When demoncraps don’t win, they want to change the rules.
AG contests assigning new gun law case to same federal court judge
State lawyers opposed assigning the lawsuit, filed by more than a dozen individuals and groups to U.S. District Court Judge Roger Benitez
Lawyers for Attorney General Xavier Becerra, facing another lawsuit from gun rights groups in San Diego federal court over firearms laws, are formally objecting to the case being heard by the same judge who twice before struck down state gun regulations.
In a document filed on Thursday, state lawyers opposed assigning the lawsuit to U.S. District Court Judge Roger Benitez. The suit was filed by more than a dozen individuals and groups including the San Diego County Gun Owners PAC, Firearms Policy Coalition, and the Second Amendment Foundation.
Benitez has issued rulings striking down the laws banning high capacity ammunition magazines and requiring background checks for people buying ammunition in the past two years. He is also now hearing two other cases from Second Amendment advocates, one dealing with the state’s assault weapons regulatory scheme and another on the ban on billy clubs and blackjacks.
The latest suit challenges a new law that made changes to the state’s roster of approved handguns allowed for sale, also known as the Safe Handguns Roster. Those changes are set to go into effect in January. The suit contends that the law violates the Second Amendment of the federal constitution by infringing on the rights of state residents to purchase and keep firearms.
While cases are randomly assigned to federal court judges, under a local court rule so-called “related cases” can be heard by the same judge. After ruling on the large capacity magazine case initially, the three other lawsuits were sent to Benitez under the local court rule.
Gun control groups have chafed under that, however, and noted that San Diego’s rule is faulty because, unlike some other federal courts, it does not specifically allow for the other side in a lawsuit to object when a case is deemed related.
On the day the lawsuit challenging handgun laws was filed the plaintiffs again asked that the case be assigned to Benitez under the related case rule. Lawyers for the group said the suit “involve substantially similar legal issues” concerning gun laws and the Second Amendment.
This time lawyers for Becerra filed an objection, despite the lack of an explicit procedure to do so in the rule.
The lawyers said that the case does not meet the criteria for a related case because it does not deal with “same or similar claims” as the other suits, which is required under the rule.
The court docket shows no decision has been made yet on where the case will be assigned.
The new law being challenged requires handguns offered for sale to have microstamping technology — a controversial system that is supposed to imprint each bullet fired with a unique identifier. It also requires state officials to remove three handguns for every one new handgun added to the roster of guns approved for sale.