Gun firms take aim against the city

http://www.cincypost.com/2003/04/03/gun040303.html

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By Kimball Perry
Post staff reporter

When the city of Cincinnati sued gun manufacturers and distributors in 1999, hoping to recover costs incurred as a result of violence related to firearms, gun companies shuddered.
Now, they are firing back, asking the city in court documents to substantiate all of its allegations before the case goes to trial in September — a request city attorneys are resisting, calling it an “impossibility.”

Motion to compel
Gun manufacturers and distributors are trying to convince a Hamilton County judge to compel the city to turn over evidence documenting:
? Unintentional gun discharges resulting in injury or death in Cincinnati;

? Suicides in Cincinnati caused by guns;

? The city’s investigations or analysis of illegal gun sales in Cincinnati and its policies or initiatives to address the issue;

? City statistics on gun-related crimes;

? “Quantification” of costs of additional police, medical and emergency services, court and prosecution proceedings required by the sale and manufacture of guns;

? Decreases in property values caused by guns;

? Evidence of loss of business or tax revenues caused by guns;

? Police and other city budgets showing how money “has been spent, why the monies have been spent in the way they were spent, what services have been provided for the monies spent, and the reasons justifying the levels of police services provided” by the city.

Attorneys for Beretta USA Corp. and other gun manufacturers and distributors want to know exactly how their sales increased gun-related violence drove up crime, forced the city to hire more police, increased medical bills and taxes and decreased property values.

There is a difference in making an allegation and proving one, gun attorneys argued, and they want the city to provide documentation to back up its claims.

The city, though, is asking Hamilton County Common Pleas Court Judge Robert Ruehlman not to force it to comply.

“The City further objects to this request in that it is overly burdensome, overly broad, vague and ambiguous, and seeks the disclosure of information that is irrelevant and not likely to lead to the discovery of admissible evidence,” attorneys stated in court documents.

“Likewise, the City objects on the basis of impossibility,” attorneys stated in a reply to 47 specific requests for evidence sought by gun manufacturers and dealers.

Philip Hudson III, an attorney for the Southern Ohio Gun Distributors, argued Wednesday before Ruehlman that legally making or selling guns shouldn’t be considered a crime.

“There has to be that intervening act with a third party,” Hudson said, saying a gun has to be fired, shown or pointed for a crime to occur. “There is no additional need for police until there has been a crime.”

But Paul DeMarco, one of the attorneys for the city, countered that the Ohio Supreme Court already has ruled against Hudson’s argument. The state high courts says that a “crime” occurs when there is unreasonable interference with the public’s health, welfare and safety, according to DeMarco.

“The (Ohio) Supreme Court says there is a public nuisance claim even if nobody ever fires a gun,” DeMarco told the judge.

Prove it, gun lawyers said.

They have asked the city for time sheets, budgets and other financial and work-related documentation supporting the claim that gun-related violence has increased the city’s cost in providing services.

In addition to calling the requests impossible to meet, city attorneys also believe some of the information is protected by the attorney/client privilege.

This is the second time the case has been before Ruehlman. Previously he threw it out, saying people, not guns, kill.

That was upheld by an appeals court but overturned by the Ohio Supreme Court and sent back to him.