Second Amendment Violated by Seizure of Firearms License from Alleged Domestic Violence Victim

From Tuesday's opinion by Judge Aida Delgado-Colón (D.P.R.) in Ramos-Cruz v. P.R., granting summary judgment to plaintiff on her Second Amendment claim:

The Court draws the following factual findings from the parties' admissions on the record and those statements of proposed facts submitted by plaintiff that comply with L. Civ. R. 56….

On November 19, 2022, after an argument with her husband, plaintiff left her residence in Ceiba and went to Luquillo where she called the police to make a report against him for domestic violence. At the Luquillo Police Station, PRPB [Puerto Rico Police Bureau] agents seized plaintiff's firearms license [a seizure that apparently made it illegal for her to acquire new guns -EV]. The agents then travelled to plaintiff's house, where her father-in-law was present, and proceeded to enter the home, where they seized her weapons and ammunition. This was done without her permission and without a court order, pursuant to Article 2.13 of [Puerto Rico Weapons Act]. The next day, on November 20, 2022, an ex parte temporary restraining order was entered in plaintiff's favor and against her husband….

Article 2.13… reads, in relevant part, as follows:

Any law enforcement officer shall temporarily seize the license, firearms, and/or ammunition of a citizen if he has grounds to believe that the firearms license holder has used or shall use said firearms and ammunition unlawfully to harm other persons; for uttering threats to commit a crime; for stating the intention to commit suicide; for repeatedly demonstrating negligence or carelessness in handling the firearm; when it is believed that the firearms license holder has a mental illness, is considered to be a habitual drunkard, or is addicted to controlled substances; or in any other situation of grave risk or danger that warrants the seizure.

The record before the Court shows that none of the enumerated exceptions applied to plaintiff's situation when she sought assistance from the PRPB. Rather, the PRPB effectuated the seizure pursuant to the last, broadly worded clause: "in any other situation of grave risk or danger that warrants the seizure." …

Defendant argues that Rahimi stands for the proposition that "dangerousness" is a proper basis on which to disarm an individual. The statute at issue in that case was 18 U.S.C. § 922(g)(8), which bars a person from possessing a firearm … when a court, after the subject is given notice and an opportunity to be heard, makes the finding of "dangerousness" or explicitly proscribes the use of force…. [But] Article 2.13 allows a police officer to make the determination of dangerousness prior to any judicial process and based on his or her subjective appreciation of a situation's dangerousness….

The summary judgment record (such as it is) suggests that plaintiff was dispossessed of her firearm and firearms license solely because she (i) she was a firearms owner, and (ii) sought the government's protection against her husband in a domestic violence dispute. According to the uncontested material facts on record, which the Court reads in the light most favorable to the non-movant defendants, plaintiff is a citizen of the United States, employed as a private security officer, and had legally obtained and possessed a firearms license, firearms, and ammunition. She exercised her right to seek a protective order against her husband as an alleged victim of domestic violence under Puerto Rico law.

After taking her complaint and being informed of the presence of firearms in the house, the PRPB went to the residence to detain her husband and seized several firearms. The PRPB also seized and retained plaintiff's weapons license. No warrant was ever issued for the seizure of either. Even after plaintiff withdrew her domestic violence complaint against her husband and repeatedly requested the return of her firearms and weapons license, she was refused. {Strikingly, after having also seized the alleged aggressor's firearms, the PRPB promptly returned them to him.} The PRPB retained both her firearms and license until on or about October 15, 2024, when they were returned to plaintiff. This happened a month and a half after she commenced the present action against defendants, on August 31, 2024.

As the record stands, plaintiff's only relevant characteristic is being a purported victim of domestic violence who seeks a protective order. Rahimi involved the exact opposite situation: the disarmament applied to the person against whom a domestic violence restraining order has been issued. The Supreme Court found that the surety and going armed laws justified disarming a person "who poses a credible threat to the physical safety of another," and a person against whom a domestic violence restraining order has been issued is such a person. It stretches logic to find that the putative victim of domestic abuse can be disarmed under the same standard.

{Of course, a person who exercises his or her right to keep and bear a firearm for self-defense purposes may be thought of, in the abstract, as posing a credible threat of physical harm against his or her aggressor. But that defies the logic behind the Second Amendment—the use of firearms in self-defense is at the core of the constitutional right. It would be unreasonable to justify disarmament under this premise.}

When interpreted holistically, Article 2.13 suggests that its residual "grave risk or danger" clause only means to refer to situations like the ones immediately listed before it. That is, applying the ejusdem generis canon of statutory construction, "grave risk or danger" should be interpreted to extend to situations similar to when "the firearms license holder has used or shall use said firearms and ammunition unlawfully to harm other persons; for uttering threats to commit a crime; for stating the intention to commit suicide; for repeatedly demonstrating negligence or carelessness in handling the firearm; when it is believed that the firearms license holder has a mental illness, is considered to be a habitual drunkard, or is addicted to controlled substances …."

All these instances evince a risk of danger to the person, to others, or to the community at large. Therefore, any circumstance posing a "grave risk or danger" should be comparable to the listed ones, if not already encompassed by these. To say that an alleged domestic abuse victim with a firearm presents a situation of comparable risk or danger to a drunk, a drug addict, or a mentally ill individual with a gun is, to put it mildly, unreasonable.

In sum, Rahimi would likely justify upholding Puerto Rico laws disarming persons against whom an accusation of domestic violence has been made. See, e.g., P.R. Laws. Ann. t. 8, § 621 (temporarily disarming a person against whom a court issues a restraining order). However, it is a stretch to say that because Rahimi validated a federal disarmament statute based on a person's dangerousness to others, the broad, subjective criteria provided for in Article 2.13 … is ipso facto constitutional….

Osvaldo Sandoval-Báez (Legitima Defensa PR) and Jose M Prieto Carballo (JPC Law Office) represent plaintiff.