IS NY GOVERNOR HOCHUL PLEASED WITH THE ANTONYUK DECISION? SURE! NOW ASK JUSTICES THOMAS AND ALITO WHAT THEY THINK.
The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit came down with its decision in Antonyuk* on December 8, 2023.
The case is mostly bad news for present or prospective concealed handgun carry licensees in New York although it’s not surprising news to us.
There is much to glean from the decision.
But to get a handle on it and to understand what it all portends, it helps to review the Second Circuit’s prior rulings, and we will do that in future articles.
The rationale behind the Court’s decision in Antonyuk is not to be found in its overt language or in the arcane interstices of it but, rather, in the Court’s earlier rulings.
Those rulings bespeak an ideology and philosophy alien to our Constitution and to our Nation’s Bill of Rights and antithetical to man’s natural law right to armed self-defense.
The Second Circuit’s rulings in Antonyuk expressly and defiantly reaffirm the Court’s own prior rulings and cohere with them.
They are inconsistent with the U.S. Supreme Court’s rulings— giving, at best, if one were to think that much of them, mere lip service to them, but twisting the rulings to support the Federal Appellate Court’s own prior rulings and reasoning.
In Heller and Bruen, the U.S. Supreme Court explained the faultiness of the Second Circuit’s approach to the Second Amendment and that of several of its sister Federal Appellate Courts that, like the Second Circuit, also abhor the natural law right codified succinctly and clearly in the Second Amendment of the Bill of Rights of the U.S. Constitution.
The Second Circuit apparently felt it could defy Heller because the Heller rulings, while directly affecting New York’s Handgun Law, didn’t directly refer to that Law. The Bruen rulings, though, did.
The impetus for the Heller rulings, apart from the major reaffirmation of the right to keep and bear arms as an individual right, was directed to the D.C. Law on handguns.
However, since Bruen specifically dealt with New York’s Handgun Law, the Second Circuit found itself in a quandary.
The nature of that quandary we had previously discussed.
See the Arbalest Quarrel article, posted on January 20, 2023, in Ammoland Shooting Sports News. We discuss two scenarios.
The first scenario, as outlined in the AQ article, is the one the Second Circuit has taken.
We said,
The Second Circuit ultimately rules in favor of the Government. The Court strikes down the PI [Preliminary Injunction] and dismisses Antonyuk vs. Nigrelli (Antonyuk II) with prejudice.
Plaintiffs will immediately file their appeal to the U.S. Supreme Court. That is a dead certainty.
And the High Court will take the case up for review. That [too] . . . is a dead certainty. The Court must accept the Writ of Certiorari. Why is that?
If the U.S. Supreme Court demurs from hearing the case, it defeats the Second Amendment and weakens its prior holdings, Heller, McDonald, and Bruen.
It makes a mockery of itself—slits its own throat, and undermines the authority of the High Court, this Third Branch of Government. It won’t do that.
The [Concealed Carry Improvement Act] CCIA legally and logically contradicts the Second Amendment and an insult to the High Court’s rulings in Heller, McDonald, and Bruen.
An adverse decision in Antonyuk vs. Nigrelli (Antonyuk II) weakens the three prior seminal Second Amendment cases.
The Second Circuit has now played its hand. Acceding to the wishes of the New York Hochul Government, it has spurned the rulings and reasoning of, and mocked and provoked, its parent, the U.S. Supreme Court.
It has echoed and amplified the sentiments of Kathy Hochul and of other New York Government officials and leaders and has made clear its own contempt for those citizens who wish to exercise their right to armed self-defense in New York.
THE ESSENCE OF THE SECOND CIRCUIT’S DECISION IN THE ANTONYUK CASE
We turn now to a gist of the Opinion.
To begin, the decision of the three Federal Appellate Judges was unanimous.
In summary, the Court said this:
In these four cases, heard and now decided in tandem, Plaintiffs raise First and Second Amendment challenges to many provisions of New York's laws regulating the public carriage of firearms. In Antonyuk, the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of New York (Suddaby, J.) enjoined enforcement of more than a dozen such provisions. In Hardaway, Christian, and Spencer, the U.S. District Court for the Western District of New York (Sinatra, J.) separately enjoined a subset of the laws previously enjoined in Antonyuk, though based on slightly different reasoning. We stayed the various injunctions pending appeal, expedited the appeals, and, in light of the substantial overlap among the cases, heard arguments in tandem on March 20, 2023.
