The Second Amendment Foundation (SAF) is refusing to let a long-running legal battle over digital firearm files fade into the background. Following a recent dismissal by a three-judge panel from the Third Circuit Court of Appeals, the group has officially filed a petition for a rehearing in the case of Defense Distributed v. Attorney General of New Jersey.
The lawsuit, which first entered the court system in 2018, takes aim at a New Jersey statute that bans the publication of computer files containing digital firearms information.
The SAF argues that the law violates both First and Second Amendment rights. However, the recent dismissal didn’t focus on those constitutional arguments. Instead, the court tossed the case based on legal technicalities and what the judges described as factual deficiencies in the record.
SAF leadership isn’t pulling any punches regarding the panel’s decision.
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Bill Sack, the SAF Director of Legal Operations, stated that the panel’s opinion contained “analytical errors” that go against established legal precedent. Sack expressed hope that the petition would prompt the court to take a second look and “set things straight.”
The petition itself describes the situation as a “long-running censorship of Second Amendment speech” by the New Jersey Attorney General. It claims that the legal process has been manipulated to avoid a review of the actual merits of the case, raising concerns about the integrity of the judicial system.
“This case has languished in the system since 2018 and it’s entirely unacceptable how the Third Circuit panel found every reason it could to avoid facing the issues we’ve presented head on,” said SAF founder and Executive Vice President Alan M. Gottlieb. “This case has been plagued by complicated legal gamesmanship and a tortured procedural history, all aimed at undercutting protections guaranteed by the Constitution that the court may find distasteful.”
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