Opinion ID: 2794092
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: Criminal Procedure Provision

Text: Powell next revisits the section 7 criminal procedure provision, arguing that the lack of license presumption infringes on his Second Amendment rights as secured under Heller and McDonald. According to Powell, these decisions restored the 6 Powell's other sundry arguments for halting the procedural default bar wholly lack merit and do not warrant extended attention. -27- presumption of innocence, invalidating statutes like [section 7] that impose criminal punishment on persons simply for exercising their Second Amendment rights. The Commonwealth agrees that we ought to afford his claim de novo review, because the SJC's decision is silent on this constitutional claim. See Clements v. Clarke, 592 F.3d 45, 52, 54 (1st Cir. 2010). Even without the constraints of AEDPA, however, Powell's claim quickly crumbles. Powell attempts to launch a Second Amendment attack on the method or legislative design by which the Commonwealth has chosen to criminally enforce its firearms licensing scheme. He avers that the viability of his claim does not necessarily depend upon whether the Second Amendment right extends outside the home, because he reads the Heller/McDonald decisions as affirmatively precluding states from impos[ing] a general prohibition against carrying a firearm and from proscrib[ing] carrying a firearm, alone, as an inherently dangerous act [that is] subject to criminal prosecution.7 But, in the midst of his iterations on the holdings of Heller and McDonald, Powell underscores that he is not challeng[ing] the licensing scheme as a whole nor arguing that generally requiring firearm owners to obtain licenses and 7 As earlier noted, the state firearms offense is a public welfare or general prohibition offense designed to control the carrying of firearms so as to protect the public from the potential danger incident to [their] unlawful possession. Commonwealth v. Jefferson, 965 N.E.2d 800, 808 (Mass. 2012) (internal quotation marks and ellipses omitted); see Commonwealth v. Young, 905 N.E.2d 90, 96 (Mass. 2009); Davis, 270 N.E.2d at 926. -28- registration cards violates the Second Amendment. Thus, on close inspection, Powell's claim is nothing more than a hollow recapitulation of his procedural due process claim in Second Amendment garb, and its fate is the same. Nowhere in its dual decisions did the Supreme Court impugn legislative designs that comprise so-called general prohibition or public welfare regulations aimed at addressing perceived inherent dangers and risks surrounding the public possession of loaded, operable firearms. Rather, the Court attended to legislative substance and endorsed the continuing viability of a range of state firearms regulations without endeavoring to draw Second Amendment lines for state legislative architecture. See Heller, 554 U.S. at 626-27; McDonald, 130 S. Ct. at 3047. In fact, along its sojourn, the Court recognized that states have historically executed firearms regulation through general prohibition public safety laws. See Heller, 554 U.S. at 631-32. Powell's reliance on Herrington v. United States, 6 A.3d 1237 (D.C. 2010), also does not help him. There, the D.C. Court of Appeals reversed a defendant's conviction for unlawful possession of ammunition that rested on a general prohibition criminal statute in which the accused had the burden of proving registration as an exception or affirmative defense. 6 A.3d at 1240-47. Significant to the court, the defendant was convicted for unlawfully possessing -29- handgun ammunition in his home, and the court restricted the reach of its holding to the statute of conviction as applied to the defendant. Id. at 1242-45. It held that the Second Amendment guarantees a right to possess ammunition in the home that is coextensive with the right to possess a usable handgun there, id. at 1243, and express[ed] no opinion as to whether the [D.C.] statute is constitutional in other applications [such as when] applied to possession of handgun ammunition outside the home, id. at 1244, n.25. Herrington, therefore, has no bearing on Powell's convictions which rest on publicly carrying a loaded firearm without a license.8 More fundamentally, given the public sphere context for his firearm possession, Powell provides us with no basis for concluding