We now AFFIRM the injunctions in part, VACATE in part, and REMAND for proceedings consistent with this opinion. In summary, we uphold the district court's injunctions with respect to N.Y. Penal L. § 400.00(1)(o)(iv) (social media disclosure); N.Y. Penal L. § 265.01-d (restricted locations) as applied to private property held open to the general public; and N.Y. Penal L. § 265.01-e(2)(c) as applied to Pastor Spencer, the Tabernacle Family Church, its members, or their agents and licensees. We vacate the injunctions in all other respects, having concluded either that the district court lacked jurisdiction or that the challenged laws do not violate the Constitution on their face.
A cursory inspection of the decision may convey the impression to some that the U.S Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit found a way out of the morass:
Reassuring Governor Hochul and the Democrat Party-controlled Legislature in Albany that the Government can continue to enforce the CCIA and, at once, placating the Plaintiffs New York concealed handgun carry license holders and the Second Amendment Foundation.
But, as for the latter, only a fool would think the Second Circuit gave Party Plaintiffs much of anything to be happy about.
The Appellate Court prohibited Government licensing authorities from demanding applicants reveal their personal identifiers for social media accounts. And the Court did prohibit Government licensing authorities from mucking about in a person’s private social media accounts.
But the constraints are lessened if not negated by the Court’s copious rulings on Good Moral Character, whose use the Court said is Constitutional, and its enforcement by the Government will therefore remain a serious concern for applicants.
Yet, “GOOD MORAL CHARACTER” is one of the two foundational components of the CCIA that infringes on the core of the Second Amendment right.
The other one is “SENSITIVE LOCATION” RESTRICTIONS. See, infra.
Since the Court held that assessment of one’s “MORAL CHARACTER” is a legitimate prerogative of Government and since, as the Court opines, the perusal of social media is a key component in the review of a person’s moral character, the Court had no wish to prevent licensing authorities from accessing social media information that would assist them in a determination of one’s character to possess a handgun in the public sphere.
So, the Court reinforced the licensing authority’s discretion to peruse an applicant’s social media with a workaround:
The Court said,
More generally, we have already explained that it is constitutional for a state to make licensing decisions regarding an applicant's ‘good moral character,’ at least where that ‘character’ is defined in terms of dangerousness. It must, therefore, be constitutional for the licensing authority to investigate the applicant's character, and no one argues that a licensing officer may not inquire into the applicant's trustworthiness beyond the challenged disclosures. It follows that the State can also require modest disclosures of information relevant to that investigation, making the (permissible) assessment of dangerousness more efficient and more accurate.” [More on this thing, ‘dangerousness’, below]
The CCIA falls apart IN THE ABSENCE of “GOOD MORAL CHARACTER” and New York’s “SENSITIVE LOCATION RESTRICTIONS.”
These two things are the guts of Hochul’s CCIA.
The Government insists on their retention, and is adamant that the Government can enforce them. The Second Circuit has obliged the New York Government.
The Court has set forth a comprehensive, albeit defective, legal and logical argument to support the pragmatic need for the GOOD MORAL CHARACTER Requirement and SENSITIVE LOCATION RESTRICTIONS. Worst of all, the Court assumes, rather than articulates, the constitutionality of the GOOD MORAL CHARACTER Requirement and SENSITIVE LOCATION RESTRICTIONS.
RE: GOOD MORAL CHARACTER
The problem with the GOOD MORAL CHARACTER is that, Constitutionally, application of it in the Second Amendment right is contra exercise of the Right.
The Second Circuit Court of Appeals knows this or should know this.
But, because the Court presupposed and did not proffer an argument to support a finding that the “GOOD MORAL CHARACTER” requirement is Constitutional, its arguments come across as strained and uncompelling.
And, it is noteworthy the Court found its application problematic and said so.
The Court remarked,
“We recognize that ‘good moral character’ is a spongy concept susceptible to abuse. . . .”
The concept is more than “spongy.” The Second Circuit uses that word as a makeweight to avoid acknowledging the concept is facially unconstitutional.
The Court slithers around that fact, doing what it can to deal with pragmatic concerns attendant to the concept’s application only.
But, logically, the Court’s approach is flawed.
Having perfunctorily dismissed a facial challenge to it, the Court proceeded directly to pragmatic concerns. But those concerns are of secondary importance, and they lose all significance without a compelling argument to deal effectively with the facial challenge that goes directly to the constitutionality of the concept in the context of a fundamental natural law right.
