Mehl v. Blanas was a carry case in California brought by Attorney Gary Gorski that had the potential to upset the whole apple cart of Second Amendment litigation in the 9th circuit. Given that the Supreme Court has denied cert in the 2nd Circuit and 4th Circuit cases [UPDATE: Not for Wollard though. Williams was denied.], and the 7th Circuit case has now been remedied legislatively, the 9th circuit carry cases are more important than ever. Calguns offers a scathing review of the issues at hand with the Mehl case, and the attorney arguing it. They conclude with:
We are certainly not guaranteed a positive result in Richards and Peruta but we are very encouraged that Mehl was disposed of on grounds that do not injure those critical cases or, most importantly, the precious civil rights and millions of law-abiding people they represent. As we live to watch the Seventh Circuit force handgun carry by non-prohibited people upon Illinois and anti-gun rights municipalities like Chicago, we believe that the ultimate outcome — up to, and potentially including, a United States Supreme Court decision — will respect and protect our right to keep and bear arms for self-defense outside the thresholds of our homes as the framers of the Constitution and Bill of Rights intended.
It’s certainly encouraging. They could have taken Mehl and used it as a vehicle to screw us, but they didn’t.
What 4th circuit case are you talking about? A petition hasn’t yet been filed in Woolard v Sheridan, SAF’s carry case in MD. It’s due in the next week or two. Conventional wisdom is that Gura was waiting on the outcome in IL before filing, so I expect we’ll see it shortly.
Sorry, confusion on my part. It was Williams that was denied.
Yes…Williams was denied…but Cert Petition for Woollard is due next week 7/16/2013 (en banc denial was 4/16/13).
The problem with having plaintiffs with very similar sounding names :)
Additionally, Williams was never in the federal courts except for a cert petition from MD Court of Special Appeals (MD Supreme Court).