Yolo County Sheriff Ed Prieto claimed vindication Thursday following a federal appellate court ruling backing the county’s longtime concealed-weapon permit policy.
A 9th Circuit Court of Appeals “en banc” panel ruled 7-4 that counties have the right to develop their own policies and procedures when it comes to issuing the permits to the general public, and that Yolo’s “good cause” requirements don’t constitute a violation of the Second Amendment.
“Nowhere in there (the amendment) does it dictate that people have the right to carry a concealed weapon,” Prieto said in a phone interview.
Yolo County Sheriff Ed Prieto. Courtesy photo
Thursday’s ruling comes nearly a year after the 11-member panel heard oral arguments in a rehearing of the case of Richards v. Ed Prieto, County of Yolo, filed after plaintiff Adam Richards was denied a concealed weapon permit in 2009.
The decision also applies to the case of Peruta v. San Diego, which involved similar issues.
As currently written, Yolo County’s concealed-weapon permit policy largely mirrors those of other counties, requiring applicants to be local residents at least 21 years of age, of good moral character and free of criminal convictions, among other criteria.
But it also calls for applicants to demonstrate “good cause” for seeking the license, such as being the victim of a violent crime, or a business owner who carries large amounts of cash or works in remote areas and is “likely to encounter dangerous people and situations.”
Self-protection and protection of family, absent a threat of violence, is considered an invalid reason for requesting a permit.
“Localizing the decision allows closer scrutiny of the interests and needs of each community,” says the appellate court’s history-laden majority opinion, which explores right-to-bear-arms laws dating back to late 13th-century England.
“California entrusts the decision-making responsibility to local law enforcement officials because they are best positioned to evaluate the potential dangers that increasing or decreasing concealed carry would have in their communities,” the ruling says.
In their dissent, four members of the en banc panel contend the majority opinion “eviscerates” the Second Amendment right to bear arms — a right that “extends beyond one’s front door. Like the rest of the Bill of Rights, this right is indisputably constitutional in stature and part of this country’s bedrock.”
The majority decision reverses a March 2014 ruling by a three-member appellate court panel that declared that Yolo County’s concealed-weapon permit policy “impermissibly infringes on the Second Amendment right to bear arms in lawful self-defense,” issuing a similar ruling in the San Diego case.
Before that, U.S. District Courts in both jurisdictions upheld the policies.
Elected sheriff in 1998, Prieto said Yolo County’s policy was in place before he took office. He never considered revising it, although he acknowledges it’s more restrictive than other such policies in California.
“I think it’s a reasonable policy. It makes sense,” said Prieto, who petitioned for last year’s rehearing in the appellate case. “I do not think that everyone should be walking around carrying a concealed weapon.”
Yolo County had roughly 220 concealed weapon permits issued as of Thursday, Prieto said.
— Reach Lauren Keene at lkeene@davisenterprise.net or 530-747-8048. Follow her on Twitter at @laurenkeene