Free Republic

BELLEVUE, Wash. — Georgia gun dealer Jay Wallace's decision Monday to default on a lawsuit by New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg, and carry his case to an appeals court, was the right move because of genuine concerns he could not get a fair trial before federal judge Jack B. Weinstein, the Second Amendment Foundation said today. SAF has been the largest single contributor to Wallace's defense against the rogue lawsuit filed by Bloomberg, following the anti-gun mayor's infamous vigilante sting operation in 2006. SAF founder Alan Gottlieb concurred with Wallace's attorney, John Renzulli, that "There was no chance for a...

In a surprise turn of events on the eve of opening arguments, New York City prevailed Monday in its public nuisance lawsuit against Georgia gun dealer Adventure Outdoors when Eastern District of New York Judge Jack B. Weinstein granted the city's motion for a default judgment. The ruling gave the city a victory in the most high-profile case in Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg's fight against the dealers of guns used in crimes within the city. Of the 27 original defendants, three have now defaulted, 20 settled, three won dismissal and one is scheduled to go to trial in September. The...

A federal judge is forbidding the city from calling Mayor Bloomberg as a witness in its landmark suit against a gun salesman from Georgia. At a hearing yesterday, the judge, Jack Weinstein of U.S. District Court in Brooklyn, explained his decision to keep the mayor off the witness stand by saying, "I'm not going to turn the case into a media circus for either side," according to a partial transcript. A jury will be picked next week to hear the city's claim that a store owned by the gun dealer, Jay Wallace, sold a disproportionate number of the guns that...

When Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg stood at City Hall two years ago to announce that he had just filed suit against several gun shop owners, mainly in the South, it was in a certain fashion the capstone of a signature campaign. Mr. Bloomberg had already bashed the industry in several angry speeches, gone to Washington to pressure congressmen and lobbyists, and made his war against illegal guns a personal crusade. Now, however, Mr. Bloomberg is likely to answer verbally — and literally in person — for his personal crusade. City officials said on Wednesday that he was virtually certain to...

Lawyers for Mayor Bloomberg are asking a judge to ban any reference to the Second Amendment during the upcoming trial of a gun shop owner who was sued by the city. While trials are often tightly choreographed, with lawyers routinely instructed to not tell certain facts to a jury, a gag order on a section of the Constitution would be an oddity. “Apparently Mayor Bloomberg has a problem with both the First and the Second amendments,” Lawrence Keane, the general counsel of a firearms industry association, the National Shooting Sports Foundation, said. The trial, set to begin May 27, involves...

NEWS RELEASE Second Amendment Foundation 12500 NE Tenth Place • Bellevue, WA 98005 (425) 454-7012 • FAX (425) 451-3959 • www.saf.org FEDERAL COURT IN GEORGIA BLOCKS BLOOMBERG BID TO MOVE LAWSUIT For Immediate Release:   9/25/2007 BELLEVUE, WA – A federal district court in Georgia has denied a request by attorneys for New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg to transfer a lawsuit filed against the mayor and others by Adventure Outdoors, a Georgia retailer, to a federal court in New York State. That lawsuit, supported by the Second Amendment Foundation, names as defendants Mayor Bloomberg, the Corporation Counsel of the...