Latest news with #ProtectionofLawfulCommerceinArmsAct
Yahoo
09-06-2025
- Politics
- Yahoo
Two Illinois senators help introduce bill on gun industry negligence
WASHINGTON, D.C. (WTWO/WAWV)— Two Illinois Senators helped introduce a bill Monday that they believe will hold gun companies and sellers more liable in court. Senator Tammy Duckworth(D-IL) and U.S. Senate Democratic Whip Dick Durbin (D-IL) along with the help of many others including senators, U.S. Representatives, and and more than 80 members of congress introduced the bill Monday. The bill is entitled the Equal Justice for Victims of Gun Violence Act. They believe the bill will ensure victims of gun violence can get their day in court. It will also repeal the Protection of Lawful Commerce in Arms Act (PLCAA) that was passed by Congress in 2005. The PLCAA gives the gun industry a unique legal liability shield that protects manufacturers from lawsuits. They believe that repealing this will allow gun companies and gun sellers to face liability for acts of gun violence that threaten public safety. 'The needless gun violence that too many Illinoisans—and Americans across the country—experience is heartbreaking and not reflective of the kind of future my daughters or any of our young people deserve,' Duckworth said. 'That's why I'm proud to join my colleagues in introducing the Equal Access to Justice for Victims of Gun Violence Act, which will hold gun manufacturers accountable and bring justice to grieving families. I'll never stop working for commonsense gun safety reforms.' Congress originally stated that the reason for the PLCAA was that it was necessary to protect the gun industry from frivolous lawsuits. Due to this, though, the press release from the Senate states that numerous cases of gun violence victims around the nation have been dismissed based on the PLCAA, even when gun dealers acted in a way that would be negligent for other products. 'It's unconscionable that the gun industry is shielded from the consequences of negligent behavior that would result in liability if this were any other product,' said Durbin. 'Gun dealers and manufacturers do not deserve special treatment, and certainly not at the expense of the communities that are plagued by gun violence. By repealing this unjustifiable legal liability shield, this bill will allow victims of gun violence to seek justice and have their day in court.' The legislation is endorsed by Brady, GIFFORDS Law Center, Everytown for Gun Safety, March for Our Lives, Guns Down America, Newtown Action Alliance, and Sandy Hook Promise Action Fund. For full wording of the bill, you can click here. Copyright 2025 Nexstar Media, Inc. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.
Yahoo
06-06-2025
- Politics
- Yahoo
The Worst Part of the Unanimous Supreme Court Ruling Blocking a Lawsuit Against Gunmakers
On Thursday, the Supreme Court unanimously ruled that the government of Mexico may not continue its lawsuit seeking to hold firearms manufacturers and a firearms distributor civilly accountable for their role in causing cartel-driven gun violence in Mexico. Having taken the case at an unusually early stage in the litigation, and so working from an undeveloped factual record, all nine justices agreed that Mexico's current complaint does not even satisfactorily allege that the defendants have aided and abetted U.S. dealers who illegally sell guns to traffickers who then get them to the cartels in Mexico. What's worse, Justices Clarence Thomas and Ketanji Brown Jackson each wrote separate concurrences in which they wade into the substantive law of the Protection of Lawful Commerce in Arms Act, offering unprecedented interpretations that would make it harder for victims of gun violence to try to hold firearms-makers and sellers responsible for their part in the harms they cause. All in all, Thursday's intervention from the Supreme Court means expanded impunity for the firearms industry—and thus the likelihood of more death and injury due to gun violence. PLCAA is a complex federal statute that specifies only a limited number of circumstances when victims of gun violence may bring a lawsuit against the maker or seller of a gun. Apart from these circumstances, PLCAA bans civil suits against industry members for harms arising from the criminal use of firearms. One ground for a civil action permitted by PLCAA arises when a firearms industry actor knowingly violates a statute applicable to the sale and marketing of firearms. When this happens, victims of a criminal shooting may sue the maker or seller of the firearms used, advancing any cause of action supported by facts of the case. Mexico's complaint alleged that the named firearms manufacturers and the named distributor aid and abet rogue dealers in the U.S. who illegally sell firearms to straw purchasers. These purchasers work with traffickers to illegally convey the arms to criminal cartels in Mexico. Aiding and abetting the sale of firearms to straw purchasers is itself a violation of the