that his convictions could even reach the safe haven of the Second Amendment. He boldly -- and wrongly -- pronounces that the Supreme Court in Heller clearly established that the right to keep and bear arms encompasses one's 'person' unrelated to the home. (Emphasis in original.) We flatly reject his read. 8 The D.C. court also included in its analysis numerous caveats beyond the home-versus-public distinction. It took note, for example, that in the District of Columbia, the relative burden of producing licensing paperwork remained in equipoise between the government and the defense. Herrington, 6 A.3d at 1245 n.30; see Brown v. United States, 66 A.2d 491, 494 (D.C. 1949) (unlike most states, only one licensing authority exists in the relatively small geographical area of the District of Columbia and that entity annually issues only a small number of licenses). This is markedly different from the burden faced by law enforcement in Massachusetts. See Gouse, 965 N.E.2d at 805-06. -30- Together, Heller and McDonald establish that states may not impose legislation that works a complete ban on the possession of operable handguns in the home by law-abiding, responsible citizens for use in immediate self-defense. See Heller, 554 U.S. at 628-32, 635-36; McDonald, 130 S. Ct. at 3036-46, 3050; see Hightower, 693 F.3d at 72; Booker, 644 F.3d at 22, 25 n.17. The neoteric decisions addressed only the setting of us[ing] arms in defense of hearth and home, left open for future cases the sort of judicial review to be applied to other firearms regulation, and firmly disavowed any notion that an individual has a constitutional right to keep and carry any weapon whatsoever in any manner whatsoever and for whatever purpose. See Heller, 554 U.S. at 626-35; McDonald, 130 S. Ct. at 3047, 3050; see also Booker, 644 F.3d at 22.9 9 Several circuits have adopted a two-part framework for evaluating a claim of Second Amendment infringement in the postHeller era. Broadly speaking, some courts first consider whether the challenged law imposes a burden on conduct that falls within the scope of the Second Amendment's guarantee as historically understood, and if so, courts next determine the appropriate form of judicial scrutiny to apply (typically, some form of either intermediate scrutiny or strict scrutiny). See, e.g., Jackson v. City and County of San Francisco, 746 F.3d 953, 962-63 (9th Cir. 2014), petition for cert. filed, (U.S. Dec. 12, 2014) (No. 14-704); Drake v. Filko, 724 F.3d 426, 429 (3d Cir. 2013), cert. denied, 134 S. Ct. 2134 (2014); Woollard v. Gallagher, 712 F.3d 865, 874-75 (4th Cir.), cert. denied, 134 S. Ct. 422 (2013); Nat'l Rifle Assn'n of Am., Inc. v. Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, & Explosives, 700 F.3d 185, 194 (5th Cir. 2012), cert. denied, 134 S. Ct. 1364 (2014); United States v. Greeno, 679 F.3d 510, 518 (6th Cir.), cert. denied, 133 S. Ct. 375 (2012); Heller v. District of Columbia, 670 F.3d 1244, 1252 (D.C. Cir. 2011) (Heller II); Ezell v. City of Chicago, 651 F.3d 684, 701–04 (7th Cir. 2011); United States v. Reese, 627 F.3d 792, 800–01 (10th Cir. 2010), cert. denied, 131 S. Ct. 2476 (2011); United States v. Marzzarella, 614 -31- While the Supreme Court spoke of a right of law-abiding, responsible citizens to keep and bear arms in case of confrontation outside the context of an organized militia, Heller, 554 U.S. at 582-92; see McDonald, 130 S. Ct. at 3036-42, 3048, it did not say, and to date has not said, that publicly carrying a firearm unconnected to defense of hearth and home and unconnected to militia service is a definitive right of private citizens protected under the Second Amendment. Debate continues among courts. Compare Peruta v. County of San Diego, 742 F.3d 1144, 1149-66 (9th Cir. 2014), request for rehearing en banc granted, 2015 WL 1381752 (9th Cir. Mar. 26, 2015) (No. 10-56971); Drake v. Filko, 724 F.3d 426, 430-31 (3d Cir. 2013), cert. denied, 134 S. Ct. 2134 (2014); Woollard, 712 F.3d at 874-76; Moore v. Madigan, F.3d 85, 89 (3d Cir. 2010), cert. denied, 131 S. Ct. 958 (2011); cf. Kwong v. Bloomberg, 723 F.3d 160, 167 (2d Cir. 2013), cert. denied, 134 S. Ct. 2696 (2014); United States v. Bena, 664 F.3d 1180, 1182-85 (8th Cir. 2011); United States v. Skoien, 614 F.3d 638, 639–43 (7th Cir. 2010) (en banc). See also Tyler v. Hillsdale County Sheriff's Dept., 775 F.3d 308, 318 (6th Cir. 2014) (There may be a number of reasons to question the soundness of [the] twostep approach adopted by various circuits.). We thus far have entered the discourse on few occasions, mostly in direct appeals of federal firearms convictions, and have hewed closely and cautiously to Heller's circumscribed analysis and holding. See United States v. Carter, 752 F.3d 8 (1st Cir. 2014); United States v. Armstrong, 706 F.3d 1, 3-8 (1st Cir. 2013), vacated and remanded on other grounds, 134 S. Ct. 1759 (2014) (Mem.) (citing United States v. Castleman, 134 S. Ct. 1405 (2014)); United States v. Rehlander, 666 F.3d 45, 48-50 (1st Cir. 2012); United States v. Booker, 644 F.3d 12, 15-26 (1st Cir. 2011), cert. denied, 132 S. Ct. 1538 (2012); United States v. Rene E., 583 F.3d 8, 16 (1st Cir. 2009), cert. denied, 558 U.S. 1133 (2010); cf. Hightower, 693 F.3d 61. -32- 702 F.3d 933, 935-36 (7th Cir. 2012), with Peruta, 742 F.3d at 1179-91 (Thomas, J., dissenting); Drake, 724 F.3d at 444-46 (Hardiman, J., dissenting); Moore, 702 F.3d at 944-49 (Williams, J., dissenting); see also United States v. Masciandaro, 638 F.3d 458, 467-68, 474-76 (4th Cir. 2011).10 Perhaps recognizing that we would reject his argument that Heller and McDonald reach so far, Powell nevertheless invites us to hold that the limited Second Amendment right as articulated in Heller extends outside the vicinity of the home. We decline to do so. This circuit has yet to weigh in on the scope of the Second Amendment as to carrying firearms outside the vicinity of the home without any reference to protection of the home. Hightower, 693 F.3d at 72. Thus far, we have held that any 10 We are not sanguine about the Ninth Circuit's characterization that a consensus has developed among the circuits regarding some limited right under the Second Amendment to keep and bear operable firearms outside the home for the purpose of self-defense. See Peruta, 742 F.3d at 1166. True, the Seventh Circuit in Moore held as the Ninth Circuit posits, at least to a limited degree. See United States v. Williams, 731 F.3d 678, 69394 (7th Cir. 2013) (Hamilton, J., concurring in part and in the judgment). However, the remaining three circuits identified merely assumed for analytical purposes, without deciding, that the limited Second Amendment individual right described in Heller extended somewhat beyond the hearth and home setting. See Drake, 724 F.3d at 430-31; Woollard, 712 F.3d at 874, 876; Kachalsky v. Cnty. of Westchester, 701 F.3d 81, 89 (2d Cir. 2012); see also Hightower, 693 F.3d at 72 n.8, 74 (declining to decide public sphere question, and assuming without deciding some Second Amendment interest in publicly carrying a concealed weapon). -33- individual right in carrying concealed weapons outside the home is distinct from [the] core interest emphasized in Heller, and that under Heller, [l]icensing of the carrying of concealed weapons is presumptively lawful. See id. at 72-74 & n.8. Yet, Powell offers only a meager measure of briefing, about one page, to support his rather significant request. He cites two decisions in which the Seventh and Ninth Circuits ventured into the topic of putative gun rights in the public sphere as prompted by the holistic, substantive effect of the regulations challenged before them. See Moore, 702 F.3d 933; Peruta, 742 F.3d 1144.11 Powell's slight advocacy, however, makes his coquetry the proper candidate for appellate waiver. See United States v. Zannino, 895 F.2d 1, 17 (1st Cir. 1990); cf. Moore, 702, F.3d at 935 (The parties and the amici curiae have treated us to hundreds of pages of argument, in nine briefs as advocacy on Second Amendment rights in the public sphere.). 11 See Peruta, 742 F.3d at 1169-71 (county regulation barred a typical, law-abiding citizen fearing for his personal safety from accessing a concealed-carry license, and open carry was otherwise prohibited); Moore, 702 F.3d at 940 (Illinois is the only state that maintains a flat ban on carrying ready-to-use guns outside the home . . . [n]ot even Massachusetts has so flat a ban as Illinois); see also Holden, 26 N.E.3d at 726 (emphasizing that Massachusetts law does not absolutely prohibit handguns in the home nor ban ready-to-use firearms in public). -34- All told, we conclude that Powell's Second Amendment claim provides no grounding for setting aside his state firearms convictions.