right is really worth insisting upon. A constitutional guarantee subject to future judges’ assessments of its usefulness is no constitutional guarantee at all. Constitutional rights are enshrined with the scope they were understood to have when the people adopted them, whether or not future legislatures or (yes) even future judges think that scope too broad." Heller v. DC

"UNLOADED DOES NOT MEAN USELESS"

Hammers and clubs are weapons too, right? Which is what unloaded guns are. Hammers and clubs that is. This is such a good idea in fact, that I propose that we apply UOC to the police in the performance of their duties. What's good for the citizen is good for our employees imo.

[Rossi357]

Bartender, bartender, lend me your ear.
I can't...someone shot it off.

[Librarian]

I also liked

Moreover, the notion that an unloaded gun is a useless gun, such that the Second Amendment necessarily entails the right to bear be of loaded arms, is unsupported by any facts or common sense.

[Crom]

I agrees with Olecuss, although factually wrong about many things, probably one of the better written anti-briefs.

Can't wait for the anti's arguments to be crushed wholesale by SCOTUS.

[proclone1]

Oh ok, try telling that to LE and tell them they don't need to carry loaded anymore, because Hey it's not the wild west anymore! Also, be sure to take away their service pistol Glocks because turns out, modern pistols don't need percussion caps anymore and there is no such thing as carrying a glock that's loaded but uncocked and with the safety-lever on (omg do not trot out the picture of those rare semi-prototype decocker'd glocks).

All the writers of this drivel have to do is youtube search any of the numerous videos of self-defense shootings during robberies or police-shooting videos (i'm thinking specifically of the police who get ambushed by criminals) and tell those victims that they had time to load their weapon before it would have been too late.

[MindBuilder]

Perhaps a good way to expose the absurdity of this idea that being loaded and ready for a quick draw is not important, would be to find excerpts from official police, security guard, and private firearm training manuals, that emphasize the need to be ready and practiced for a quick draw.

[mag360]

were they high on some davis loco weed when theey wrote this? It's comical to read through. They are going down.

[Maestro Pistolero]

Speed of firing is absolutely part of the constitutional criterion. I would agree with that statement and plaintiff's 'own definition', and so does the Heller decision. Remember the court said a gun must be ready for 'immediate use for self defense' in the process of invalidating the trigger-lock ordinance. Unloaded doesn't even come close to clearing the constitutional bar.

Many guns in the mainstream of common use have no external safety, unless one views a trigger mechanism as an external safety. For example, garden variety double action revolvers.

To argue that it is constitutional to require a safety be engaged on a handgun would be to argue that the carrying of the one pistol that's in the most common use by police agencies and citizens could be banned.

The uncontroverted safest way to carry a 1911 ready for defense is cocked and locked, unless one thinks lowering the hammer manually on a live round is a safe practice. Indeed, unless a 1911 is cocked, the safety cannot even be engaged.

This argument fails totally. Otherwise Glocks, 1911s, and double-action revolvers would all be found unconstitutional to carry in ready condition for self-defense.

[wildhawker]

That's why so many people carry glocks, no need to fuss with a cocking mechanism or safety, just draw and pull the trigger.

[sighere]

I can't wait to see the point by point rebuttal from AG! Heck, I could rip that brief to shreds, Alan could make mince meat pie out of it!

[DeanW66]

Hmm, too much of a stretch I know but.........


maybe not an anti-?

[Sgt Raven]

On the other hand I have a MSK safety installed on my carry Glock G23. It may give me time to live if some dirt-bag gets a hold of it.

[wildhawker]

On the other hand I have a MSK safety installed on my carry Glock G23. It may give me time to live if some dirt-bag gets a hold of it.

If I had a gun with a safety, then I've already flipped it off and engaged the target (having identified one); at such point in time, if they were to take the firearm from me it [the safety] wouldn't be a factor (as it's already off). If I'm dumb and incompetent enough to allow someone to take my firearm from my holster, then I get what I get.

I love my safetied 1911s et al, but I want "ID threat>draw>confirm>engage>end encounter" my only tasks in the critical path.

-Brandon

[sandman21]

If this were to result in another ruling that UOC satisfies the constitutional burden, I don't see how the UOC ban, if signed, could last a week before a preliminary injunction would be issued. If we get good case law that OC is protected, then the unloaded requirement is history in the making, per Heller.
Wouldn't that be rich irony? If the overreach of the legislature caused UOC to become LOC with nothing they could do about it. Bwahahahahahah! At that point, I predict a stampede toward shall-issue.
Again, if there's one thing an anti-gunner despises more than knowing their fellow citizens are freely armed, it's actually having to SEE the damn things.

You can still UOC a rifle when AB144 is signed, this will satisfy the 2A, pure folly to think that a ban on UOC will give us a form of carry any faster.

I do like how they argued that I can LOC in my front yard.

[fatirishman]

There are a couple of vulnerabilities here, although I think they did a pretty good job - actually, this is one of the very few anti-gun briefs that is non-risible. First of all, by invoking Tombstone, AZ they inadvertently move the time frame to the Reconstruction era - where the history is much clearer about the intent on the part of the framers of the 14th Amendment to include the possession of arms, etc. - and there is ample case law from the era which holds that the restrictions on carrying arms are judicially to be construed as prohibitions on blacks and other undesireables, not as general prohibitions. Additionally and relatedly, it is no small irony that the UOC statute that they claim is perfectly suitable would have been, c. 1880 or so, more honestly entitled An Act to Disarm Negroes Hindering Law Enforcement (curtailing the 2nd, and arguably 1st, Amendment rights of the Black Panthers and others engaging in direct action for civil rights and against LE abuse was the clear intent of the law). Also, they open up a can of worms by somewhat dishonestly citing the stats regarding cops shot and removing, as best I can tell, from the denominator routine traffic deaths - which of course puts guns up there as a lot of officer deaths because it is followed by stabbings and heart attacks (some years literally by heart attacks). All in all, though, one is reminded of the immediate post-Brown era, when lower courts - presumably more out of laziness than malice - tried to limit Brown to only schools, etc.