Hunters aren't a protected minority just because they carry guns, a state appeals court ruled yesterday in a case involving a Sullivan County hunter who allegedly shot another hunter in 2009.
The case involves a hunter named Robert Robar who, according to the Times Herald-Record, shot another hunter, Terry Pelton, in the town of Lumberland in November 2009. According to yesterday's decision from the appeals court, Robar was charged with assault and reckless endangerment; Pelton was seriously injured.
During Robar's criminal trial last August, his defense attorney, Jacqueline Ricciani, refused to allow five hunters onto the jury. Judge LaBuda then declared a mistrial, writing that Ricciani had discriminated against hunters, who, LaBuda wrote, are a protected class akin to women or ethnic minorities because they are exercising a Second Amendment right to bear arms.
The appeals court rejected LaBuda's reasoning, which it described as a "novel rationale." From the decision:
There is no authority for the proposition, dubious at best, that [hunters] are a cognizable group on par with race, ethnicity (or ethnic origin), gender or other status whose exclusion implicates heightened equal protection concerns and scrutiny ... The fact that hunters may exercise their Second Amendment right — a right certainly not limited to hunters or conferred upon them because they are hunters — does not morph them into a cognizable group for equal protection purposes.
Because of LaBuda's attempt to give hunters a new set of rights, the case against Robar is over. The appeals court ruled that trying Robar again for the same crime would be "double jeapardy," and therefore the indictment against him must be dropped.
To read the full decision, click here.
