The United States Supreme Court Justices rejected an appeal Tuesday from Remington Arms that argued a 2005 federal law shields firearms manufacturers from most lawsuits when their products are used in crimes. The Protection of Lawful Commerce in Arms Act, PLCAA, is a law crafted to protect manufacturers from being sued for misuse of their product.

Depending upon the specific language in the appeal rejection and on how the lawsuit proceeds going forward this has the potential to hamstring several industries, not just firearms. The most obvious are alcohol and tobacco, vehicles are also vulnerable from the marketing standpoint. Every vehicle advertised with high speed turns, off road antics, or as a status symbol of some sort, that later results in death or injury would be at risk of paying out huge sums for implying improper use.

A pillar of the Sandy Hook lawsuit is that the advertisement of the Bushmaster XM15 by Remington caused or encouraged the behavior of the mass shooter who used it, Lanza.

The ad most often mentioned is this one. Reissuing the “man card” was a tongue and cheek push back against the ‘dumb dad’ advertisement wave that often portrayed men as goofy clumsy buffoons totally useless to women and just another child to take care of. Men were not providers, they were not protectors, they weren’t even an equal part parent in nearly every portrayal in every industry ad.

The ad is cheesy and a little low brow. Inferring that Lanza took it to mean murder his mother, six elementary school staff, and 20 children however, that is what the Sandy Hook suit is alleging. It also aims to give credence to the argument that the AR-15 and its ilk are especially dangerous and should be prohibited from citizen ownership.

The lawsuit is all about providing the legal stepping stone for a ban. It cannot redress the murders.

Why is this on a gun blog?

Simple.

Guns are often the target of civil asset forfeitures and are written into many states laws specifically as targets. A civil infraction or misdemeanor crime that already carries a prescribed penalty, fines or time, automatically also subject vehicle, firearms, and other property even tangentially connected to the case to forfeiture by the state. A parking ticket or running a red light or driving with a light out on your car could cost you your gun, even if that isn’t a specific penalty of the offense.

That’s how forfeiture works. “All your base now belong to us” if the property was ‘suspected’ being related to the crime or offense in some manner that property is now the state’s, not that it was part of the fine or penalty after conviction.

From Reason

The Eighth Amendment prohibition against excessive fines and fees applies to states as well, SCOTUS rules, opening a new way to challenge outlandish forfeitures.

States are bound by the Eighth Amendment’s prohibition against excessive fines and fees when they seek to seize property or other assets from individuals charged or convicted of a crime, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled unanimously on Wednesday.

It’s a decision that hands a major victory to critics of civil asset forfeiture, and it opens another avenue to legal challenges against that widely used (and often abused) practice by which states and local governments can seize cars, cash, homes, and pretty much anything else that is suspected of being used to commit a crime.

Here’s how that did work/could work.

I get pulled over for ________ reason. Officer discovers AR pistol and a stock in my car, not even together. Suspected NFA violation carries a felony charge with a 10 year sentence and $250,000 fine. My lawyer calls bullshit, prosecutor agrees, I walk away my ticket instead of all the bad thing convictions… except the state kept my truck, my legal carried pistols, and all the stuff in my truck because it was connected to the commision of a crime.

They just kept them, they’re the state’s now. That’s how civil asset forfeiture has been used. It’s utter bullshit.

The ‘conceived’ notion is that Dougie McDruggiedealer gets picked up for heroin distribution and is going to prison. The state has license to recoup costs and generate revenue off his souped up drug runner sports car, weapons, stash house, etc. To ‘further aid the community’ and things along those lines. Sometimes that works. But opening a revenue stream where the accountability bar is so ridiculously low was bound to be abused… but don’t worry, they definitely won’t do this all over again with red flag laws. They pinky promise.

So, all hail the downfall of asset forfeiture.

Kendra Miller is quoted in this very oddly slugged (digital sharable title) and titled Daily Mail piece. However, in it, the one victim of the massacre in Mexico’s sister-in-law makes the case about the absolute defenselessness of the Mexican population, as legislated by their central government. That very same government who lost a fight to the cartels over keeping a single cartel head imprisoned for criminal prosecution. They caved when attacked.

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-7657505/Relative-slain-Mormon-family-advocates-gun-control.html?fbclid=IwAR3yZGbSqqosbLrNjMPRCZ_hjX2LcNmpC-SWA42Z87-WvBZ7kJWS41LgOQA

Speaking from her home in La Mora, where she is due to get married next week, Miller told CNN that her family constantly face threats from the cartels. 

Miller brought up the issue of gun control and urged Americans to fight against any bans on weapons.

‘I don’t know where you’re standing on the whole (idea of) trying to take away the guns in America right now, but I say fight for those guns,’ she said. 

‘These things are happening here in Mexico because people can’t protect themselves because by law they’re not allowed to own these guns. 

‘So since the government isn’t doing their job of protection in the way that they should, these cartels can just wreak havoc and the people are left defenseless. 

‘So I say hold onto your guns, people.’ 

Three mothers and six children, aged between six months and 12 years, were killed in the cartel ambush after leaving their La Mora religious community, which is a decades-old settlement in Sonora state founded as part of an offshoot of the Mormon church.

The Mexico Reality

The situation just south of our border is something entirely alien to those here in the U.S. The brutal criminal elements can openly influence what the Mexican National Government does, through force. They are effectively a ruling power in the hemisphere. This is something Americans have a hard time wrapping our heads around. Our domestic forms of corruption and quid pro quo are nearly universally financial and clandestine. Those are done with handshakes and personnel placements and the exchange of money for services.

Just over the border they are literally done at the barrel of a gun, or rocket launcher. The cartel who’s the majority in that region doesn’t like someone, they just openly remove them in a brutally violent manner. Violence isn’t a final option with dire consequences, it could very well be the easiest way to get what they want.

Imagine that reality, even in crime ridden Chicago, imagine a criminal organization so powerful they could just kill a mayor or city council member and the combined forces of the Chicago PD, County Sheriff, and Illinois National Guard couldn’t really do anything about it. The manhunt that would occur here is a dream there.

Here, in my local metro area, when a man shot and killed 7 of his family members he was chased and hunted by dozens of officers. They flew helicopters. They cornered him with overwhelming force and stopped him. That is so far from Mexico’s reality it might as well be a heroic novela of what an ideal world would be like for citizens of our southern neighbor.

The cartels have a legitimate slice of power, open and backed by force. They might as well be their own state, with their own laws and rules, that is in conflict with Mexico over territory.

But… the Democrats would love themselves some Mexican style gun control laws.

Safety Mentality

Imagine, again the reality where these folks lived and where they were killed, but imagine a world in which you, Joe or Jane Americano, must convoy with other neighbors and family in order to safely go visit your relatives. Getting into your car and going anywhere isn’t an option available to you, there exists a real threat of attack. Not the ‘wrong place wrong time’ crime that everyone worldwide is under threat of for any number of reasons, but of deliberate targeting and attack by a hostile group openly operating in defiance of your local PD, Sheriff, and the Army, all who actually cannot stop them. They are incapable of stopping them.

Carrying a gun in such a place would be the most sensical thing you could do, for yourself and your family. But it is illegal there. The citizenry and the nations guests must rely on a provenly ineffective armed force and the good will of the hostile cartel.