Federal judge upholds constitutionality of law against possessing guns without serial numbers
Judge William Martínez agreed that guns lacking serial numbers are not ‘typically possessed by law-abiding citizens for lawful purposes’

Although a major U.S. Supreme Court decision last year made it easier to strike down gun safety regulations as unconstitutional, a federal judge agreed on Monday that a law banning the possession of guns that lack serial numbers does not run afoul of the Second Amendment.

Within months of his indictment for possessing a firearm with an “obliterated” serial number in Denver, Jonathan Avila moved for dismissal of the criminal charge, arguing the law violated his constitutional right to bear arms.

But in a May 8 order, U.S. District Court Senior Judge William J. Martínez disagreed, noting the Supreme Court has interpreted the Second Amendment as protecting the right to own weapons for the lawful purpose of self-defense.

“Reason and the experience of law enforcement counsel is that obliterating a firearm’s serial number serves another purpose: making the identity of a person who possesses a particular firearm more difficult to determine,” Martínez wrote. “This feature makes firearms with obliterated serial numbers useful for criminal activity.”

Consequently, he determined guns lacking serial numbers are not within the Second Amendment’s protection.

Martínez is one of many federal judges who have had to grapple with the fallout from the Supreme Court’s 2022 decision in New York State Rifle & Pistol Association, Inc. v. Bruen. The court’s conservative majority voided New York’s licensing regime for the public carry of weapons, but also laid down a new legal framework for analyzing the constitutionality of gun regulations broadly.

The government, when defending the constitutionality of a firearm law, “must demonstrate that the regulation is consistent with this Nation’s historical tradition of firearm regulation,” wrote Justice Clarence Thomas for the majority.

He added that if a law addresses a “general societal problem that has persisted since the 18th century,” the lack of a regulation from the 1700s comparable to a modern restriction is “relevant evidence” that current policies are unconstitutional.

In addition to ongoing challenges against Colorado’s state regulations on guns, U.S. District Court Judges Regina M. Rodriguez and Charlotte N. Sweeney separately rejected challenges last year to the federal prohibition on felons owning weapons.

“It is undisputed that jurisdictions throughout history have had the ability to regulate the possession of a weapon,” Sweeney wrote in November.

Avila filed his motion to dismiss the weapons charge one month after a federal judge in West Virginia determined the prohibition on possessing a gun with an obliterated serial number was unconstitutional.

U.S. District Court Judge Joseph R. Goodwin deemed the law a “blatant prohibition on possession,” and reiterated the Bruen decision barred him from considering the government’s interest in controlling firearms. Without analyzing the Second Amendment’s protection of self-defense, he followed the Supreme Court’s directive to look at the history of regulating guns without serial numbers — and found it to be nonexistent.

“While firearms then were not the same as firearms today, there certainly were gun crimes that might have been more easily investigated if firearms had to be identifiable by a serial number or other mark,” Goodwin wrote in October. “The Government has presented no evidence, and the court is not aware of any, that any such requirement existed in 1791.”

Even though other federal judges reached the opposite conclusion, Avila seized on Goodwin’s analysis.

“The Second Amendment draws no distinction between arms with serial numbers and arms without them,” wrote defense attorney Rebecca Briggs. “An individual’s possession of a firearm is being criminalized.”

The government countered that the Supreme Court has acknowledged the Second Amendment protects the right to possess arms “in case of confrontation,” and there was a history of prohibiting “dangerous and unusual weapons.” Colonial laws even required gun owners to register with militia officers.

“Here, the defendant does not explain how prohibiting the possession of a firearm with an obliterated serial number unconstitutionally inhibits his ability to possess a weapon in case of confrontation,” wrote Assistant U.S. Attorney Laura Cramer-Babycz.

Martínez sided with the government, finding guns with obliterated serial numbers are not guns “typically possessed by law-abiding citizens for lawful purposes.” He also believed they fit within the Supreme Court’s label of “dangerous and unusual,” and, therefore, do not have Second Amendment protection.

Because Avila’s alleged crime did not implicate his constitutional rights, Martínez did not address the historical tradition of regulating guns that lack serial numbers.

Avila also stands accused of three counts of distributing fentanyl and cocaine.