Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School

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One of the most important issues facing this country today is gun violence and how to prevent it.  Lawyers can play a vital role in advising legislators who want to enact meaningful gun regulations, and by using their skills to try to prevent the adoption of laws designed to block meaningful gun regulations.  Last month, a Proskauer team achieved a victory with nationwide implications by persuading a Florida state trial court to strike down a Florida gun law as unconstitutional.

The Florida law preempted “the whole field of regulation of firearms and ammunition,” meaning municipalities and counties could not pass gun regulations.  Unfortunately, such a preemption provision is not unusual, but in 2011, the Florida legislature took it a step further by adding substantial penalties for violating the preemption.  Under the law, if a municipality enacts a gun law later found preempted, it is subject to a private damages lawsuit with liability up to $100,000, plus uncapped attorneys’ fees, and the legislators who voted for the preempted law are subject to a $5,000 fine and removal from office by the governor.

Earlier this month, Proskauer filed an amicus brief on behalf of the Brady Center to Prevent Gun Violence in support of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts’ ban on assault weapons, such as the AK-47 or the AR-15, and large-capacity magazines.  We filed the brief with the United States Court of Appeals for the First Circuit in Worman v. Healey, a case challenging the ban on Second Amendment grounds.  Partner Kimberly Mottley and I led the team, with Lindsey Olson Collins and Steven A. Sutro co-authoring the brief.

Since 1998, Massachusetts has banned the sale and possession within the state of military-style assault weapons and large capacity magazines.  These same weapons were used in some of America’s deadliest mass shootings:  Sandy Hook Elementary in Newtown, Connecticut;  the Pulse nightclub in Orlando, Florida;  the Route 91 Harvest Festival in Las Vegas, Nevada;  Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, Florida; and most recently,  the Temple of Life synagogue in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. The popularity of such assault weapons among perpetrators led the New York Times to dub them the “rifles of choice for mass shootings.”