The City of Cincinnati's reckless lawsuit against lawful gun manufacturers was dealt another blow last week when the Court of Appeals for the First District of Ohio unanimously upheld last year's lower court ruling dismissing the Cincinnati suit. Judge Robert P. Ruehlman handed down the original dismissal last October, stating "the City's complaint is an improper attempt to have this Court substitute its judgement for that of the legislature.... [O]nly the legislature has the power to engage in the type of regulation that is being sought by the City here. Moreover, the City's request...exceeds the scope of its municipal powers and...violates the Commerce Clause of the United States Constitution."
Stanley Chesley, the attorney for Cincinnati, has indicated he will ask the City Council to appeal the dismissal, but this ruling also gives new strength to the taxpayer lawsuit against the city funded by NRA-ILA. Based in the state's "good government" laws, the suit was filed on behalf of City Councilman Charlie Winburn (R), who opposed the city lawsuit from the beginning. It asks the court to forbid the city from pursuing its frivolous lawsuit any further as a grotesque abuse of taxpayer dollars. We expect the courts will continue to throw out these suits designed to beat lawful gun makers into submission or drive them to bankruptcy, and we are prepared to pursue other taxpayer suits against cities to prevent their use of taxpayer funds to blindly pursue endless appeals of their frivolous claims. As NRA-ILA Executive Director James Jay Baker said after the first Cincinnati ruling, "[T]his dismissal is a major blow for the greedy attorneys seeking enormous contingency fees and for the mayors seeking scapegoats to blame for their own failure to enforce current laws and prosecute violent criminals. We are confident that other cities that have filed such reckless lawsuits will soon hear the same message." Baker's statement holds as true today as it did last October. In fact, suits filed by Bridgeport, Conn., and Miami-Dade County, Fla., were also dismissed last year, and part of the city of Chicago's suit was dismissed earlier this year. Furthermore, NRA has successfully worked to enact legislation in 23 states to prohibit municipalities from wasting tax dollars through reckless lawsuits against firearm manufacturers. NRA continues this legislative effort at the state level, and, at the federal level, will continue to promote U.S. Representative (and NRA Director) Bob Barr's (R-Ga.) H.R. 1032, and U.S. Senator Orrin Hatch's (R-Utah) S. 2270. These bills would prohibit any litigation that seeks to hold manufacturers, distributors, dealers, and importers responsible for the criminal or negligent misuse of their products. Both bills are awaiting further action by the House and Senate.
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