A Pima County ordinance requiring gun owners to report when their firearms were stolen or lost has been struck down by a federal court.
Under the ordinance, gun owners are required to report their firearms as stolen or lost within 48 hours or face a fine of $1,000. County leaders said it was intended to cut down on straw sales — which is when a weapon is purchased by one person on behalf of another who can’t make the purchase themselves.
Joe Setyon is the senior communications manager with the Goldwater Institute — which filed suit against the rule last year. The suit argues it goes against an Arizona law prohibiting local jurisdictions from passing their own gun laws.
“There’s very high standards for enacting firearm regulations. And there’s a way to do that, you can do that at the state level, as the law says, but that’s just not what they did here,” he said.
In a bench ruling this week, a federal judge in Tucson ruled the ordinance broke state statute and struck it down. In a social media post about the ruling, Pima County attorney Laura Conover’s office said the county is considering next steps.
