WASHINGTON (AP) - A federal judge struck down the District of Columbia's ban on carrying guns outside of a person's home, concluding it violates Second Amendment rights.
The ruling from U.S. District Judge Frederick J. Scullin is the latest in a protracted fight over gun laws in Washington. In 2008, the U.S. Supreme Court issued a landmark decision striking down the city's 32-year-old ban on handguns. Since then, the city has rewritten its laws, lawsuits have been filed and even Congress has waded into the fight.
In a decision made public Saturday, Scullin concluded that the Second Amendment gives people the right to carry a gun outside the home for self-defense. He cited two U.S. Supreme Court cases as important to his ruling - the 2008 opinion striking down the District of Columbia's ban and a 2010 ruling involving Chicago's handgun ban.
"There is no longer any basis on which this court can conclude that the District of Columbia's total ban on the public carrying of ready-to-use handguns outside the home is constitutional under any level of scrutiny," wrote Scullin, who was appointed by President George H.W. Bush and is a retired Army colonel.
A city official said Sunday officials would ask for a stay and were weighing an appeal.
The city rewrote its rules after the 2008 Supreme Court decision. Residents were required to register their guns and keep them in their homes. Gun owners also have to take a safety class, be photographed and fingerprinted and re-register their weapons every three years. Those requirements were challenged in court but upheld by a federal judge.