The owner of a prescription card granting legal access to medicinal marijuana in Nevada was constitutionally deprived of her right to purchase guns, a federal appellate court affirmed on Wednesday.
The Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals in San Francisco rejected the claims of S. Rowan Wilson. The would-be purchaser had alleged that her rights to freedom of expression and gun ownership were violated by the federal government, alongside her due process protections.
Wilson had sought to purchase a firearm in October 2011, but the gun store owner in her small community of Moundhouse, Nev., refused to sell her one, noting her ownership of the marijuana prescription card.
Frederick Hauser cited federal laws prohibiting arms sales to users of cannabis, in denying Wilson. Just three days earlier, he and all federally-licensed firearms dealers were reminded of that statutory ban by the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF).
“[A]ny person who uses or is addicted to marijuana, regardless of whether his or her State has passed legislation authorizing marijuana use for medicinal purposes, is an unlawful user of or addicted to a controlled substance, and is prohibited by Federal law from possessing firearms or ammunition,” the ATF had said. The letter was sent as several states were preparing 2012 ballot initiatives on legalization.
Wilson had argued in court that she never even used cannabis, and that she possessed the card strictly to protest the federal prohibition on marijuana. Though the court accepted this claim, it nonetheless said the law and actions taken by the ATF were constitutional.
“[I[t is eminently reasonable for federal regulators to assume that a registry cardholder is much more likely to be a marijuana user than an individual who does not hold a registry card,” Senior District Judge Jed Rakoff wrote for the circuit, serving from Manhattan by designation.
He also noted that Wilson would have been properly denied, even if she used marijuana to treat “debilitating illnesses.” State laws on marijuana and other substances, he said, don’t supplant Congress’ “reasonable conclusion that the use of such drugs raises the risk of irrational or unpredictable behavior with which gun use should not be associated.”
Rakoff also dismissed Wilson’s claims of having her due process protections violated, rejecting allegations she is“being treated differently from other persons with similar medical conditions who have pursued other methods of treatment.”
“None of these groups…is a suspect or quasi-suspect class,” he wrote.
“The production, distribution, and use of medical marijuana are not protected by the First Amendment,” Rakoff also ruled. “[A]nd efforts by the Government to impede–or even eliminate altogether–the production, distribution, and use of medical marijuana are not evidence of any conspiracy against free speech.”
Though the ruling gave no quarter to states that have legalized medicinal marijuana, Rakoff’s opinion seemed ambivalent, at times, to the federal ban on the substance. At one point, he suggested a loophole that would allow those interested in using medicinal marijuana in Nevada to stockpile guns.
“Wilson could have amassed legal firearms before acquiring a registry card,” he noted.
Wilson’s attorney, Charles Rainey, told Courthouse News that they intended to appeal.
“We are going to litigate this, exhaust whatever remedies we have,” Rainey said, stating that he still believes the ATF intended to violate the civil liberties of his client and others. “When this letter was issued, it was issued as part of a deliberate attempt by the DOJ to quell a political movement.”
Wilson had previously lost her case at a federal district court in Nevada in 2014.
