A federal judge has turned down the latest challenge to Hawaii gun control laws filed by an Aiea man who sought to carry a handgun in public.
Christopher Baker contended that state laws violated his "right to bear arms" under the Second Amendment of the U.S. Constitution.
But on Wednesday Senior U.S. District Judge Alan Kay rejected Baker’s request for an injunction that would have paved the way for him to carry a gun in public.
Kay said Baker was not likely to prevail at a November trial on his lawsuit; that the public interest weighed in favor of turning down his request; and Baker had not shown he was "irreparably harmed."
The judge said he would later file a written decision.
"We think it’s the correct ruling," city Deputy Corporation Counsel Curtis Sherwood said.
Baker, 27, president of the Hawaii Defense Foundation, a nonprofit group established last year to defend the Second Amendment, filed his lawsuit after Honolulu Police Chief Louis Kealoha turned down his application for a license to carry a concealed handgun.
Baker said he will continue to press his case but wants to review the judge’s written ruling before taking the next step.
"We definitely don’t agree with his opinion," Baker said.
Baker’s attorney, Richard Holcomb, said they were considering options that include proceeding to trial or immediately seeking an appeal to the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals.
Honolulu police rarely issue the one-year license.
Under state law, the license is granted only in an "exceptional case," in which the applicant has reason to fear injury or damage to property.
According to police, 14 requests for licenses were filed last year and all were denied. No one currently has such a license, said Michelle Yu, Honolulu police spokeswoman.
Baker maintained that he needed a firearm for self-defense to earn money as a licensed process server who delivers court papers to individuals.
But Sherwood cited a police report that says Baker was the only one among about 75 Honolulu process servers known to have applied for the license.
Baker’s lawsuit is one of many around the country filed by gun rights advocates in the wake of two major U.S. Supreme Court rulings.
In 2008, the justices ruled in the case of District of Columbia v. Heller that the Second Amendment protects the right of an individual to have a gun at home for self-defense. The court struck down a total prohibition on handguns.
In the McDonald v. Chicago decision in 2010, the high court held that the rights under the amendment apply to states.
Holcomb argued that those rulings show that Hawaii’s gun laws are too restrictive.
But Deputy Attorney General Kendall Moser argued that the high court decisions hold that "citizens have the right to protect themselves within their homes, and that those cases do not stand for the proposition that there is an unlimited right to bear arms in public."
Moser and Sherwood said Kay’s ruling is in line with about 40 other rulings in state and federal courts.
They cite decisions that say the courts should wait for the U S. Supreme Court to issue another ruling on whether the Heller ruling extends the Second Amendment right to have handguns outside the home.
Honolulu attorney Mark Murakami submitted court papers on behalf of the Brady Center to Prevent Gun Violence urging Kay to turn down Baker’s request.
The national nonprofit organization is named after James Brady, who was disabled by a gunshot to the head during an assassination attempt on President Ronald Reagan in 1981.
Murakami and the government lawyers also cited a 2009 decision by Hawaii federal Judge David Ezra in another firearms case.
Ezra said he could not find any language in the Heller decision that says the possession of a firearm in public is "a fundamental right."
