BELLEVUE, WA – The Second Modification Basis is applauding an amicus transient submitted by the American Civil Liberties Union in a Second Modification case which contends a person named Steven Duarte “didn’t forfeit his Second Modification rights due to a previous, nonviolent felony conviction.” The case is called U.S. v. Duarte.
“This can be a exceptional and refreshing strategy by the ACLU,” stated SAF founder and Govt Vice President Alan M. Gottlieb. “The group has produced a stunningly detailed amicus transient supporting the Second Modification. Whereas acknowledging its historical past of issues relating to gun-related violent crime, on this case the ACLU correctly criticizes federal legislation for completely disarming folks beforehand convicted of nonviolent offenses, together with misdemeanors the place a state legislature has imposed a sufficiently lengthy potential jail sentence to end in a lifetime lack of Second Modification rights. Thus, because the ACLU sagely observes, somebody could possibly be put in jail for ‘essentially the most fleeting, innocuous, or merely constructive ‘possession’ of a firearm’.”
The ACLU’s 40-page transient, Gottlieb famous, may be very crucial about how the legislation has been used to punish individuals who had been beforehand convicted for essentially the most innocuous offenses. The transient notes, for instance, “The federal government can’t present that making use of such sweeping felony legal responsibility to folks like Mr. Duarte is in keeping with the ideas underpinning our custom of regulating firearms.”
Duarte had beforehand been convicted of nonviolent offenses akin to vandalism and drug possession. As detailed within the transient, the federal government “by no means contended that he poses a hazard or menace of violence to others.” But the statute, 922(g)(1), was used to severely punish Duarte, sentencing him to 4 years in jail.
“We’re delighted the ACLU acknowledges the federal government has wielded a really heavy hand in its enforcement of federal statute 922(g)(1),” Gottlieb said, “not solely in opposition to Mr. Duarte, but in addition in opposition to different folks. The ACLU makes a compelling argument that the federal government has didn’t justify completely stripping folks of their Second Modification rights, when they don’t pose a danger to society, merely due to a earlier conviction that is perhaps punishable by greater than a yr in jail.
“Bravo to the ACLU for submitting this transient in Mr. Duarte’s case,” he concluded.
