Miller v. Sessions

• Decision Date: 04 February 2019
• Docket Number: CIVIL ACTION NO. 17-2627
• Citation: 356 F.Supp.3d 472
• Parties: Daniel F. MILLER, Plaintiff, v. Jeff SESSIONS, et al., Defendants.
• Court: U.S. District Court — Eastern District of Pennsylvania

356 F.Supp.3d 472

Daniel F. MILLER, Plaintiff,

v.Jeff SESSIONS, et al.¹ , Defendants.

CIVIL ACTION NO. 17-2627

United States District Court, E.D. Pennsylvania.

Signed February 4, 2019

Adam J. Kraut, Joshua Prince, Prince Law Offices PC, Bechtelsville, PA, for Plaintiff.

Michael S. Macko, U.S. Attorney's Office, Philadelphia, PA, for Defendants.

MEMORANDUM

EDUARDO C. ROBRENO, District Judge.

I. INTRODUCTION

This action is about one citizen's individual Second Amendment right to keep and bear arms. The citizen wishes to purchase and possess a firearm. The Government contends that under 18 U.S.C. § 922(g)(1), the citizen is permanently banned from possessing a firearm because of a 1998 misdemeanor conviction under the Pennsylvania Vehicle Code. The citizen challenges the federal statute as unconstitutional as applied to him. The citizen wins.

II. BACKGROUND

Plaintiff Daniel F. Miller is a citizen of the United States who wishes to "purchase, possess and utilize firearms" after being denied the ability to do so.² Compl.

¶ 33, ECF No. 1. Miller has been denied the ability to purchase, possess, and use firearms on the basis of a 1998 misdemeanor conviction of the first degree, punishable by imprisonment for up to five years under the Pennsylvania Vehicle Code. Although the conviction does not disqualify Miller from purchasing, possessing, or using firearms under Pennsylvania law,³ it does disqualify him under federal law. See 18 U.S.C. § 922(g)(1). Under federal law, a person convicted of a crime punishable by more than one year of imprisonment is banned from possessing a firearm for life. Id.

The background of this case revolves around a 1998 misdemeanor conviction. Miller was pulled over for having window-tint on his car that, according to the patrolman who stopped him, was too dark. Id. ¶ 19. He had previously received an exemption from the Pennsylvania Department of Transportation ("PennDOT") for tinted windows on a previously owned car. Id. ¶ 20. Miller did not apply for a new exemption for his new car. Id. ¶ 21. Instead, with the aid of a typewriter, white-out, and a scanner, Miller replaced his previously owned car's Vehicle Identification Number ("VIN") on the exemption certificate with the VIN of his new car. Id.; see also Miller Dep. 45-49. Miller presented this altered PennDOT certificate to the Magisterial District Justice at his hearing regarding the window-tint violation. Based on the asserted authenticity of this certificate, he was found not guilty of the window-tint violation.

After the hearing, the patrolman who had originally stopped Miller requested a copy of the PennDOT certificate that Miller had proffered to the court. When the patrolman attempted to verify its authenticity, PennDOT informed him that Miller had never obtained a window-tint exemption for his new car. PennDOT informed the patrolman that Miller had only ever received a window-tint exemption for his previously owned car. It then became apparent that the certificate evidencing the window-tint exemption proffered in court had been altered and was not authentic. As a result, Miller was charged with and later pleaded guilty to possessing and using documents issued by PennDOT that he knew were altered in violation of 75 Pa. Cons. Stat. § 7122(3).⁴ Miller was sentenced to a year of probation, which he completed successfully, and has had a spotless record ever since. Compl. ¶¶ 23-24; see also id. Ex. A, B.

Miller filed this action, challenging the constitutionality of 18 U.S.C. § 922(g)(1) as applied to him. He seeks a declaration that his 1998 conviction for knowingly using an altered PennDOT document does not justify the permanent deprivation of his Second Amendment right and a permanent injunction against the Government's enforcement of § 922(g)(1) as applied to him. Miller and the Government each have filed motions for summary judgment. ECF Nos. 15, 16. The Court heard oral argument, and the case is now ready for disposition.

III. LEGAL STANDARD

Summary judgment is awarded under Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 56 when "there is no genuine dispute as to any material fact and the movant is entitled to judgment as a matter of law." Fed. R. Civ. P. 56(a) ; Liberty Mut. Ins. Co. v. Sweeney, 689 F.3d 288, 292 (3d Cir. 2012). "A motion for summary judgment will not be defeated by ‘the mere existence’ of some disputed facts, but will be denied when there is a genuine issue of material fact." Am. Eagle Outfitters v. Lyle & Scott Ltd., 584 F.3d 575, 581 (3d Cir. 2009) (quoting Anderson v. Liberty Lobby, Inc., 477 U.S. 242, 247-48, 106 S.Ct. 2505, 91 L.Ed.2d 202 (1986) ). A fact is "material" if proof of its existence or non-existence might affect the outcome of the litigation, and a dispute is "genuine" if "the evidence is such that a reasonable jury could return a verdict for the nonmoving party." Anderson, 477 U.S. at 248, 106 S.Ct. 2505.

