WASHINGTON (dpa-AFX) - The Justice Department has sued the District of Columbia, alleging that the District government and its Metropolitan Police Department unconstitutionally banned semi-automatic firearms.
The District of Columbia's gun laws require anyone seeking to own a gun to register it with D.C. Metro Police. However, the D.C. Code provides a broad registration ban on numerous firearms, including the AR-15 and other fast-loading guns.
The Justice Department alleges that the ban is an unconstitutional incursion into the Second Amendment rights of law-abiding citizens seeking to own protected firearms for lawful purposes.
MPD's current pattern and practice of refusing to register protected firearms is forcing residents to sue to protect their rights and to risk facing wrongful arrest for lawfully possessing protected firearms, it says.
'Washington, DC's ban on some of America's most popular firearms is an unconstitutional infringement on the Second Amendment - living in our nation's capital should not preclude law-abiding citizens from exercising their fundamental constitutional right to keep and bear arms,' said Attorney General Pamela Bondi.
In 2003, a special policeman named Richard Heller in the nation's capital sued Washington, D.C. because the laws at the time prevented him from owning a handgun and keeping it in his home for self-defense. In a landmark decision in 2008, the U.S. Supreme Court held that the Second Amendment does protect the rights of law-abiding citizens to own a semi-automatic weapon in their homes for lawful purposes, such as self-defense.
'Unfortunately, law-abiding citizens throughout our nation's capital are facing wrongful arrests due to the enforcement of unconstitutional laws, the Justice Department said in a press release.
Washington D.C. is ruled by Democrats, though ultimate oversight of the district rests with the U.S. Congress, where Republican lawmakers have historically blocked D.C.'s efforts to enact gun control measures.
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