same statutes the rogue dealers are breaking. According to Mexico's complaint, the defendants' participation in breaking these law opens them to the full panoply of civil liability for the ensuing gun violence. Writing for the full court, Justice Elena Kagan announced that Mexico had not succeeded in stating a sufficiently plausible aiding-and-abetting claim. The court reversed the 1st U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, which had held that Mexico had properly pleaded aiding and abetting, opening the door to discovery and trial on the merits. The court's reversal is odd, because it interrupts the normal flow of civil litigation. Kagan criticized Mexico for its failure to specify precisely which rogue dealers the defendants supply and what exactly the defendants know about the dealers' illegal sales. But the ordinary way for a plaintiff to attain such precision is by conducting discovery, thus uncovering the facts necessary to proving their case to a jury. The court today preemptively shut down this process, in essence requiring plaintiffs bringing aiding-and-abetting claims to somehow know information that they would typically learn through pretrial discovery. It remains open to Mexico to revise its complaint to address the full court's criteria for properly pleading aiding and abetting, if Mexico can obtain the required information outside the legal process. Regardless, we know from Thursday's opinions that at least two justices—and quite possibly more—are poised to radically revise the body of PLCAA law lower federal courts have been developing. Thomas and Jackson both went beyond the issue of aiding and abetting to make pronouncements about the sorts of conduct and kinds of legal violations that trigger PLCAA's permission to bring civil actions against the firearms industry. Thomas wrote to cast doubt on whether PLCAA's reference to knowing violations of federal or state statutes includes violations that have not been formally found by a court or other regulatory body. No lower court that I know of has adopted this position. Indeed, no lower court opinions have even discussed the question. Yet Thomas took the opportunity to alert the firearms industry that 'it seems to [him] that the PLCAA at least arguably requires not only a plausible allegation that a defendant has committed a predicate violation, but also an earlier finding of guilt or liability in an adjudication regarding the 'violation.' ' He doesn't provide even a hint of an argument that the words of PLCAA support his impression. Thomas instead vaguely gestures to 'serious constitutional considerations' that would support his view. Jackson's concurrence is just peculiar. She argued that Mexico's complaint should be dismissed because Mexico did not identify particular statutory violations committed by the defendants. But the complaint notes several specific statutes it alleges the defendants have violated, including the U.S. Gun Control Act of 1968. The Gun Control Act expressly forbids selling guns to straw purchasers, buyers who purchase guns for somebody else who cannot lawfully by them. This is exactly what people who buy guns for traffickers do. The complaint also names state statutes it alleges the defendants have violated: the Connecticut Unfair Trade Practices Act (which applies to defendant Colt) and the Massachusetts Consumer Protection Act (which applies to Smith & Wesson). These statutes require the responsible sale and marketing of consumer goods, including firearms. Stocking rogue dealers with guns the manufacturers and the distributor know the dealer will sell to straw purchasers who will then supply them to traffickers breaks these laws. Ignoring the complaint's discussion of how the defendants' conduct violates the Gun Control Act, CUTPA, and MCPA, Jackson writes, 'Mexico merely faults the industry writ large for engaging in practices that legislatures and voters have declined to prohibit.' Jackson's disregard for what the complaint actually says is baffling. She claims to be concerned for PLCAA's purpose of establishing the 'primacy of the political branches—both state and federal—in deciding which duties to impose on the firearms industry.' But federal gun control laws and state consumer protection statutes like the ones Mexico pinpoints do just that: They codify legislatures' decisions as to the duties firearms manufacturers and sellers have. Perhaps Jackson regards the complaint as 'conclusory' because it does not itemize occasions when rogue dealers, intentionally supplied with firearms by the defendants, violated the Gun Control Act. Nor does the complaint itemize specific instances of when the defendants violated CUTPA or MCPA. But again, even if PLCAA calls for this, the necessary facts would ordinarily be gathered by the plaintiff through discovery. By demanding more specifics on the statutory violations alleged, Jackson's position comes close to Thomas': Only formally adjudicated violations can secure a complaint against a motion to