A federal judge in Kansas has dismissed a charge of possessing machine guns, asking whether a ban on the weapons violates the Second Amendment.
If the ruling by U.S. District Judge John W. Broomes in Wichita is upheld on appeal, it could have a far-reaching impact on the regulation of machine guns, including homemade automatic weapons that many police officers and prosecutors say fuel gun violence.
Broomes, a President Donald Trump appointee, on Wednesday dropped two machine gun possession charges against Tamori Morgan, who was indicted last year. Morgan was accused of possessing a Model AM-15 .300-caliber machine gun and a machine gun conversion device known as a “Glock switch” that allows the semi-automatic weapon to fire like a machine gun.
“The Court finds that the Second Amendment applies to the weapons in question because they are ‘portable weapons’ within the original meaning of the amendment,” Broomes wrote, adding that the government “has the burden of demonstrating that the regulations are consistent with the historical tradition of firearms regulation in this country.”
No appeal had been filed as of Friday. A spokeswoman for the U.S. Attorney’s Office in Wichita declined to comment.
Federal prosecutors in the case said in earlier court documents that the “Supreme Court has made it clear that the machine gun regulations fall outside the Second Amendment.”
A June 2022 Supreme Court ruling in the New York State Rifle case & Pistol Association v. Bruen was seen as a major expansion of gun rightsThe ruling said that Americans have the right to carry firearms in public for self-defense.
Jacob Charles, an associate professor of law at Pepperdine University who follows Second Amendment cases, said the Kansas ruling is a direct result of the Bruen decision.
“This gives lower courts the ability to cherry-pick the historical data in a way that they believe the Second Amendment should be read,” Charles said.
Charles expects Broomes’ ruling to be overturned, citing Supreme Court case law allowing regulation of machine guns.
Communities across the US have seen an increase in shootings carried out with weapons converted to fully automatic in recent years. These weapons are usually converted using small pieces of metal that are 3D printed or ordered online.
Weapons with conversion devices have been used in several mass shootings, including one that left four dead. Sweet Sixteen Party in Alabama last year and another that left six people dead in a bar district in Sacramento, Californiain 2022. In Houston, police officer William Jeffrey died in 2021 after being shot with a modified weapon while serving an arrest warrant.
The Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives reported a 570% increase in the number of conversion devices collected by police departments between 2017 and 2021. That’s the most recent data available, The Associated Press reported in March.