The gun industry could be held liable for shootings under proposed state laws
Mass shootings in America invariably raise questions of guilt. The belated police response outside an elementary school in Uvalde, Texas. A district attorney’s failure to prosecute the alleged Club Q shooter a year before the deaths of five people at the LGBTQ nightclub.
However, this blame rarely ends up with the manufacturers of the weapons used in the massacres.
Legislators in Colorado and at least five other states are considering changing that, proposing bills to take back legal protections for gun manufacturers and dealers who have kept the industry immune from questions of guilt.
California, New York, Delaware and New Jersey have passed similar laws in the last three years.
A draft of Colorado’s bill, expected to be presented Thursday, not only repeals the state’s 2000 law — which largely shields gun manufacturers from liability for violence committed with their products — but also outlines a code of conduct , which aims in part at how companies develop and market firearms.
Colorado is joined by Hawaii, New Hampshire, Virginia, Washington and Maryland contemplating similar bills.
While the firearms industry is still largely shielded from liability under federal law, the law in Colorado would make it easier for victims of gun violence to file civil lawsuits like the one filed in 2015 against Remington — the company that made the rifle used in the Sandy massacre Hook Elementary School 2012 in Connecticut.
Last year, Remington reached a $73 million settlement with the families of those killed in the shooting after the families accused the company of targeting younger, at-risk men with advertising and product placement in violent video games.
However, states that already have the law in place now face legal challenges or threats of lawsuits from national gun rights groups, in part because federal law passed by Congress in 2005 already grants broad legal immunities to the gun industry.
“We may forget how unusual and bizarre it is to provide this exemption from accountability,” said Ari Freilich, state policy director for the gun control advocacy group Giffords, who argues that federal law allows states some control over the industry’s legal liability.
This bill would “allow victims of gun violence to have their day in court and to be able to prove that the gun industry may not have taken reasonable precautions to avoid harm,” Freilich said.
Mark Oliva, executive director of public affairs at the National Shooting Sports Foundation, which filed the lawsuits challenging other states’ laws, said Colorado is “ripe” for a legal challenge if the law passes. Oliva argues that if the Coors Brewing Company shouldn’t be held responsible for the drinking and driving of their customers, then why should gun companies be held responsible for what their customers do?
“The intent of this bill is to expose the arms industry to legal costs for scrap claims,” Oliva said. “You don’t have Second Amendment rights if you don’t have the ability to first purchase a firearm at a retail store.”
While federal law remains intact, Colorado bill sponsors argue that it involves carveout, which gives states some degree of power.
The bill includes a provision for companies not to market or design a firearm in a way that could “predictably” encourage an illegal conversion — for example, advertising a semi-automatic rifle that can hold a large-capacity magazine, which is illegal is Colorado.
Current Colorado law also requires plaintiffs to pay attorneys’ fees if their case against a gun company is dismissed. That requirement bankrupted two parents of a woman who was killed while filming at the Aurora Theater in 2012.
“One of my hopes is to give Club Q victims … an opportunity to at least fully participate in our Colorado justice system,” said Rep. Sonya Jaquez Lewis, a Democrat and one of the bill’s backers. “As any other victim might do in any other civil proceeding.”
Lewis said the bill would merely level the playing field with other industries, such as pharmaceuticals, which do not share the gun industry’s legal protections. The sponsors firmly believe that not only would this provide an avenue for gun violence victims, survivors and their families to seek redress, but that the threat of civil lawsuits hanging over the industry would force them to turn to the police themselves make.
“We need players in the industry to enforce the laws for themselves and if there is a route to civil liability… (that) creates an additional incentive for them to enforce laws that are already on the books,” said Rep. Javier Mabrey, a Democrat and one of the sponsors of the bill.
The bill will likely be pushed back by Republicans in Colorado’s Democratic-majority statehouse. Republican Rep. Mike Lynch, the Colorado House Minority Leader, said he had not seen a draft of the bill and thus declined to comment.
Colorado Senate President Steve Fenberg said, “I am pleased that this legislation will be introduced and I look forward to supporting it when it reaches the Senate.”
Gov. Jared Polis did not answer specific questions from The Associated Press about his position on the bill.
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