Free Republic
Browse · Search
News/Activism
Topics · Post Article

Skip to comments.

The Right to Sue the Gun Industry
New York Times ^

Posted on 03/05/2016 1:48:48 PM PST by Sub-Driver

The Right to Sue the Gun Industry

By THE EDITORIAL BOARD MARCH 4, 2016

The world recoiled in horror in 2012 when 20 Connecticut schoolchildren and six adults were killed at Sandy Hook Elementary School by a deranged teenager using a military-style assault rifle to fire 154 rounds in less than five minutes. The weapon was a Bushmaster AR-15 semiautomatic rifle adapted from its original role as a battlefield weapon. The AR-15, which is designed to inflict maximum casualties with rapid bursts, should never have been available for purchase by civilians.

This is the eminently reasonable point that the parents of the 6- and 7-year-old students cut down at the school are now pressing in Connecticut state court. They are attempting to sue the gun manufacturer, Remington; the wholesaler; and a local retailer for recklessness in providing the weapon to the consumer marketplace “with no conceivable use for it other than the mass killing of other human beings.”

The question of whether the lawsuit will be allowed to proceed is at issue because Congress, prodded by the gun lobby, in 2005 foolishly granted the gun industry nearly complete immunity from legal claims and damages from the criminal use of guns.

The Sandy Hook parents argue that their suit should continue because that law, the Protection of Lawful Commerce in Arms Act, allows claims against companies — gun shop dealers, for example — if they knew or should have known that the weapons they sold were likely to risk injury to others. The parents contend that the maker of the Bushmaster is no less culpable because it knowingly marketed a risky war weapon to civilians.

(Excerpt) Read more at nytimes.com ...


TOPICS: Constitution/Conservatism; Culture/Society; News/Current Events
KEYWORDS: banglist; guncontrol; guns; secondamendment
Navigation: use the links below to view more comments.
first 1-2021-4041-56 next last
I believe the shooter was nuts? Am I wrong?
1 posted on 03/05/2016 1:48:48 PM PST by Sub-Driver
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | View Replies]

To: Sub-Driver

So is the NY Times.


2 posted on 03/05/2016 1:50:00 PM PST by Luke21
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: Sub-Driver

“The parents contend that the maker of the Bushmaster is no less culpable because it knowingly marketed a risky war weapon to civilians.”

Apple beware...this may become a precedent!


3 posted on 03/05/2016 1:51:36 PM PST by jessduntno (The mind of a liberal...deceit, desire for control, greed, contradiction and fueled by hate.)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: Luke21

We should then have a right to sue 0bama’s Volkische Beobachter..


4 posted on 03/05/2016 1:51:45 PM PST by sheik yerbouty ( Make America and the world a jihad free zone!)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 2 | View Replies]

To: Luke21

If you sue the gun industry you better sue the auto industry the knife industry, the bat industry, the rope industry and how about those illegal drugs that all the hypocrites in Washington are secretly invested in that is killing our children on the streets? Should we sue the politicians?


5 posted on 03/05/2016 1:52:58 PM PST by ronnie raygun
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 2 | View Replies]

To: Sub-Driver

I believe everyone else there was obeying the rules & laws rendering them impotent against the attacker, who being bent on mass murder would not have been stopped by lack of an assault weapon. The two largest mass murders in U.S. history were perpetrated without firearms (one with fertilizer & diesel, the other with a gallon of gasoline).


6 posted on 03/05/2016 1:53:34 PM PST by ctdonath2 (History does not long entrust the care of freedom to the weak or the timid. - Ike)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: Sub-Driver

Nah. It’s just a fake newspaper using a fake event...


7 posted on 03/05/2016 1:53:51 PM PST by max americana (fired every liberal in our company at every election cycle..and laughed at their faces (true story))
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: Sub-Driver

...and for those of you ready to vote against Trump on ‘principle’, keep in mind that it just takes ONE (key) COURT RULING to shut down the firearms industry....and then one more ruling and gun owners will be LIABLE any time they fire at another person.

But I know, Trump defends Planned Parenthood...so I guess the Second Amendment isn’t that big a deal, to some.


8 posted on 03/05/2016 1:56:40 PM PST by BobL (Who cares? He's going to build a wall and stop this invasion.)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: Sub-Driver

Maybe we should , each of us, just sue ourselves.


9 posted on 03/05/2016 1:58:09 PM PST by disndat
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: Sub-Driver

Then lets sue the car industry every time there is a crash.