The nature of one’s character is irrelevant to one’s exercise of the natural law right to self-defense.
Therefore, its application is constitutionally suspect at the get-go.
But, assuming, for argument’s sake, that consideration of one’s character to possess a concealed handgun for self-defense in the public domain is constitutional, the Court’s perception that Government abuses can be dealt with is no simple task.
The Court simply says that, notwithstanding the susceptibility to abuse, “such abuses, should they become manifest, can still be vindicated in court as they arise.”
They can’t because assessing one’s character is a complicated undertaking and subject to abuse even where its application is legally permissible.
The Government licensing authority’s bias against the applicant is inextricably bound to that authority’s personality.
Even if mechanisms to handle such abuse exist, what do those involve?
An Administrative Appeal?
A Court action?
The Second Circuit doesn’t concern itself with the time, monetary expense, effort, or psychological impact on the applicant whose application is denied.
Its argument that abuses can be vindicated as they arise is lame. The Court suggests, as it must know, that abuses will invariably occur. That fact alone should have given the Court pause.
The Court should have investigated whether and not have assumed that GOOD MORAL CHARACTER is an appropriate, legitimate, legal, logical, ethical, and pragmatic concept to be employed in a matter involving exercising a fundamental, natural law right.
It dispensed with all of that except for the ostensible pragmatic reason for retaining it.
Among the arguments offered, the Court said this:
. . . The character requirement states that ‘[n]o license shall be issued or renewed except for an applicant . . . of good moral character.’ . . .
Since 1913, New York has required concealed carry licensees to possess ‘good moral character,’ but this phrase was left statutorily undefined until the CCIA added the following definition: ‘having the essential character, temperament and judgement necessary to be entrusted with a weapon and to use it only in a manner that does not endanger oneself or others. . . .’”
The CCIA's definition of ‘character’ is a proxy for dangerousness: whether the applicant, if licensed to carry a firearm, is likely to pose a danger to himself, others, or public safety. And there is widespread consensus (notwithstanding some disputes at the margins) that restrictions which prevent dangerous individuals from wielding lethal weapons are part of the nation's tradition of firearm regulation. We therefore cannot conclude that every denial on grounds of ‘good moral character’ as defined by New York will violate the Second Amendment, though various avenues lie open for as-applied challenges.
From a close reading of the opinion text, one can infer that the Second Circuit concedes, albeit tacitly, the dubious legality of employing “CHARACTER” to deny the exercise of a fundamental, unalienable, natural law right.
More to the point, if “DANGEROUSNESS” is really of concern to the Court, then why do two standards for GOOD MORAL CHARACTER exist in the New York HANDGUN LAW——
One for those few individuals who make application only for a restricted “PREMISE” license that does not permit the licensee to use a handgun lawfully for self-defense while in the public domain, and another, a new, more robust standard for those individuals—most individuals—who apply for a concealed handgun carry license that ostensibly allows for the lawful use of a handgun for self-defense in the public domain?
The Second Circuit doesn’t bother to explore the disparity.
The principal, overarching issue is the Constitutionality of assessing one’s character before obtaining a New York State concealed handgun carry license.
What other fundamental right necessitates showing “GOOD MORAL CHARACTER” as a condition precedent to an American citizen exercising his natural law right?
The answer? “There is none.”
To demand that one demonstrate “GOOD MORAL CHARACTER” is incongruous and patently absurd.
So why is an exception made here?
The Court says “GOOD MORAL CHARACTER” serves as “A PROXY FOR DANGEROUSNESS.”
Pay close attention to the verbiage. Why did the Court say this, and what does the Court mean by it?
The Court knows that assessing one’s character has nothing to do with exercising any natural law right.
CONSIDER——
FREE EXPRESSION (AS LONG AS THAT DOES NOT ENTAIL SPECIFIC THREAT OF VIOLENCE TO ANOTHER)
FREE EXERCISE OF RELIGION (UNCONSTRAINED AS LONG AS THE IMPETUS OF THAT RELIGION DOES NOT ENTAIL PHYSICAL HARM TO OTHERS)
FREEDOM OF ASSOCIATION (WITH THOSE OF LIKE MIND, UNIMPEDED BY GOVERNMENT OR ANY OTHER ENTITY.
