WASHINGTON — New York City’s nine-year lawsuit accusing gun makers of flooding illicit markets with their firearms came to an end on Monday, when the United States Supreme Court refused to consider a lower court’s dismissal of the case.
Without comment, the justices decided not to review a ruling by a three-judge panel of the United States Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit, which declared on April 30 that federal law protected the manufacturers from such suits.
The appeals court had overturned a decision by Judge Jack B. Weinstein of Federal District Court in Brooklyn, who ruled in 2005 that the suit could proceed despite protests by gun makers like Beretta U.S.A., Browning Arms, Colt Manufacturing, Glock and Smith & Wesson. The gun companies had complained that a federal law passed just two months earlier shielded them from such suits.
The legal theory behind this case was wrong from the start. New York City was trying to blame gun companies because some people misused their products and committed crimes. Using the same logic, if someone were to use a screwdriver to kill another person they could take Craftsman to court for filling Sears stores with these deadly weapons.
Guns are tools. They do not commit criminal acts. People commit criminal acts.
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