Guns and pot case put on hold

Jim Saunders
News Service of Florida

The Supreme Court’s decision will have a big impact on the Florida lawsuit.
After the U.S. Supreme Court this week said it will hear a case focused on the same federal law, a judge Thursday put on hold a long-running lawsuit about whether Florida medical-marijuana patients can be barred from having guns.
Chief U.S. District Judge Allen Winsor issued a stay of the Florida lawsuit until after the Supreme Court decides whether a law prohibiting drug users having guns violates the Second Amendment. The Supreme Court on Monday announced it will take up a Texas case, known as United States v. Hemani, that focuses on the law.
In a motion seeking the stay of the Florida case, U.S. Department of Justice attorneys wrote that the Supreme Court decision in the Hemani case will “almost certainly have a significant impact” on the Florida lawsuit
“The court (Winsor) should stay this case because the Supreme Court is currently hearing a case concerning the constitutionality of the same statutory provision at issue in this case,” the Justice Department attorneys wrote.
The Florida lawsuit, filed in 2022, is rooted in a conflict between federal and state laws. Under federal law, possession of marijuana is illegal; under a 2016 Florida constitutional amendment, hundreds of thousands of patients are able to buy medical marijuana.
The federal law at issue bars possession of firearms by a person who is an “unlawful user of or addicted to any controlled substance.” The Florida and Texas cases center on whether that prohibition violates the Second Amendment.
“In this (Florida) case, plaintiffs allege that they either use or wish to use marijuana pursuant to Florida’s medical marijuana laws,” said the Justice Department’s motion for a stay, which was filed Thursday. “Plaintiffs also allegedly wish to possess firearms while being regular users of marijuana, but are prohibited from doing so by (the federal law). Plaintiffs seek a declaration that (the federal law) and its implementing regulations violate the Second Amendment as applied to their conduct and an injunction preventing the government from enforcing (the federal law) and its implementing regulations against plaintiffs.”
The Texas case does not involve medical-marijuana patients — it stems from the discovery of a gun and drugs during an FBI raid of the home of Ali Danial Hemani as part of a criminal investigation. Hemani was charged under the law prohibiting drug users from having guns. In a document filed at the U.S. Supreme Court, the federal government said the prosecution involved Hemani’s “habitual use of marijuana.”
But the 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals ruled in favor of Hemani’s arguments that the federal law was unconstitutional as it applied in his case. The Justice Department then asked the Supreme Court to take up the issue. While the Supreme Court announced Monday it will hear the case, it is unclear when a ruling will come.
The Florida lawsuit was filed by then-state Agriculture Commissioner Nikki Fried and medical-marijuana patients. The lawsuit said the federal prohibitions “forbid Floridians from possessing or purchasing a firearm on the sole basis that they are state-law-abiding medical marijuana patients.”
Winsor dismissed the case in November 2022, spurring the plaintiffs to go to the 11th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals. Agriculture Commissioner Wilton Simpson, who was elected in 2022 to succeed Fried, dropped out of the case, but it has continued with the patients as plaintiffs.
A panel of the appeals court this year overturned Winsor’s dismissal of the case, saying the federal government “failed to meet its burden … to establish that disarming medical marijuana users is consistent with this nation’s history and tradition of firearm regulation.”
The ruling sent the case back to Winsor for further consideration.