Sporting purposes
Title 18, section 925(d) of the United States Code provides that certain types of firearms may be imported into the United States. Among these are firearms “generally recognized as particularly suitable for or readily adaptable to sporting purposes.” … [T]he ATF determined that the BD44 was not importable under section 925(d)(3) because it was not “generally recognized as particularly suitable for or readily adaptable to sporting purposes.” Plaintiff challenges the ATF’s decision. Plaintiff argues that the ATF’s interpretation of section 925(d)(3) is arbitrary and capricious, and seeks damages for lost income resulting from his inability to sell BD44s to prospective military re-enactors
Additionally, plaintiff said all bans are unconstitutional. The court ruled in light of Heller that plaintiff’s challenge fails that test.
Seems to me that the way to challenge this would be under the sporting purposes language. After all, one could import a weapon suitable for self-defense and that would seem to pass what was laid out in Heller.
More info here and here. Looks like another case of someone screaming SHALL NOT BE INFRINGED and representing themselves. I told someone offline that we need to get someone to challenge the MG ban. And not because I think MGs will be unbanned. Rather, because I don’t want someone challenging the ban doing more damage.
Seems we’ll be arguing the details for a while.
July 7th, 2008 at 9:23 am
Yup.
The irony is, the BD44 (which is a semi-auto MP44 clone) IS a legitimate sporting and self-defense rifle. But “sporting” is not limited to hunting deer and ducks.
That being said, the best approach to challenging ATF’s definitions of “sporting” are the high-end target pistols. ATF has decided that all “sporting” pistols MUST have a safety…which most of the top-end European match pistols lack (or have included purely for the American market). Get a Euro-spec Pardini or Hammerli, let ATF grab it, then take them to court and point out that ATF tried to ban the import of the very same pistol used in the last Olympics.
July 7th, 2008 at 1:33 pm
I still say someone should try for a WTO challenge… it’s crazy as hell, but it might get someone’s attention.