Today attorney Tom Odom of Prince Law Offices, P.C., will file with the U.S. Supreme Court a brief on behalf of Firearms Owners Against Crime (“FOAC”) and Firearms Industry Consulting Group (“FICG”), in support of the request of Tab Bonidy and the National Association for Gun Rights to review a decision of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Tenth Circuit.

Bonidy is a responsible, law-abiding citizen with a permit to carry a firearm who lives in rural Colorado. Like millions of other Americans, he obtained such a permit so that he might be prepared to defend himself outside of his home. When the U.S. Postal Service advised Bonidy that he would be subject to prosecution simply for momentarily storing his firearm in the trunk of his vehicle in an unsecured parking lot made available for postal patrons, Bonidy sought a determination that applying the postal regulation to him under such circumstances would violate the Second Amendment.

The area where Bonidy lives is sufficiently rural that there is no home delivery of mail, the lobby of the post office is open to the public at all times so that individuals may retrieve mail from their post office boxes, and the post office does not maintain any regular security employees. Nonetheless, the Tenth Circuit stated that both the lobby and the unsecured parking lot where Bonidy proposed to lock the firearm in the trunk of his vehicle constituted “secure places” beyond the scope of the Second Amendment right articulated by the U.S. Supreme Court in District of Columbia v. Heller, 554 U.S. 570 (2008).

In the belief that Bonidy’s case presents a superior opportunity for the U.S. Supreme Court to make clear that the Second Amendment is not exclusively limited to self-defense within one’s own home, FICG prepared the brief in support of Bonidy’s petition for certiorari on a pro bono basis. FOAC joined in the effort and covered the cost of the printing of the briefs.

The decision below was reported as Bonidy v. United States Postal Service, 790 F.3d 1121 (10th Cir. 2015). The U.S. Supreme Court docket number is 15-746. Here is a link to the brief filed with the court.

UPDATE: On behalf of the U.S. Postal Service the Solicitor General (“SG”) requested and was granted additional time to file a brief in opposition to U.S. Supreme Court review. While the SG’s position is not surprising, the fact that the SG will file a brief at this stage indicates concern that the case could represent one of the 3% or so requests for review that the Court grants.