Cars are 4-6000 pound machines that easily,kill people, and do.

Lets sue cutlery makers every time people areminjured by their knives. I am talking about dinnerware makers, those knives are just as deadly and are used in fights and aggression.

Lets sue contraceptive makers every time an unintended pregnancy comes about.

See personal responsibility means nothing. Using the product wrong means nothing. Oh, wait, mr libtard, only when it comes to guns and other products you despise? (rhetorical, not at the poster)


10 posted on 03/05/2016 2:00:18 PM PST by Secret Agent Man (Gone Galt; Not averse to Going Bronson.)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: jessduntno
“The parents contend that the maker of the Bushmaster is no less culpable because it knowingly marketed a risky war weapon to civilians.”

How often could the parents say that "The maker of the (insert name of vehicle here) is no less culpable because it knowingly marketed a (fill in vehicle weight) pound instrument of death and destruction to people who might operate it in an altered state of consciousness or while distracted."

Pretty soon we're going to be suing the guy who sold the fertilizer to the farmer who grew the corn the distiller made into the whiskey the driver consumed before getting in a wreck, too.

The responsibility has to lie on the person who did the deed, not the people who abused a tool to commit a crime..

11 posted on 03/05/2016 2:00:22 PM PST by Smokin' Joe (How often God must weep at humans' folly. Stand fast. God knows what He is doing.)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 3 | View Replies]

To: Sub-Driver

I heard or saw somewhere, that the Bushmaster was in the car trunk and he only used pistols????


12 posted on 03/05/2016 2:01:33 PM PST by Bringbackthedraft (HILLARY 2016 - SERIOUSLY? What are they thinking? Wuff, wuff?)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: BobL

Sorry, Bob, I’m more in favor of a guy who has been for the RKBA all along and who never supported an ‘assault weapons ban’.


13 posted on 03/05/2016 2:01:34 PM PST by Smokin' Joe (How often God must weep at humans' folly. Stand fast. God knows what He is doing.)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 8 | View Replies]

To: Sub-Driver

People die when the press lies. Maybe we should make it easier to sue the NYTs. And not just libel laws. How about class action suits for any lies?


14 posted on 03/05/2016 2:03:08 PM PST by TigersEye (This is the age of the death of reason and rule of law. Prepare!)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: Sub-Driver

This editorial just sold another 10,000 AR15s.


15 posted on 03/05/2016 2:04:38 PM PST by Toliph
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: Sub-Driver

So the NYT believes in suing companies whose products worked exactly as they were designed? The gun did everything right. Why should it be blamed?


16 posted on 03/05/2016 2:04:44 PM PST by OrangeHoof (Obama - the AIDS virus for the American body politic.)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: Sub-Driver
So, the only reason the police have AR-15's is to commit mass murder, because that's the only thing an AR-15 is good for. Am I following the "logic" correctly?

Take the judge to any given shooting range on any given Saturday, and count the AR-15s there that aren't murdering anyone.

17 posted on 03/05/2016 2:05:23 PM PST by Campion (Halten Sie sich unbedingt an die Lehre!)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: Smokin' Joe

I’d respect that if he were serving some other purpose than throwing the nomination process into a brokered convention...leaving us with Romney, Linda, or Jeb - who DON’T HAVE A PRAYER at winning.


18 posted on 03/05/2016 2:09:42 PM PST by BobL (Who cares? He's going to build a wall and stop this invasion.)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 13 | View Replies]

To: Sub-Driver

The AR-15, which is designed to inflict maximum casualties with rapid bursts... pure bullshit from liberal assholes. I doubt the NYT even knows which end the projectile departs from.


19 posted on 03/05/2016 2:11:17 PM PST by maddog55 (America Rising a new Civil War needs to happen.)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: Sub-Driver

I believe that we should reform the libel and slander laws to give citizens the right to sue newspapers and journalist for unlimited damages if they print any falsehood or false information about persons or property.


20 posted on 03/05/2016 2:16:06 PM PST by Navy Patriot (America, a Rule of Mob nation)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]


Navigation: use the links below to view more comments.
first 1-2021-4041-56 next last

Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.

Free Republic
Browse · Search
News/Activism
Topics · Post Article

FreeRepublic, LLC, PO BOX 9771, FRESNO, CA 93794
FreeRepublic.com is powered by software copyright 2000-2008 John Robinson