Suing gun makers

[hellofromreddit]

To distract from all the petty threads about who's the meanest meanie, how about we discuss guns? Specifically, can anyone describe how letting victims sue gun makers will depress gun violence? On her site, Hillary talks about reigning in straw purchasers, which makes obvious sense. It's this other part that concerns me:

She voted against the dangerous immunity protections Congress provided gun dealers and manufacturers that prevent victims of gun violence from holding negligent manufacturers and dealers accountable.

The part about immunity is not completely true. However, the most relevant paragraph from the PF article:

The law at issue is the Protection of Lawful Commerce in Arms Act, which was signed into law by President George W. Bush and seen as a victory for gun rights advocates. The purpose of the law is to protect gun dealers and manufacturers from lawsuits when their products are misused. For example, if a person buys a gun legally and then uses the gun to intentionally kill someone, the gun dealer and manufacturer cannot be held liable for the crime under the law.

...gets at the "immunity" she often describes. No suing of manufacturers.

For Clinton to achieve what she advocates she'd need to pass some new legislation explicitly allowing those suits or just repealing the old law (that would still be iffy though, since it would then be an open question for courts to decide). I don't really see how that would be much of a direct benefit to those victims. It seems like gun makers would simply purchase some form of liability insurance, make the guns marginally more expensive to cover the cost, and go back to business. Then the victim of an attack would have to not only wade through the legal system to get a settlement of some kind, but also go head-to-head with some well-heeled legal teams. It would simply be a minor nuisance for gun makers and a generally non-viable option for gun crime victims.

Obama's still pushing the TPP. That has some provisions in it that make suing foreign manufacturers far more difficult. How would things play out with a victim attempting to sue a foreign gun manufacturer? Could a foreign victim sue one of our manufacturers?

It's not that I disagree on the basic concept of addressing gun violence; I just think suing gun makers won't get it done. If we go through all the fight to pass such a law, then even if it's totally ineffective, it'll give some cover to anyone opposing an improved law later: "We already fixed that, now you're just piling on." So the old adage, "something is better than nothing" isn't necessarily true.

[TeddyR]

1. From what I've read in the past

The people in favor of being able to sue gun manufacturers/dealers are those who simply want to ban guns. Since the Second Amendment prohibits such bans, and there is a less-than-zero chance the Second Amendment will ever be repealed, the gun-banners workaround is to sue gun manufacturers/dealers out of existence. So it really has nothing to do with limiting gun violence but instead is an effort to gut one of the key amendments in the Bill of Rights. I don't think anyone legitimately believes that suing gun manufacturers when someone misuses their product is based on any sound legal theory.

[Lizzie Poppet]

2. Precisely.

Nuisance suits are gun ban advocates' way around the fact that they can't succeed democratically.

[Vattel]

3. The model is the use of lawsuits against tabacco. The hope is that similar

suits could effect changes in the types of guns that are manufactured. I do think that a whole range of guns should be banned, and that is not contrary to the second amendment. I doubt that the lawsuit strategy would work, though. Only legislation will do the trick.

As for PLCAA, it is a dumb law in the fine republican tradition of dumb tort reform laws. I love Bernie, but I gotta disagree with him on that vote.

[hellofromreddit]

4. Yeah, the PLCAA was a bad vote.

IIRC, one of the big arguments against it at the time was that hardly anybody sued gun makers anyway because it was essentially fruitless.

[TeddyR]

5. Legitimate question

Did the tobacco lawsuits actually make tobacco "safer," or did they only reveal that tobacco manufacturers had misled the public for years about the danger of tobacco?

I occasionally see the argument that lawsuits would cause firearms manufacturers to make a "safer" gun but I haven't seen anything that supports that argument. I wonder what sort of safety features people envision that would prevent/lower gun violence?

[Vattel]

7. It didn't make cigarettes safer. And I doubt lawsuits is the way to make

guns safer. One safety feature some favor is making guns "personalized" so that only the owner can fire them. The smart technology is definitely out there to achieve this. And of course getting rid of weapons that allow lots of ammo to be fired in a short time would make guns safer. I highly favor laws that ban the most dangerous guns and require safety features for the guns that are sold, as well as background checks and mandatory gun license tests similar to tests you take to get a drivers license.

[TeddyR]

11. Thanks

My understanding (and I haven't really researched the issue) is that the current smart gun technology isn't all that trustworthy. I believe that there are no current law enforcement groups that use any sort of smart gun. I oppose a ban on high capacity magazines (although "high capacity" is subject to interpretation) but understand that some people do support such a ban, and in fact some states have such bans in place. To be honest, the "most dangerous guns," at least when you are discussing guns used in crimes, are handguns, and I don't believe a handgun ban would pass constitutional muster, and I certainly would oppose such a ban.

[Vattel]

15. Most calculations of the danger of various sorts of guns don't take into account

the use of guns in Mexico that are purchased in the US. We need to think of the loss of lives there too, and guns that can fire lots of bullets in a short time are used extensively by drug gangs in Mexico.

I need to do more research into the viability and advisability of various safety features. I am no expert on this.

[TeddyR]

16. I agree that guns in the wrong hands are a bad idea

And I'm not an expert on the safety-features issue.

[Dem2]

8. Essentially guns that only fire for their owners

There are several competing technologies but this would make it less likely that a perp or family member could fire a gun wrestled or stolen from it's owner. There are other safety measures in the works too. As you know, the gun-nuts put the gun shop owner out of business (or tried to) for promoting one of these safer guns. This is an issue where the NRA/right is wrong.

[hack89]

21. Smart technology is ok as long as it is not mandated.

the problem is that it can be implemented in such a way that it becomes a backdoor ban on guns. See the old NJ law as a good example. That is why gun owners fight it - it is not the technology itself but the politics around it and how the laws are written.

