SACRAMENTO, Calif. (AP) — High-capacity gun magazines will remain legal in California under a ruling Friday by a federal judge who cited home invasions where a woman used the extra bullets in her weapon to kill an attacker while in two other cases women without additional ammunition ran out of bullets.
“Individual liberty and freedom are not outmoded concepts,” San Diego-based U.S. District Judge Roger Benitez wrote as he declared unconstitutional the law that would have banned possessing any magazines holding more than 10 bullets.
California law has prohibited buying or selling such magazines since 2000, but those who had them before then were allowed to keep them.
In 2016, the Legislature and voters approved a law removing that provision. The California arm of the National Rifle Association sued and Benitez sided with the group’s argument that banning the magazines infringes on the Second Amendment right to bear arms.
Benitez had temporarily blocked the law from taking effect with a 2017 ruling.
Attorney General Xavier Becerra said in a statement that his office is “committed to defending California’s common sense gun laws” and is reviewing the decision and evaluating its next steps.
Chuck Michel, an attorney for the NRA and the California Rifle & Pistol Association, praised what he called a “well-researched and comprehensive ruling.”
The decision “recognizes that the Second Amendment is not a second-class right and that the state has to meet a high burden before it can pass a law that infringes on the right to keep or bear arms,” Michel said.”
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