BELLEVUE, Wash. —— Attorneys representing New York resident Brett Christian have filed a memorandum of law with the U.S. District Court for the Western District of New York, opposing a motion by the defendants for a summary judgment, and supporting their cross-motion for summary judgment in a case supported by the Second Amendment Foundation (SAF) and Firearms Policy Coalition.
The case, known as Christian v. Chiumento, challenges New York state’s continuing prohibition on lawful concealed carry in public parks and all private property open to the public. Christian is represented by attorneys David H. Thompson and Peter A. Patterson at Cooper & Kirk in Washington, D.C. and Nicolas J. Rotsko at FLUET in Tyson’s, Virginia.
“New York has been trying to dance around the Supreme Court’s 2022 Bruen ruling in what amounts to a painful exercise in legal acrobatics,” said SAF founder and Executive Vice President Alan M. Gottlieb. “This case, which has been dragging along for a couple of years, illustrates the ridiculous lengths to which New York state has been going in order to keep its laws active which are clearly is not allowed under Bruen, which rejected ‘interest balancing’ in tests of Second Amendment restrictions.”
“As we explain in our memorandum,” noted SAF Executive Director Adam Kraut, “the state relies on pre-Bruen case law, which is no longer relevant, and in conflict with an existing Second Circuit ruling that owner-consent statutes cited by the state do not support a tradition of banning carry on private property open to the public. The state is stubbornly clinging to the past and refusing to acknowledge the present, and frankly, there is no future in that strategy. We expect to ultimately prevail, and it appears the state is simply trying to delay an inevitable conclusion.”
Earlier this year, SAF and FPC filed a motion for summary judgment in the case, which dates back to September 2022.
The Second Amendment Foundation (saf.org) is the nation’s oldest and largest tax-exempt education, research, publishing and legal action group focusing on the Constitutional right and heritage to privately own and possess firearms. Founded in 1974, SAF has grown to more than 720,000 members and supporters and conducts many programs designed to better inform the public about the consequences of gun control.
