Father of 6-year-old Sandy Hook victim hopes to bring unique lawsuit against AR-15 makers
BY James Fanelli - New York Daily News
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Not a day goes by that Ian Hockley doesn’t think about the death of his son Dylan.
The 6-year-old boy was gunned down five years ago by deranged mass shooter Adam Lanza. He was among the 26 children and adults whom the 20-year-old Lanza killed during his Dec. 14, 2012, rampage at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, Conn.
“Dylan is dead every day, and his mother and his brother Jake and I live with that,” Hockley said.
The boy’s death left an unfillable void in Hockley — but it also gave him a purpose.
He and family members of other victims have filed a unique lawsuit against the gun manufacturers of the AR-15, the powerful semi-automatic assault rifle that allowed Lanza to carry out his rampage so quickly and with such lethal capability. They claim the manufacturers, Remington Arms and Bushmaster Firearms, bear responsibility for the massacre.
“This is about accountability for actions,” said Hockley, who is 47. “Businesses are there to supply products and services. They have to be accountable for decisions they take and the products they sell.”
Thanks to Congress, gun manufacturers have largely been absolved from any responsibility.
After intense lobbying from the National Rifle Association, Congress passed the Protection of Lawful Commerce in Arms Act in 2005. Under the law, manufacturers cannot be held accountable when one of their weapons is used in a crime or mass shooting.
However, the law allows for a sliver of wiggle room if the plaintiffs can prove “negligent entrustment.” In this case, the legal term means proving the manufacturers were reckless in that they knew they were selling deadly weapons and looking for violent young men as customers.
The plaintiffs’ lawyer, Joshua Koskoff, believes they can prove this.
He said Remington and Bushmaster have described the gun as a modern sporting rifle. But in their marketing, they showcase it as a militarized weapon.
The gun appears in violent first-person shooter video games and is advertised in a catalog as capable of making the “forces of opposition bow down,” according to Koskoff.
The lawyer scoffed at the manufacturers’ classification of the weapon as a sporting rifle when it was meant for trained military personnel, not civilians.
“This has military roots going back to Vietnam,” Koskoff said of the gun. “They were trying to design the perfect killing machine for the world’s greatest military. It checked all the boxes.”
Moreover, Koskoff said, public filings by Remington show that it has been eager to tap into a younger demographic. The marketing, and the customer base it targets, lead to high-risk users like Lanza, Koskoff said.
Remington has argued in filings that the rifle was lawfully purchased by Lanza’s mother, Nancy, whom the deranged man also killed. It says that Lanza bore sole responsibility for his criminal acts.
The manufacturer also says millions of Americans have purchased semiautomatic rifles for lawful civilian purchases.
Remington, which owns Bushmaster, did not respond to a request for comment.
The lawsuit — which is filed on behalf of the families of 10 victims — has wound its way to Connecticut’s highest court after a lower court judge dismissed the case and the plaintiffs appealed.
The lower court judge, Barbara Bellis, said in her decision that the case “falls squarely within the broad immunity” given to gun manufacturers under the federal law.
Last month, Koskoff and lawyers for Remington and Bushmaster argued their cases before a panel of seven justices. The panel will decide in the coming months if the case can move forward to trial.
More than a dozen interested parties on both sides of the gun issue have filed amicus briefs in the case — and for good reason.
If the panel allows the case to go to trial, it would be a game-changer. A trial would open manufacturers up to the discovery process, forcing them to turn over documents on their focus groups, marketing schemes and emails.
The NRA and Gun Owners of America are among the parties who have filed briefs in support of the manufacturers and dismissed the plaintiff’s portrayal of the AR-15.
“The AR-15 is not a Galactic Empire Death Star equipped with a Romulan Cloaking Device,” Gun Owners of America wrote in its brief. “Rather, it is a relatively low-tech mechanical tool.”
One brief, by a group of law professors from across the country, said the main question is whether the manufacturers, in their aggressive marketing to a particular customer base, should have foreseen that their gun could lead to the deaths of innocent people.
Anita Bernstein, a Brooklyn law professor and co-author of the brief, said it is marketing that helps the gunmakers reach new customers.
“Aggressive marketing is the best way to sell assault rifles because people who have one already don’t need another one,” Bernstein said. “The only way that Remington can sell another AR-15 is to reach someone like Adam Lanza.”