dismiss. Writing from the right and left wings of the Supreme Court, Thomas and Jackson have emboldened Second Amendment absolutists to attack cases brought under the rubric of PLCAA. They invite lower court judges to grant early motions to dismiss. This is contrary to rule of law in an appellate system like ours. Our civil justice system permits plaintiffs to initially plead their cases comparatively generally and then to refine them in light of discovery. Quick dismissals of properly pleaded, if general, claims undermine the proper evolution of individual lawsuits. Worse, it strips all courts of the chance to identify and analyze relevant issues of law. Even if Thomas and Jackson have rightly detected questions raised by PLCAA—what constitutes a statutory violation and what does a plaintiff have to plead to preliminarily identify one—their concurrences foreclose usual judicial processes for answering them. The court as a whole and the two concurrences hurtle pell-mell toward making it virtually impossible for plaintiffs like Mexico to successfully plead their claims. Beyond that, the decision short-circuits the careful development of the law of PLCAA. The statute is a particularly intricate one, which already gave an industry that produces, markets, and sells exceptionally lethal products a large measure of impunity from any civil accountability for its harm-causing conduct. The opinions handed down by the Supreme Court in Smith & Wesson v. Estados Unidos Mexicanos thwart case-by-case determination of PLCAA's applicability, a process that promotes careful explication of the law. This is a very poor ruling. It will put more firearms in the hands of criminals who will use them to wreak havoc. It will prevent victims of this havoc from seeking justice in court.
Time of India
05-06-2025
- Business
- Time of India
Supreme Court Ruling On Gun Companies: Supreme Court Blocks Mexico's Gun Lawsuit Against US Companies, ET LegalWorld
The U.S. Supreme Court on Thursday spared two American gun companies from a lawsuit by Mexico's government accusing them of aiding illegal firearms trafficking to drug cartels and fueling gun violence in the southern neighbor of the United States. The justices in a 9-0 ruling authored by liberal Justice Elena Kagan overturned a lower court's ruling that had allowed the lawsuit to proceed against firearms maker Smith & Wesson and distributor Interstate Arms. The lower court had found that Mexico plausibly alleged that the companies aided and abetted unlawful sales routing guns to Mexican drug cartels, harming its government. Advt Advt Join the community of 2M+ industry professionals Subscribe to our newsletter to get latest insights & analysis. Download ETLegalWorld App Get Realtime updates Save your favourite articles Scan to download App The justices embraced the argument made by the companies for dismissal of Mexico's suit under a 2005 U.S. law called the Protection of Lawful Commerce in Arms Act that broadly shields gun companies from liability for crimes committed with their products. The Boston-based 1st U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals had decided in 2024 that the alleged conduct by the companies fell outside these Supreme Court decided that while it has little doubt that U.S. companies are aware of some unlawful sales to Mexican gun traffickers, Mexico's lawsuit failed to allege that the companies had aided and abetted such illegal firearms sales by deliberately helping to bring about the transactions."Mexico's plausible allegations are of 'indifference' rather than assistance," Kagan wrote. "They are of the manufacturers merely allowing some unidentified 'bad actors' to make illegal use of their wares." The case came to the Supreme Court at a complicated time for U.S.-Mexican relations as President Donald Trump pursues on-again, off-again tariffs on Mexican goods. Trump has also accused Mexico of doing too little to stop the flow of synthetic drugs such as fentanyl and migrant arrivals at the lawsuit, filed in Boston in 2021, accused the two companies of violating various U.S. and Mexican laws. Mexico claims that the companies have deliberately maintained a distribution system that included firearms dealers who knowingly sell weapons to third-party, or "straw," purchasers who then traffic guns to cartels in suit also accused the companies of unlawfully designing and marketing their guns as military-grade weapons to drive up demand among the cartels, including by associating their products with the American military and law enforcement. The gun companies said they make and sell lawful avoid its lawsuit being dismissed under the 2005 law, Mexico was required to plausibly allege that the companies aided and abetted illegal gun sales and that such conduct was the "proximate cause" - a legal principle involving who is responsible for causing an injury - of the harms claimed by Mexico. The Supreme Court, which heard arguments in the case on March 4, declined to resolve the proximate cause question