Important Takeaways:
- Undocumented Immigrants Have Right to Own Guns, Judge Rules
- A judge this month dropped gun charges against an illegal migrant in Illinois, sparking further debate about the rights associated with the Second Amendment.
- S. District Court Judge Sharon Coleman of the Northern District of Illinois referenced lower court rulings in dismissing firearm possession charges against Heriberto Carbajal-Flores, who was illegally or unlawfully in the United States when he possessed a handgun in the Little Village neighborhood of Chicago on June 1, 2020.
- “The Court finds that Carbajal-Flores’ criminal record, containing no improper use of a weapon, as well as the non-violent circumstances of his arrest do not support a finding that he poses a risk to public safety such that he cannot be trusted to use a weapon responsibly and should be deprived of his Second Amendment right to bear arms in self-defense,” Coleman, who was appointed under President Barack Obama, wrote in her eight-page ruling filed March 8.
- Carbajal-Flores was charged under Title 18 of U.S. Criminal Code, which legally disallows undocumented individuals to possess firearms and ammunition “or to receive any firearm or ammunition which has been shipped or transported in interstate or foreign commerce.”
- The defendant, who contended the firearm was possessed for self-defense and protection of property “during a time of documented civil unrest” in the spring of 2020 [during George Floyd], has never been convicted of a felony, a violent crime or a crime involving the use of a weapon.
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