SELF-PRESERVATION, THAT IS TO SAY, SELF-DEFENSE (AND THIS IMPLIES, BY LOGICAL IMPLICATION, THE USE OF THE BEST MEANS TO SECURE ONE’S LIFE AND WELL-BEING—A FIREARM)
Yet, the natural law right of “SELF-DEFENSE” and the natural law right to “ARMED SELF-DEFENSE” are treated by many elements both inside Government and outside it, as two distinct things.
Why is that?
Major advances in information and communication technology have enabled the common man to express himself efficiently and effectively and immediately disseminate his ideas to the world.
Ought those technological advances require a person to demonstrate moral character consistent with the Government’s imposition of arbitrary standards before he’s permitted to apply that technology?
Some might think so. Some have said so.
Government and Business have impliedly done so through illegal censoring of speech, which presumptively means the party censored exhibits “BAD CHARACTER,” necessitating that one’s ideas should be censored.
AND CONSIDER——
Major advances in the technology of personnel weapons have now provided otherwise weak, essentially defenseless people the ability to defend themselves effectively, assertedly, and immediately against the abnormal strength exhibited by rabid aggressors who intend to harm, maim, or kill them.
Ought those technological advances require a person to demonstrate moral character consistent with the Government’s imposition of arbitrary standards before applying that technology?
Some have said so. Many there are who would deny a person the right to secure his own life against an external, dangerous threat because they discern the life of an innocent individual to have less “utility” than the greater utility allocated to the masses, existing in a well-ordered, well-engineered, Collectivist world order.
The Second Circuit didn’t explore the normative implications of its rulings for individuals.
Rather, it focused on finding a plausible explanation to justify (i.e., rationalize) its finding that the use of “GOOD MORAL CHARACTER” makes practical sense, and it erroneously and fatuously assumed it passes constitutional muster.
And so, the Court focused on the concept of ‘dangerousness.’
That concept is as fascinating as it is disconcerting, for “dangerousness,” as a function of GUNS and of GUN USE, underscores every argument ever made by those who find civilian possession of firearms abhorrent and senseless.
They see guns as inherently dangerous and of minimal utility, regardless of the sentient agent who wields them and the end for which he uses them.
Those who find civilian possession of guns distasteful and of no practical use in a purported “civilized society” take as axiomatic the following DECLARITIVE STATEMENT and utilize it as a MORAL IMPERATIVE.
“GET RID OF GUNS AND THE PROBLEM OF ‘DANGEROUSNESS’ WILL TAKE CARE OF ITSELF.”
But, at the moment, it is impossible constitutionally in our Country “to get rid of guns” by systematically and dramatically banning civilian possession of guns outright, even as many want and would undertake, if they could, notwithstanding constitutional limitations standing in their way.
So, meanwhile, those governments and those private interests that detest civilian possession of firearms employ A PLOY. They describe this or that person as “dangerous” to himself or others. That is what the New York Hochul Government has done.
Applying a new robust standard for GOOD MORAL CHARACTER, in effect, operates as a stand-in for the old “PROPER CAUSE” standard the U.S. Supreme Court struck down as facially unconstitutional, as applied to New York concealed handgun carry licenses.
Application of GOOD MORAL CHARACTER restricts the domain of civilians allowed access to guns for lawful concealed carry in the public domain.
The Government’s handgun licensing authorities serve as the gatekeepers for the Government’s leaders who abhor civilian access to firearms, especially access to handguns or any other semiautomatic weapon.
This concept of “dangerousness” crops up elsewhere to prevent a person from exercising his God-given right to armed self-defense.
State Governments have employed “RED FLAG” laws to prevent a person from exercising his natural law right.
State Governments have used the ploy of misdemeanor convictions or even mere charges of “DOMESTIC VIOLENCE” to prevent citizens from ever having access to firearms.
The Party Plaintiffs in Antonyuk will challenge the constitutionality of GOOD MORAL CHARACTER facially and various aspects of it that the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit has upheld as both valid and constitutional and not subject to “facial” attack.
There is a procedural question of whether this issue is ripe for appeal to the U.S. Supreme Court.
Plaintiffs can ask for an “en banc” review of the decision by the entire Second Circuit instead of a direct appeal immediately to the High Court, or they might—as the three-judge panel and the Government hope—proceed to the lower Federal District Court to deal with the issues the Second Circuit has remanded to it. That would buy the Government more time as it allows for continued enforcement of the CCIA during the pendency of further review.
