California’s ban on magazines that can accept more than ten rounds of ammunition is currently being challenged in court, but in the meantime the state is still attempting to enforce the law on legal gun owners in the state. One Tulare County man is facing charges for possession of a 15-round magazine, but his attorney says the purchase was legal, because it was made during a one-week period when a federal judge had put a hold on enforcement of the state’s law.
Back in January, deputies in Tulare County showed up a home for a parole check. While they were there, officers found a magazine in Pheng Yang’s bedroom. Yang is the brother of the individual on parole, and wasn’t suspected of any crime himself. After the magazine was discovered, however, police arrested him and charged him with illegally possessing the magazine, even though Yang told deputies that the magazine was purchased during “Freedom Week.”
Since the year 2000 in California, it’s been illegal to manufacture, import, sell, give, lend, buy, or receive magazines that hold more than 10 rounds of ammunition.
But on March 29th of 2019, a U.S. District Court Judge ruled that the ban was unconstitutional and shouldn’t be enforced.That launched a buying spree across California with gun owners snatching up large-capacity magazines.About a week later, the same judge decided that the large-capacity magazine ban should continue to be enforced as California’s attorney general took the case to the U.S. Court of Appeals.
But the judge also said the law could not be enforced against those who bought a high capacity magazine during that one-week gap. And that one week, called Freedom Week, is now the argument in defense of Yang.
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