after finding that Mexico's suit failed to adequately allege aiding and Arrocha Olabuenaga, the legal adviser for Mexico's Foreign Ministry, vowed that Mexico will continue pursuing its legal fight."While we are disappointed with the decision from this Supreme Court, we are convinced of the strength of our arguments and the evidence that upholds them, and we are encouraged by the support at home and abroad for Mexico's actions," he in the lawsuit had sought monetary damages of an unspecified amount and a court order requiring Smith & Wesson and Interstate Arms to take steps to "abate and remedy the public nuisance they have created in Mexico."The Second Amendment Foundation, a gun rights group that backed the U.S. gun companies in the case, welcomed Thursday's ruling."The lawsuit, dreamt up by multiple gun control groups, had one goal - bankrupt the American firearms market by allowing civil liability to apply for the criminal misuse of its products," the group said in a social media post. "Thankfully the Supreme Court stepped in and squashed it."Gun violence fueled by trafficked U.S.-made firearms has contributed to a decline in business investment and economic activity in Mexico and forced its government to incur unusually high costs on services including healthcare, law enforcement and the military, according to the a country with strict firearms laws, has said most of its gun homicides are committed with weapons trafficked from the United States and valued at more than $250 million Perez Ricart, an international affairs researcher at Mexico's Center for Economic Research and Teaching (CIDE), criticized the ruling."Once again, the industry is shielded. It doesn't matter how many bullets cross the border or how many people are killed on the Mexican side. Bullets are not the only things that kill; so does the legal impunity guaranteed by Washington," Ricart said in a social media post.
UPI
05-06-2025
- Business
- UPI
Supreme Court rules in favor of U.S. gun makers in Mexico's lawsuit
Various semiautomatic handguns are displayed in a case at a gun store in Dundee, Ill. (2010). On Thursday, the U.S. Supreme Court unanimously ruled against a lawsuit filed by Mexico that accuses seven American gun manufacturers and one wholesaler of unlawful sale practices, and arming drug dealers. File Photo by Brian Kersey/UPI | License Photo June 5 (UPI) -- The U.S. Supreme Court unanimously ruled Thursday against a lawsuit filed by Mexico that accuses seven American gun manufacturers and one wholesaler of unlawful sale practices, and arming drug dealers. "The question presented is whether Mexico's complaint plausibly pleads that conduct. We conclude it does not," wrote Justice Elena Kagan in the opinion of the court. Mexico filed suit in March against a group of companies that includes Smith & Wesson, Beretta, Colt and Glock, alleging that the defendants violated the Protection of Lawful Commerce in Arms Act, or PLCAA, which can allow for some lawsuits against the makers and sellers of firearms. As stated in the case document, Mexico purports the accused companies "aided and abetted unlawful gun sales that routed firearms to Mexican drug cartels," and failed to exercise "reasonable care" to keep their guns from being trafficked into Mexico. Kagan explained that it falls on the plaintiff in this case to properly show that the defendant companies directly committed violations of PLCAA, or otherwise "the predicate violation opens a path to making a gun manufacturer civilly liable for the way a third party has used the weapon it made." Kagan did include that "Mexico has a severe gun violence problem, which its government views as coming from north of the border." She added that the country has only a single gun store, which is slightly inaccurate as Mexico currently has two, but in regard of the one store she mentioned, Kagan claimed that it "issues fewer than 50 gun permits each year." She also purported gun traffickers can purchase weaponry in the United States, often illegally, and then take those guns to drug cartels in Mexico. Kagan further noted that as per the Mexican government, "as many as 90% of the guns recovered at crime scenes in Mexico originated in the United States." Nonetheless, the court ruled "that Mexico has not plausibly alleged aiding and abetting on the manufacturers' part." This is why, Kagan explained, that the defendant companies are immune under the PLCAA. In a concurring statement, Justice Clarence Thomas wrote that the court's opinion hasn't resolved what exactly a future plaintiff will have to show to prove a defendant has committed a PLCAA violation, and that Mexico hadn't "adequately pleaded its theory of the case." Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson also included a concurring statement that Congress passed PLCAA in order to decide "which duties to impose on the firearms industry," and that ignoring PLCAA's set reasons that do "authorize lawsuits like the one Mexico filed here" would twist PLCAA's main purpose.
