In a 13-page brief, lawyers in Moodyโs office wrote that the U.S. Supreme Court has โbeen clear that longstanding prohibitions on the possession of firearms by felons do not infringe the Second Amendment.โ
An attorney for convicted felon William Edenfield in August asked the Florida Supreme Court to take up a constitutional challenge to the law.
The request came after a three-judge panel of the 1st District Court of Appeal in May rejected Edenfieldโs arguments, which focused, in part, on a 2022 U.S. Supreme Court decision in a case known as New York State Rifle & Pistol Association v. Bruen.
In that case, the U.S. Supreme Court required evaluating gun restrictions by whether they are consistent with the nationโs โhistorical tradition of firearm regulation.โ
Edenfieldโs attorney wrote that the 1st District Court of Appeal interpreted the Bruen decision to โread into the Second Amendment a limitation to only โlaw-abiding, responsible citizens.โ
Such a qualification is found nowhere in the Second Amendmentโs controlling text. The district court cited almost no historical evidence in support of this limitation.โ
But Moodyโs office Monday said the Florida Supreme Court should not take up Edenfieldโs case.
โPetitioner (Edenfield) cites no case in which a court has held that a felon-dispossession law is facially unconstitutional under the Second Amendment,โ the stateโs lawyers wrote. โOn the contrary, the courts overwhelmingly have upheld the validity of felon-dispossession laws even after Bruen.โ
This article appears in Oct 12-18, 2023.