Or the Plaintiffs can file for immediate review of one or more or all of the issues directly to the U.S. Supreme Court and hope the Court will take up final appealable issues and even those that the Second Circuit has remanded to the lower District Court.
THE BOLSTERED GOOD MORAL CHARACTER REQUIREMENT AND A “SENSITIVE LOCATION” RESTRICTIONS LAW OPERATE TOGETHER AS A REPLACEMENT FOR NEW YORK’S “PROPER CAUSE” REQUIREMENT
The concepts of “SENSITIVE LOCATION” RESTRICTIONS and the bolstered “GOOD MORAL CHARACTER” REQUIREMENT are as ingenious as they are devious.
The two—“GOOD MORAL CHARACTER” AND “SENSITIVE LOCATION”—operate in tandem as a SUBSTITUTE for “PROPER CAUSE” (i.e., “EXTRAORDINARY NEED”), which the U.S. Supreme Court ruled unconstitutional.
The Hochul Government overhauled the “GOOD MORAL CHARACTER” complicating the process for obtaining a license for those people applying for a New York concealed handgun carry license.
The new bolstered “GOOD MORAL CHARACTER” requirement places unnecessary obstacles in the path of those individuals who wish to acquire a valid New York concealed handgun carry license, burdening and frustrating them.
The Government intends to limit, to the extent possible, the number of applicants who can qualify for a New York concealed handgun carry license.
And, for those applicants who apply for a valid State concealed handgun carry license and who do receive said New York State concealed handgun carry license, the Hochul Government has imposed “SENSITIVE LOCATION” RESTRICTIONS to frustrate a person’s lawful use of a handgun for self-defense whose life is threatened while in the public sphere of activity.
Unlike “GOOD MORAL CHARACTER,” there is no precedent in New York Gun Law for “SENSITIVE LOCATION RESTRICTIONS.”
RE: “SENSITIVE LOCATION” RESTRICTIONS
The Hochul Government concocted a “SENSITIVE LOCATION RESTRICTIONS” mechanism to transform the “UNRESTRICTED” CONCEALED CARRY LICENSE into—what is now effectively—a “HIGHLY RESTRICTED” CONCEALED CARRY LICENSE, and for all such license holders.
Why did the Hochul Government do this? It did this BECAUSE The U.S. Supreme Court has compelled the Hochul Government to grant more concealed handgun carry licenses to many more applicants, and the Government is decidedly unhappy about this—enraged, in fact.
The Government has, therefore, imposed on all holders of valid New York concealed handgun carry licenses a bizarre, extensive, ad hoc patchwork quilt of areas in the public sphere where civilians who hold valid licenses are prohibited from lawfully carrying a handgun for self-defense, thereby transforming all unrestricted carry into restricted carry.
The situation now facing holders of concealed handgun carry licenses is analogous to one that always faced holders of highly restrictive premise handgun licenses.
The New York Government allows holders of restricted premise handgun licenses “to carry” their handgun in public when they GO TO OR COME FROM a shooting range, take their handgun in for repairs, or surrender their handgun to the proper government authority.
BUT, IMPORTANTLY, IN EACH OF THOSE INSTANCES, HOLDERS OF A RESTRICTED PREMISE LICENSE CANNOT LAWFULLY USE A HANDGUN FOR SELF-DEFENSE IF THE NEED WERE TO ARISE.
And, as a matter of practical necessity, the use of a handgun in a life-threatening emergency is empirically impossible.
A restricted premise license holder must carry his handgun in an appropriate gun case, and the ammunition must be separated from the handgun.
A declaration of certain areas as “SENSITIVE LOCATIONS” operates in much the same way for holders of concealed handgun carry licenses.
They must not carry their handguns in those areas, for the Government does not allow lawful use of them for self-defense against life-threatening aggressive attacks.
N.Y. Penal L. § 265.01-e is the “SENSITIVE LOCATION” statute.
There are now many areas where a concealed carry license holder is prohibited from carrying and using a handgun for self-defense, as stated in this statute, passed by the Legislature and signed into law by Hochul in 2023.
The lower District Court imposed a preliminary injunction on most of these areas, and apart from one instance involving one Church, the Second Circuit broadly vacated the District Court’s granting of the Plaintiffs’ preliminary injunction.
This means the Hochul Government may continue enforcing concealed carry restrictions in those areas. The Second Circuit has set its imprimatur on this.
Plaintiffs will likely appeal the “SENSITIVE LOCATION” RESTRICTIONS to the U.S. Supreme Court.
