Plaintiff in gun ban case sues D.C. over new laws

Dick Heller, one of three D.C. residents who filed the suit in D.C. federal court, argued in court documents that the city’s new laws continue to violate citizens’ Second Amendment right to own a handgun for self-defense.

The District’s leaders seemed to go out of their way to flout the high court’s decision and invite more legal challenges, said attorney Stephen P. Halbrook.

“[The District] lost the case. They need to move on,” Halbrook said. “Instead, it seems like they are intentionally writing the new law to obstruct the Supreme Court.”

The lawsuit challenges the District’s  requirement of trigger locks for revolvers and continued refusal to allow residents to keep semiautomatic handguns.

Police earlier this month denied Heller’s application to register a Colt Model 1911 semiautomatic pistol on the basis that the pistol constituted a “machine gun,” the lawsuit states.

Under D.C. law, any weapon that has the capability to fire 12 rounds without reloading is considered a “machine gun.”

The District considers a semiautomatic firearm that shoots fewer than 12 shots without reloading, such as Heller’s World War I-era Colt, to be a machine gun under the theory that it “can be readily converted or restored to shoot” more than 12 shots, the lawsuit said.

The definition essentially prevents the usage of all handguns except revolvers, the lawsuit alleges.

“That’s a very weird definition,” Halbrook said. “It’s the only one like it in the world.”

One of the three plaintiffs, Amy McVey, the first D.C. citizen to register a handgun this month, is also suing over the District’s requirement that handguns be kept secured by a trigger lock or in a gun safe. D.C. requires that the handguns be kept secured unless there’s the “perceived threat of immediate harm to a person.”

That standard not only prevents residents from using their handguns to protect themselves in their homes, but it prohibits them from cleaning their weapon, Halbrook said.

smccabe@dcexaminer.com