By Paul Lathrop | Contributing Editor
Pennsylvania’s Allegheny County is the subject of a federal lawsuit after shutting down its firearms division, thus making it impossible to process applications for licenses to carry.
It’s a problem facing citizens in several jurisdictions, all the way out to Washington State, where some law enforcement agencies have not accepted new applications since mid-March.
Trib Live is reporting that Allegheny County Sherrif Bill Mullen, Allegheny County, and Pennsylvania State Police Commissioner Col. Robert Evanchick are the defendants in a federal lawsuit alleging Second and 14th Amendment violations. This stems from the Sheriff’s Department Firearms Division closure. In a Facebook post, the closure was attributed to an employee testing positive for COVID 19.
Plaintiffs are alleging that the closing was infringes on their right to keep and bear arms.
“Uncertain times such as the present are precisely when plaintiffs and plaintiffs’ members must be able to exercise their fundamental rights to keep and bear arms,” the lawsuit says. “The challenges we all face because of the covid-19 Coronavirus, the election, social unrest, or other social ills do not, cannot, and must not justify or excuse government infringements upon fundamental human rights.”
“State and local governments, whether legislatively or by executive decree, cannot simply suspend the Constitution,” the complaint continues. “And they certainly may not use a public health crisis as political cover to impose bans and restrictions on rights they do not like.”
One of the plaintiffs in the suit, Emily Cowey, has been trying to acquire a license since March.
Nine counties in Pennsylvania allow for the online application for licenses, Allegheny county is not among them.
While open carry without a license is technically permitted in the state, it is not allowed within a vehicle, so if you are walking to your destination you are legal, however, if you are inside a vehicle at any point you are in violation of the law.