Yahoo
05-06-2025
- Politics
- Yahoo
Supreme Court strikes down Mexico's lawsuit against US gun manufacturers
The United States Supreme Court has rejected a lawsuit from the government of Mexico that argued American gun manufacturers like Smith & Wesson failed to prevent illegal firearm sales to cartels and criminal organisations. In one of a slew of decisions handed down on Thursday, the top court decided that the Protection of Lawful Commerce in Arms Act shielded the gun manufacturers from Mexico's suit. The court's decision was unanimous. Writing for the nine-member bench, Justice Elena Kagan explained that even 'indifference' to the trafficking of firearms does not amount to willfully assisting a criminal enterprise. 'Mexico's complaint does not plausibly allege that the defendant manufacturers aided and abetted gun dealers' unlawful sales of firearms to Mexican traffickers,' Kagan wrote (PDF). 'We have little doubt that, as the complaint asserts, some such sales take place — and that the manufacturers know they do. But still, Mexico has not adequately pleaded what it needs to: that the manufacturers 'participate in' those sales.' The Mexican government's complaint, she added, 'does not pinpoint, as most aiding-and-abetting claims do, any specific criminal transactions that the defendants (allegedly) assisted'. The case stems from a complaint filed in August 2021 in a federal court in Boston, Massachusetts. In that initial complaint, the Mexican government — then led by President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador — argued that the sheer volume of firearms illegally smuggled into its country amounted to negligence on the part of gun manufacturers. Those firearms, it said, had exacted a devastating toll on Mexican society. The country has some of the highest homicide rates in the world, with the United Nations estimating in 2023 that nearly 25 intentional killings happen for every 100,000 people. Much of that crime has been credited to the presence of cartels and other criminal enterprises operating in Mexico. The Igarape Institute, a Brazil-based think tank, estimated that Mexico's crime cost the country nearly 1.92 percent of its gross domestic product (GDP) from 2010 to 2014. The US is the largest arms manufacturer in the world — and also the largest source of illegally sourced firearms. The stream of firearms that pour into Mexico and the broader Latin America region, for instance, has been dubbed the 'iron river'. Nearly 70 percent of the illegal guns seized in Mexico from 2014 to 2018, for instance, were traced to origins in the US, according to the Department of Justice. That has led countries like Mexico to demand action from the US to limit the number of firearms trafficked abroad. In its lawsuit, Mexico targeted some of the biggest names in gun manufacturing in the US: not just Smith & Wesson, but also companies like Beretta USA, Glock Inc and Colt's Manufacturing LLC. But the firearm companies pushed back against the lawsuit, arguing they could not be held responsible for the actions of criminals in another country. The Supreme Court itself cast doubt on some of Mexico's arguments, including the idea that the gun manufacturers designed and marketed their products specifically for cartel buyers. 'Mexico focuses on production of 'military style' assault weapons, but these products are widely legal and purchased by ordinary consumers. Manufacturers cannot be charged with assisting criminal acts simply because Mexican cartel members also prefer these guns,' Justice Kagan wrote. 'The same applies to firearms with Spanish language names or graphics alluding to Mexican history,' she added. 'While they may be 'coveted by the cartels,' they also may appeal to 'millions of law-abiding Hispanic Americans.'' On Thursday, an industry trade group, the National Shooting Sports Foundation (NSSF), celebrated the Supreme Court's decision as a 'tremendous victory' against an unfair charge. It had filed an amicus brief in support of the defendants in the case. 'For too long, gun control activists have attempted to twist basic tort law to malign the highly-regulated U.S. firearm industry with the criminal actions of violent organized crime, both here in the United States and abroad,' the group's senior vice president, Lawrence G Keane, said in a statement. Keane added that he and others in the firearm industry felt 'sympathetic to plight of those in Mexico who are victims of rampant and uncontrolled violence at the hands of narco-terrorist drug cartels'. But he said the issue was about 'responsible firearm ownership', not the actions of gun manufacturers.
