Illinois’ new gun ban challenged in federal court; Marengo Guns among plaintiffs

A McHenry County gun shop is among a group of plaintiffs challenging the constitutionality of Illinois’ ban on high-powered semi-automatic weapons and large capacity magazines that took effect last week.

Marengo Guns along with the Illinois State Rifle Association, the Second Amendment Foundation, the Firearms Policy Coalition and a downstate gun store filed the lawsuit in federal court Tuesday. It names Illinois Attorney General Kwame Raoul, Illinois State Police Director Brendan Kelly, McHenry County State’s Attorney Patrick Kenneally and McHenry County Sheriff Robb Tadelman among the defendants.

[ 5 things to know about Illinois' new gun ban ]

“The State has enacted, and defendants have authority to enforce, a flat prohibition on the manufacture, delivery, sale, import, purchase, and possession of many common firearms – tendentiously labeled ‘assault weapons’ – by ordinary citizens, making it a crime for law-abiding citizens to exercise their fundamental right to keep and bear such arms,” the lawsuit stated.

Dominic DeBock, owner of Marengo Guns, said the ban takes away 30% to 35% of his revenue.

He said the term “assault weapons” is not an industry term but a media and political one, adding that the firearms that have been banned are not all “assault weapons.”

“They overreached, in my opinion, by quite a bit,” he said.

DeBock said he was asked to join the lawsuit and did so in the hopes that “it would be helpful.”

The lawsuit was filed in federal court Tuesday, the same day lawsuits were filed in Crawford and Effingham counties challenging the new ban’s constitutionality.

The ban was prompted in large part by the July 4 mass shooting at an Independence Day parade in Highland Park that left seven people dead and dozens more injured or traumatized.

The alleged shooter in that case used a Smith & Wesson M&P 15 rifle with three magazines of 30 rounds each, items that are included within the scope of the new law.

That weapon is similar to AR-style rifles that have been used in numerous mass shootings in the U.S. But the plaintiffs in the lawsuit argue that those weapons actually account for only a small percentage of overall gun crimes in the country.

“The folks buying these guns are honest, law-abiding hunters, sport shooters and people looking to protect their homes,” DeBock said.

The lawsuit asserts that the new law infringes on the right of “law-abiding, peaceful citizens to keep and bear commonly possessed firearms and ammunition magazines for defense of self and family and for other lawful purposes.”

[ Sheriffs across northern Illinois say they won't enforce gun registration under new ban ]

The Second Amendment to the U.S. Constitution guarantees “the right of the people to keep and bear Arms,” the federal lawsuit argues.

Other solutions exist that could ease people’s fears and avoid another Highland Park mass shooting, including allowing the state to search juvenile records when considering issuing a firearm owners identification card, said Richard Pearson, executive director of the Illinois State Rifle Association.

He said the ban infringes on the Second, Fourth and “maybe even the Fifth Amendment rights of self-incrimination,” making this a civil rights violation, as well.

“To think that you are going to ban something and you will prevent people from doing bad things, it never works,” Pearson said. “They tried that with banning alcohol and what we got was the mafia. We made drugs illegal and what we got was the cartel smuggling people and drugs into the U.S. The only time you do a ban the bad people profit and only the good people become the victims. It doesn’t stop bad people.”

[ Here are the weapons banned under Illinois’ new gun law ]

The federal lawsuit filed Tuesday night seeks a temporary injunction with the end goal of securing a permanent injunction against the ban, Pearson said.

In the meantime, the firearms named in the ban may not be sold, said David G. Sigale, the attorney heading up the lawsuit.

No hearing date is scheduled as of yet, Sigale said, “but we will be looking to schedule that as quickly as possible. While the law is in place, it is enforceable so the affected firearms cannot be sold.”

When the ban went into effect last week, DeBock said he moved all the banned weapons from his Marengo shop to a warehouse.

DeBock has owned the Marengo store for 12 years, as well as a second gun shop in Wisconsin for about 1 1/2 years. The Wisconsin shop is not affected by the ban, but it is fully stocked, so moving the weapons there from Marengo is not a viable answer, he said.

“It will be a large challenge to overcome losing 30% to 35% of my revenue, but we will shuck and jive to make up for it,” he said. “We can try and compensate with other products, but we just don’t know if it is going to work out or not. Lots of product came off our shelves. That’s just not good for us.”

He said he still could sell weapons legally to buyers out of state or online, but that likely would not make up for the financial loss created by the ban.

Sigale said he became involved in his first gun rights case about 15 years ago and has since taken on such cases because “at its core, … I believe people have a right to defend themselves,” he said.

“They have that right in their home and outside their home,” Sigale said. “It is not the government’s place to tell millions of law-abiding people in the state they cannot have the guns they need and want to defend themselves (if) they are attacked. The law-abiding people who have done nothing wrong should be able to maintain their constitutional rights.”

In regard to the Highland Park shooter, Sigale said, “He should have never been able to obtain a firearm.”

While the local police did their job, a loophole and his father vouching for him, allowed him to obtain the firearm and “that was just an awful failure.”

But, as it stands today, he said, “all law-abiding people in the state are now stripped of their rights” and he does not support that.

“If there is a balance, it lies somewhere there,” Sigale said. “I understand everyone feels strongly about [this law] one way or the other. I don’t want to get into the emotion of it, but if looking at it from the law, it just goes way too far.”

Kenneally declined to comment Wednesday, saying he needed time to review the lawsuit. An attempt to reach Tadelman, who called the law unconstitutional in a statement last week and said he would not enforce the registration provision of the law, on Wednesday was not successful.

• Capitol News Illinois contributed to this report.