There is no point in the Party Plaintiffs spending time and money to request an en banc hearing of the full complement of Second Circuit Judges to rehear the case. The Court’s full complement can peremptorily deny rehearing anyway.
The U.S. Supreme Court, for its part, is likely to take the case up for review since the CCIA is a direct, unabashed assault on and affront to the Bruen rulings.
The U.S. Supreme Court would do this because New York’s “SENSITIVE LOCATION” RESTRICTIONS not only implicate and infringe upon the right to armed self-defense in the public domain but also defy the High Court’s specific assertions and admonitions to the Hochul Government. But Hochul didn’t care. It was what she intended to do. Her Government intends to turn much of New York State and most of New York City into a GUN-FREE ZONE.
Similarly, the “GOOD MORAL CHARACTER” REQUIREMENT is anathema to exercising the fundamental, natural law right to armed self-defense and has an unconstitutional chilling effect on the First Amendment right of free expression, as well.
Likely, the High Court will not have kind words for the Second Circuit, whose reasoning and rulings in Antonyuk are blatantly inconsistent with the High Court’s own reasoning and rulings in Bruen and Heller.
CONCLUDING REMARKS
The Second Circuit mentions licenses and licensing 159 times in its opinion, but never deals directly with it, as it could have done, at least in dicta, and should have done.
New York’s Handgun Licensing Regime is the “Elephant in the Room.”
It is the source of all the problems in New York’s Handgun Law Regime that harkens back to the start of handgun licensing with the enactment of the Sullivan Act in 1911. It is not a new issue that commenced with the passage of the CCIA.
The Second Circuit should have considered the problem of licensing. It mentions licensing constantly but does nothing to address it directly.
The CCIA is simply the logical end result of over 100 years of wrongheadedness by the New York Government.
The Sullivan Act that created “handgun Licensing” was promoted on a lie—to deal, ostensibly, with rising crime in the City of New York. Yet, its enactment had no appreciable effect on crime.
But, then, that was never the intention. It was all a myth.
New immigrants to the City—Jews from Eastern Europe and Italians from Western Europe—were the targets: Don’t allow Jews or Italians to have access to guns. That was the mantra.
It wasn’t a secret.
One would think a rational mind in the New York Government would, at some point, have stated the fact expressly. It is what everyone knew. The Legislature should have repealed the Sullivan Act well before it grew into the monster it now is. That never happened.
The Sullivan Act might be compared to abortion.
Margaret Sanger, the founder of Planned Parenthood—who created the organization around the time of enactment of the Sullivan Act—had despised the Black Race and wanted to prevent their propagation. That, too, is no secret.
She conceived of “contraception” and abortion as ways to make it easy for Black women to avoid conception or to deal with it after it arose.
A hundred years later, no one calls Sanger out for this, but women of all races and socio-economic status proclaim abortion to be a fundamental right. It isn’t and never was, and it is discordant to think that the murder of an innocent child could be rationally construed as a right at all, let alone a fundamental, unalienable right.
If it were possible, one might wish to ask Sanger what she thinks of the new attitude today toward abortion and what she would make of her “Planned Parenthood” as it exists today.
One might also wish to ask Timothy Sullivan, sponsor of the Handgun Licensing Act of 1911, what he thinks of his Act—what it has evolved into after more than 110 years. Would he be pleased or horrified?
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*The case before the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit was originally captioned Antonyuk vs. Hochul.
The U.S. District Court for the Northern District of New York dismissed out Kathy Hochul. The Court found her not a proper Party Defendant to the action, and recaptioned the case to reflect acting New York State Police Superintendent Steven Nigrelli as the principal Party Defendant: Antonyuk vs. Nigrelli.
Nigrelli resigned his post last summer when Hochul failed to make his appointment permanent and as he faced employment harassment issues which further complicated his retention in the position.
Hochul needed a New Superintendent of State Police, and she eventually found one.
The Federal Court then recaptioned the case to reflect the new acting New York Superintendent of State Police that Governor Hochul appointed in early October 2023, Dominick Chiumento.
The case, now captioned Antonyuk vs. Chiumento, 2023 U.S. App. LEXIS 32492, consolidates four cases challenging, inter alia, two major portions of the Concealed Carry Improvement Act of 2022 (CCIA)—The “GOOD MORAL CHARACTER” REQUIREMENT and “SENSITIVE LOCATIONS” RESTRICTIONS.
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