A Potter County man can keep his 27 guns even though he was convicted of a tampering with a witness charge in New York, a Pennsylvania court has ruled.

The Superior Court panel’s decision shoots down an attempt by the county district attorney to seize John Cyran’s firearms and prosecute him for illegally possessing them.

At issue was whether New York’s witness tampering charge equates to an intimidation of a witness charge that is on Pennsylvania’s criminal law books.

It doesn’t, a Superior Court panel found in an opinion by President Judge Emeritus John Bender.

According to Bender, Cyran’s guns were seized in June 2017 after he was accused of pointing a firearm at another man and threatening that person. Cyran was charged with 27 counts of being a felon illegally in possession of firearms. Those charges were based on his New York conviction.

Prosecutors insisted the New York conviction equals a witness intimidation conviction under Pennsylvania law. Pennsylvania’s witness intimidation count carries a ban on firearms possession.

Cyran, 68, of Shinglehouse, challenged the DA’s assertion and county Judge Stephen P.B. Minor agreed with him. Minor dismissed all 27 illegal firearms possession charges last April.

The DA appealed Minor’s ruling to the state court, noting Minor’s decision “substantially handicaps or terminates its prosecution” of Cyran, Bender wrote.

Bender agreed with Minor that the New York witness tampering and Pennsylvania witness intimidation charges don’t mesh because Pennsylvania’s charge requires that a witness must be threatened in some way. New York’s charge, however, kicks in even if a witness is only subjected to some sort of inducement, such as a bribe, Bender noted.

“Therefore, they are not equivalent crimes,” he found.

Court records show Cyran still faces misdemeanor charges of making terroristic threats, simple assault, reckless endangerment and disorderly conduct and a summary harassment count.