Vintage Firearms Lawsuit Part 1

 

Vintage Firearms Lawsuit (Part 1)

PLCAA and Nuisance

Vintage Firearms of Endicott, NY is a retailer of firearms and is being sued in several lawsuits related to a mass murder.  This is a good example of the strategy of the gun-grabbing Left, but is quite involved so SCOPE is presenting it in two parts on two successive days.

First, some general legal background.

What if you were walking down the street and were subjected to a drive by shooting; someone in a Ford drove by and shot at you with a Glock.  Would anyone expect to sue Ford because their car was used in a crime?  But the Left expects, under those same circumstances, to sue Glock.

How is a lawsuit possible under the Protection of Lawful Commerce in Arms Act (PLCAA) which was signed on October 26, 2005 and became Public Law 109–92? 

PLCAA protects, firearms manufacturers and dealers from being held liable, in most instances, when crimes have been committed with their products.  This is the law that Joe Biden constantly lies about by saying gun manufacturers can’t be sued.  Under this law, both arms manufacturers and dealers can still be held liable for damages resulting from defective products, breach of contract, criminal misconduct, and other actions for which they are directly responsible; this is the same basis as almost every other product. 

However, there are some loopholes that the gun-grabbing Left jumps through.

Under PLCAA, firearms manufacturers and dealers may be held liable for ‘negligent entrustment.’  Negligent entrustment means: “the supplying of a qualified product by a seller for use by another person when the seller knows, or reasonably should know, the person to whom the product is supplied is likely to, and does, use the product in a manner involving unreasonable risk of physical injury to the person or others.”

PLCAA also does not protect when: “a manufacturer or seller of a qualified product knowingly violated a State or Federal statute applicable to the sale or marketing of the product, and the violation was a proximate cause of the harm for which relief is sought.”  

As usual, the Democrats in the NY State government don’t believe the laws apply to them.  In order to circumvent PLCAA, NY laws passed in 2021: bills S7196 and A6762B.  

Direct quotes from the bills:

§ 898-B. PROHIBITED ACTIVITIES.

1.NO GUN INDUSTRY MEMBER, BY CONDUCT EITHER UNLAWFUL IN ITSELF OR UNREASONABLE UNDER ALL THE CIRCUMSTANCES SHALL KNOWINGLY OR RECKLESSLY CREATE, MAINTAIN OR CONTRIBUTE TO A CONDITION IN NEW YORK STATE THAT ENDANGERS THE SAFETY OR HEALTH OF THE PUBLIC THROUGH THE SALE, MANUFACTURING, IMPORTING OR MARKETING OF A QUALIFIED PRODUCT.

2.ALL GUN INDUSTRY MEMBERS WHO MANUFACTURE, MARKET, IMPORT OR OFFER FOR WHOLESALE OR RETAIL SALE ANY QUALIFIED PRODUCT IN NEW YORK STATE SHALL ESTABLISH AND UTILIZE REASONABLE CONTROLS AND PROCEDURES TO PREVENT ITS QUALIFIED PRODUCTS FROM BEING POSSESSED, USED, MARKETED OR SOLD UNLAWFULLY IN NEW YORK STATE.

§ 898-C. PUBLIC NUISANCE.

1.A VIOLATION OF SUBDIVISION ONE OR TWO OF SECTION EIGHT HUNDRED NINETY-EIGHT-B OF THIS ARTICLE THAT RESULTS IN HARM TO THE PUBLIC SHALL HEREBY BE DECLARED TO BE A PUBLIC NUISANCE.

2.THE EXISTENCE OF A PUBLIC NUISANCE SHALL NOT DEPEND ON WHETHER THE GUN INDUSTRY MEMBER ACTED FOR THE PURPOSE OF CAUSING HARM TO THE PUBLIC.

In trying to justify this, the race card was also used in these bills; apparently, the firearm, itself, is prejudiced against minorities.  According to the bills:

This nuisance poses specific harm to New Yorkers based largely on their zip code and certain immutable characteristics such as race and ethnicity.  Illegal firearm violence has disproportionately affected underserved black and brown neighborhoods in our cities and throughout the state despite stringent state and local laws against the illegal possession of firearms.

These laws are (intentionally) vague enough to drive a tank through.  The Left will claim that any “controls and procedures” were not reasonable (by their definition.) 

Perhaps the ‘stringent’ laws which keep blacks in certain ‘zip codes’ from owning guns and practicing self-defense are a root cause and it’s not the firearm itself? 

Are blacks ‘underserved’ by the lack of gun stores available to sell them firearms with which they can practice self-defense? New York State is not alone in this effort to take away your guns by any means.

Ammoland wrote about another state’s efforts to disarm law abiding citizens.

The city of Chicago filed suit against Glock for the third-party criminal misuse of its products, even though Glock is not directly responsible for the actions of criminals. Chicago is seeking to hold Glock liable when criminals use illegal devices (auto sears or so-called “Glock switches”) to illegally modify Glock pistols into illegal machine guns.  Chicago is using a “public nuisance” theory. A Chicago Tribune editorial said the lawsuit “represents an abuse of the tort liability system.”

In addition, devices that are designed to convert semi-automatic firearms to fire automatically are already illegal throughout the U.S under Federal law, 26 USC § 5845(b), which defines these devices as a “machinegun.”

Ammoland continues:

U.S. tort law has long held that a person or entity cannot be held responsible for a third party’s criminal acts.  Simply put: people are not responsible for the behavior of others. Therefore, if a violent criminal acquires and misuses a firearm to commit a crime, it is the criminal who is liable for the conduct, not the company that produced the firearm. Just like how Chevrolet isn’t responsible for the actions of drunk drivers.

In 2004, the Illinois Supreme Court ruled against Chicago and its public nuisance theory. Pointing to well-established tort law, the opinion noted: the claimed harm is the aggregate result of numerous unforeseeable intervening criminal acts by third parties not under defendants’ control…the manufacturer and distributor defendants…are even further removed from the intervening criminal acts.

Chicago lost, but the city imposed tremendous costs on the defendants. An NRA official explained at the time, “These cases aren’t designed to win… It’s a sinister abuse of the legal system aimed at bankrupting a lawful industry.”

Such abuses led to the enactment of the PLCAA in 2005 which merely codified the standard tort principle.  Despite the PLCAA’s clear mandate, anti-gun politicians and their tort attorney allies continue to concoct unconstitutional legal theories in an attempt to get around the law.  Especially in deep blue states like New York where, in 2021, a nuisance law was passed about firearms.

(Continued Tomorrow)