Seattle officials have been named in a lawsuit filed by Second Amendment groups last week over the Washington city’s newest gun regulations.
Mayor Jenny Durkin signed the measure — requiring gun owners lock up their firearms under threat of a $10,000 fine — in a public ceremony last Wednesday with city police Chief Carmen Best and gun control groups in attendance.
She described the ordinance as “a common-sense and easy way to save lives and keep firearms from falling into the wrong hands” when city lawmakers passed it in a unanimously decision.
Within 48 hours, two gun owners, Omar Abdul Alim and Michael Thyng, allied with the National Rifle Association and Second Amendment Foundation, named Durkin and Best among others in a lawsuit filed in King County Superior Court.
In the filing, the pro-gun advocates argue that the new ordinance doesn’t square with state preemption statutes designed to safeguard against localities seeking to establish gun control regulations stronger than the state’s own laws. Adopted in 1985, Washington’s preemption laws have often been used by Second Amendment groups to challenge local city and county ordinances, often to good effect.
“Seattle seems to think it should be treated differently than any other local government when it comes to firearm regulation,” said Alan Gottlieb, SAF founder. “State preemption was adopted more than three decades ago to assure uniformity of gun laws from Ilwaco to the Idaho border. Seattle simply can’t break the law to adopt an ordinance as a political statement.”
Further, the lawsuit argues that the plaintiffs are both well aware of gun safety and have a very real need to protect their home with a readily available, unlocked firearm. Alim, an Army veteran, has in the past been the victim of a home invasion in which he used a gun to ward off the intruder. Likewise, Thyng, a certified firearms instructor, has been burglarized in the past and feels that a person can’t be expected to access a locked gun if needed during the compressed timeline and pressure likely in a home invasion.
Durkan’s ordinance, proposed with input from City Attorney Pete Holmes, Councilmember M. Lorena González, and gun control organizations, would establish a range of civil fines between $500 and $10,000 for those who leave unsecured firearms in areas where minors or those considered “at risk” may find them.
Additionally, it would require those who discover that they have had a firearm lost or stolen to notify police within 24 hours. Failure to make a report would result in fines of up to $1,000.
Durkin, whose city has been involved with an ongoing lawsuit over the city’s underperforming “gun violence tax” with the same groups since 2015, welcomed the new legal challenge, saying, “If they think we are intimidated, they are mistaken. I will continue to fight for our kids.”
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