SCOTUS agrees to hear Smith and Wesson fight Mexico

The United States Supreme Court (SCOTUS) has accepted Smith & Wesson’s request to decide whether to dismiss the Mexican lawsuit against the gunmaker.

SCOTUS granted certificate on Friday Smith & Wesson vs. Mexico. The case centers on the foreign government’s claim that the U.S. firearms industry, and Smith & Wesson in particular, is responsible for cartel violence south of the border. The Court will decide whether that claim is viable under the federal Protection of Lawful Commerce in Arms Act (PLCAA).

The central questions in the case do not directly concern the Second Amendment, but focus on whether the actions of the arms industry can be legally linked to damage caused by criminal cartels in another country. However, Smith & Wesson argued in its petition to the Court that the lawsuit directly affects the constitutional right to keep and bear arms because Mexico’s goal is to effectively ban the sale of certain popular firearms in the United States .

“Simply put, Mexico abhors the U.S. system that makes firearms readily available to law-abiding citizens, consistent with the Second Amendment,” the company said in its filing. “It makes no secret of its position that ordinary citizens should not purchase an AR-15 or any firearm that can hold more than ten rounds. And it’s disgusting how law-abiding Americans have the freedom to acquire such firearms without having to beg for the government’s mercy. ”

The outcome of the case could have a significant impact on lawsuits seeking to hold gun manufacturers responsible for criminal acts by third parties using their products. There has been a resurgence of these types of lawsuits since the families of Sandy Hook victims successfully settled a case against the now-defunct Remington Arms after SCOTUS declined to grant a similar request to intervene from that company. If SCOTUS moves forward with the Mexican lawsuit, it will likely encourage many more plaintiffs to file a case against the gun industry. If not, it can have the exact opposite effect.

Smith & Wesson appealed to the Supreme Court after a three-judge panel of the First Circuit Court of Appeals greenlighted the $10 billion civil liability lawsuit. That court overturned a district judge’s ruling that the PLCAA had excluded Mexico’s claims. Instead, the panel concluded that Mexico’s lawsuit fit into one of the exceptions Congress included in the PLCAA’s liability shield.

“We agree that the PLCAA’s limitations on the types of lawsuits that can be brought in the United States apply to lawsuits brought by foreign governments for damages sustained outside the United States,” wrote Judge William J. Kayatta. “However, we also believe that Mexico’s complaint plausibly alleges a type of claim that is legally exempt from the PLCAA’s general prohibition.”

Judge Kayatta, appointed by Barack Obama, ruled that Mexico’s claim that U.S. gun manufacturers “aid and abet” the illegal sale of firearms was allowed under the law.

“On a fair reading, the complaint alleges that Defendants are aware of the high demand for their weapons among the Mexican drug cartels, that they can identify which of their dealers are responsible for the illegal sales that provide the cartels with the weapons, and that they know who the unlawful sales practices used by these dealers to get the guns to the cartels,” he wrote. “It is therefore not implausible that, as alleged in the complaint, Defendants engage in all of this conduct in order to maintain the unlawful market in Mexico, and not merely in spite of it.”

Smith & Wesson told SCOTUS that the First Circuit’s ruling “blatantly” defies established precedent and “threatens serious consequences.”

“Without this Court’s intervention, Mexico’s multibillion-dollar case will hang over the U.S. firearms industry for years to come, prompting costly and intrusive discovery by a foreign sovereign seeking to bully the industry into adopting a host of gun control systems. measures that have been repeatedly rejected by American voters,” the company wrote. Worse, as long as the decision below remains law, there will be dozens of similar lawsuits by other governments, both foreign and domestic – all trying to distract from their own political shortcomings by laying the blame for criminal violence at the feet of the government to impose. the American firearms industry.”

The gun company argued that it was critical that the Court intervene at this point because of the effect a substantive challenge to the case could have, even if ultimately successful.

“Even if ultimately unsuccessful, the costs of that lawsuit will be devastating – not only to the defendants, but more importantly to the millions of law-abiding Americans who rely on the firearms industry to effectively exercise their Second Amendment rights,” he said. Smith & Wesson. . “These types of lawsuits are exactly what Congress enacted PLCAA to avoid.”

The Supreme Court has already scheduled oral arguments in another gun-related case, Vanderstok vs. Garlandfor next Tuesday. Although it recently sidestepped and accepted several Second Amendment cases earlier this year Smith & Wesson vs. Mexico means that the Court will again issue at least two opinions in weapons cases during its next term of office.