Court Opinion

ID: 9723724
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-26 10:29:00.345908+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T13:10:18.683804
License: Public Domain

JUSTICE FREEMAN, specially concurring: The majority’s recitation of the facts and its discussion of the current state of the law with respect to the issues raised are both comprehensive and accurate. The conclusion reached is legally correct, and I am compelled to join in it. However, some of the more disturbing allegations in plaintiffs’ complaint are not highlighted in the majority opinion because they do not impact the majority’s legal analysis. I write separately to call attention to these contentions. According to plaintiffs’ complaint, the Chicago police department recovered an average of approximately 17,000 illegal handguns in the City of Chicago in each of the years 1994 to 1997. In each of the years 1996 to 1998, more than 500 firearm-related fatalities were recorded within the city limits. More than 10% of the victims were under the age of 17. These facts are both alarming and saddening but, as defendants argue, they are the results of the actions of third parties unrelated to defendants. However, plaintiffs’ additional allegations about defendants’ conduct, if true, suggest that defendants were not only aware that their products were used by third parties for criminal acts, but that defendants affirmatively sought to increase their profit by pandering to that market. For example, plaintiffs state that defendants oversaturated markets near Chicago, supplying guns in nearby suburbs far in excess of the number that the citizens of those suburbs would ordinarily be expected to purchase. Plaintiffs also contend that defendant gun manufacturers have not placed restrictions or limits, let alone oversight, on their distributors and dealers — as opposed to manufacturers of other potentially dangerous products such as chemicals and even paints — in order to remain willfully ignorant of the process by which their products are farmed out into the communities of Illinois. Plaintiffs also argue that the manufacturers have included features on some weapons to make them more attractive to the criminal element. They offer as an example the small, easily concealed nature of the Bryco “59” semiautomatic handgun, and also note the fingerprint-resistant coating on the Nave-gar “TEC-DC9.” I do not believe that all gun manufacturers should be insurers or guarantors of the conduct of the users of their product. However, I do believe that it is disingenuous to place all manufacturers on equal footing, in light of the allegations of oversaturation of markets, failure to institute even minimal oversight of the distribution network, and deliberate inclusion of features designed to make specific products more attractive for criminal use. It is, of course, impossible for a manufacturer, distributor, or even, in most cases, a dealer to know that a particular gun will be used in a crime. But plaintiffs’ allegations, if true, support the conclusion that defendant gun manufacturers are not only aware of the probability that their wares might be used in the commission of crimes, but that they actively seek to exploit that fact to increase their profit margin. Notwithstanding the above, I recognize that it would be an enormous expansion of the doctrine of public nuisance if this court were to apply the doctrine to these defendants. Other jurisdictions have reached different conclusions with respect to this question. Nevertheless, the large number of policy considerations which must be weighed on this topic lead me to conclude that it is a matter best left for legislative, as opposed to judicial, action. Given the disturbing statistical data that I noted at the outset of this separate opinion, it is my sincere hope that our General Assembly will turn its attention to the problems this case brings to light. CHIEF JUSTICE McMORROW and JUSTICES FITZGERALD, KILBRIDE and RARICK join in this special concurrence.