In undertaking this analysis, the Court views all facts in the light most favorable to the non-moving party. "After making all reasonable inferences in the nonmoving party's favor, there is a genuine issue of material fact if a reasonable jury could find for the nonmoving party." Pignataro v. Port Auth. of N.Y. & N.J., 593 F.3d 265, 268 (3d Cir. 2010) (citing Reliance Ins. Co. v. Moessner, 121 F.3d 895, 900 (3d Cir. 1997) ). Although the moving party bears the initial burden of showing the absence of a genuine issue of material fact, meeting this obligation shifts the burden to the non-moving party, who must "set forth specific facts showing there is a genuine issue for trial." Anderson, 477 U.S. at 250, 106 S.Ct. 2505.

The summary judgment standard is "no different when there are cross-motions for summary judgment." Lawrence v. City of Phila., 527 F.3d 299, 310 (3d Cir. 2008). When confronted with cross-motions for summary judgment "[t]he court must rule on each party's motion on an individual and separate basis, determining, for each side, whether a judgment may be entered in accordance with the Rule 56 standard." Schlegel v. Life Ins. Co. of N. Am., 269 F.Supp.2d 612, 615 n.1 (E.D. Pa. 2003) (alteration in original) (quoting 10A Charles A. Wright, Arthur R. Miller & Mary Kay Kane, Federal Practice and Procedure § 2720 (1998) ).

IV. DISCUSSION

The issue in this case is whether § 922(g)(1), as applied to Miller, violates the Second Amendment of the Constitution.

A. The Second Amendment

The Second Amendment provides that "[a] well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed." U.S. Const. amend. II. Its importance in the constitutional architecture has been described by Justice Joseph Story as "the palladium of the liberties of a republic."⁵ 3 J. Story, Commentaries §§ 1890-91 (1833).

And yet, despite its centrality, since 1791 when the Second Amendment was ratified, there has been a sharp division of views on just what those twenty-seven words of the amendment mean. Over the years, some scholars have concluded that the Second Amendment was intended to protect states' rights to form militias.⁶ Other scholars, with equal certitude as to the meaning of the amendment, have contended that it protects an individual right to bear arms. See generally Adam Winkler, Gunfight: The Battle over the Right to Bear Arms in America (2011).

In 2008, sixty-nine years after it last revisited the Second Amendment,⁷ the Supreme Court ultimately held that in addition to "preserving the militia," the Second Amendment guarantees an individual right to keep and bear arms. Dist. of Columbia v. Heller, 554 U.S. 570, 599, 634-35, 128 S.Ct. 2783, 171 L.Ed.2d 637 (2008). The "core" of the Second Amendment protects the right of "law-abiding, responsible citizens to use arms in defense of hearth and home." Id. at 634-35, 128 S.Ct. 2783. The Supreme Court has clarified that the Fourteenth Amendment incorporates the Second Amendment right recognized in Heller, making the right applicable to the states. McDonald v. City of Chicago, 561 U.S. 742, 778, 791, 130 S.Ct. 3020, 177 L.Ed.2d 894 (2010) (finding that the Second Amendment is "fundamental" to "our system of ordered liberty").

As are most rights, the Second Amendment right is not without bounds. See Heller, 554 U.S. at 626, 128 S.Ct. 2783. In Heller, the Supreme Court identified a non-exhaustive list of "presumptively lawful" limitations such as "longstanding prohibitions on the possession of firearms by felons and the mentally ill, laws forbidding the carrying of firearms in sensitive places such as schools and government buildings, [and] laws imposing conditions and qualifications on the commercial sale of arms." Id. at 626-27, 128 S.Ct. 2783.

B. Third Circuit Second Amendment Jurisprudence

Post- Heller, the Third Circuit has considered the contours of the Second Amendment and "how a criminal law offender may rebut the presumption that he lacks Second Amendment rights."

Binderup v. Att'y Gen. United States, 836 F.3d 336, 339 (3d Cir. 2016) (en banc ). In a fractured en banc opinion, the Binderup court became the only appellate court to date to hold § 922(g)(1) unconstitutional in any of its applications.⁸ See Medina v. Whitaker, 913 F.3d 152, 155–56, 2019 WL 254691, at *2 (D.C. Cir. 2019) (discussing Binderup ). In Binderup, Judge Ambro authored the plurality opinion joined by six other judges in part and two other judges in part. Judge Hardiman authored a concurrence joined by four other judges, and Judge Fuentes authored a dissent joined by six other judges.

When no opinion garners a clear majority, the Third Circuit has "looked to the votes of dissenting [judges] if they, combined with the votes from plurality or concurring opinions, establish a majority view on the relevant issue." United States v. Donovan, 661 F.3d 174, 182 (3d Cir. 2011). "And when no single rationale explaining the result enjoys the support of a majority of the Court, its holding ‘may be viewed as that position taken by those...