[Dem2]

23. NRA / right-wing politics

Yes of course it's voluntary and we will not pay attention to the whole New Jersey f****** right-wing b******* as a guideline, unless we're NRA trolls who are pro murder.

[hack89]

24. So opposing mandatory smart guns = pro murder?

ok.

[Dem2]

25. Strawman

[hack89]

26. Then you need to translate your post for me.

I thought you were equating opposition to smart guns to " NRA trolls who are pro murder."

Correct me if I am wrong.

[Dem2]

27. 1/50 states had a weird law, that's 2%

I don't think it's much of an issue (and NJ is mostly urban and not the kind of state that I consider a big gun state), so I was saying that let's not focus on the exception - that's what RWer/NRA types do. Let's focus on solutions.

[hack89]

29. A certain Senator from Massachusetts tries to introduce an identical law every year

How about firm guarantees that such laws will never be introduced again?That would clear the way to a mutually agreeable solution.

[Dem2]

30. That's not how life works

If that's your argument, then you're guaranteeing that my guns will be confiscated.

Let's be more pragmatic than that.

[hack89]

31. There will never be gun confiscation

That is one thing I am not concerned about.

[Dem2]

32. Then let's introduce guns that can't be fired by anybody than their owner

Who could be against that?

I'd love to have better access to my gun, sucks that it has to be locked away so that others can't access it.

[hack89]

33. Just don't mandate it

Or grandfather in existing weapons. I like my guns - I don't want to replace them. For one thing I don't have a lot of spare cash lying around.

[Dem2]

34. I wouldn't mandate it

though I'd be happy if there was an affordable retrofit for my current pieces.

[TimPlo]

14. tabacco does not have a 2nd amendentment right

Attached to it. I know some people who are blinded by thinking their way or highway is OK. But there are a bunch of us in the US that think we should follow the constitution. And with in that it actually lays out a plan for changing it. And making laws to bypass it is wrong. If we want to ban guns we should have a constitutional convention and change the 2nd amendment.
Trying to pass laws skirting around the 2nd is same as what Pro-lifers are doing trying to skirt around Roe vs Wade. It is wrong and over stepping power. So why would anyone that claims they are a liberal want to cheat.

[Fresh_Start]

6. Here's an article about the impact of that law..

To make its case, the city had marshaled significant evidence showing that gun manufacturers were unwilling to take simple steps to keep their guns out of criminals' hands—and even knowingly fed the criminal gun market. The lawsuit highlighted federal data from 1996 to 1998 that had traced more than 34,000 guns used to perpetrate crimes back to just 137 dealers. The Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, and Firearms informed gun manufacturers every time a gun used in a crime was traced to their companies, information that would have made it easy for manufacturers to determine which of their distributors and dealers were supplying the black market, yet manufacturers continued to sell guns to those "bad apple" dealers.
http://www.motherjones.com/politics/2016/01/bernie-sanders-vote-gun-immunity-black-market

[TeddyR]

9. To be clear

A gun dealer who fails to follow the law -- for example, by knowingly selling a firearm to someone who is not permitted to purchase the firearm -- can still be sued. For example, http://www.jsonline.com/news/crime/wounded-police-officers-settle-case-against-gun-shop-b99729398z1-380296841.html

[Lizzie Poppet]

10. Exactly! And not only sued, but criminally prosecuted.

The ban on nuisance suits has done nothing to change either of these realities.

[Fresh_Start]

12. Understood but for the manufacturers to continue to distribute

guns to bad actor dealers....when the information available to the gun manufacturer was far better than the information available to an individual dealer is far more irresponsible.

There public at large including legal gun owners would not have missed the 130 bad actor dealers....but the distribution of illegal guns would have been severely limited.

[TeddyR]

18. If there are manufacturers

Or dealers that are breaking the law then I think they should be subject to lawsuit, and I think they ARE subject to lawsuit under the PLCAA.

[kcr]

13. It doesn't matter if you think suing gun makers will get it done or not.

The point is legislation like the PLCAA is nothing but corporate protectionism that hurts consumers. You know, bringing up the TPP is interesting. I wonder how many people who back Bernie on his stance on the PLCAA have spoken out against the TPP. Because that's an interesting conflict of opinions, there.

[TeddyR]

17. Why do you think the PLCAA hurts consumers?

It protects the firearm manufacturers from frivolous lawsuits, which would drive up the cost of doing business, which in turn would be passed on to consumers in the form of higher costs. I'd say that it protects consumers in that regard.

[kcr]

19. Not being able to sue corporations hurts consumers.

No corporation or industry should be protected in such a manner. Being sued drives up the cost of doing business? That's a good incentive, isn't it?

[TeddyR]

20. Being sued because you sold a defective product

Is a good incentive to sell products that aren't defective. And you can sue a gun manufacturer for selling a defective product, or for knowingly breaking the law. Being sued because someone misused your product is frivolous and shouldn't be permitted. I can't think of a single instance where someone sued a manufacturer because the product was misused and won.

[hack89]

22. But the law specifically lists six situations where gun manufacturers can be sued.

why aren't they adequate to protect consumers.

[Exilednight]

28. a better gun law would be this.

1. All sales must be background checked with a 30 day wait period.

2. Once a gun is sold it is licensed to that owner, and that owner is only.

3. If the owner loses, misplaces or fails to secure the weapon from theft, then that owner is criminally liable for any and all crimes committed with said gun.

4. If the owner wishes to sell the gun then they must do so using a third party legally licensed gun dealer to perform background checks, or may instantly sell to a lcensed gum dealer.