Concord, NH (AP) -Susid with a popularity pistol trial, Sig Sauer, a new Hampshire, requested and received protection and received protection in the form of a new state law, which makes it harder to adopt a weapon manufacturer to court.
The supporters of the legislator led by the Republican legislator said the laws were needed to help the main employer. Court lawsuits say that the SIG Sauer P320 pistol may disappear without pulling out the trigger and the suspicion that the company denies.
The law includes all weapons manufacturers and federal firearms licenses related to the requirements of responsibility for the products for four specific safety functions “absence or presence”. One of these features is the external mechanical safety that people who say SIG Sauer should be standard P320, taking into account its design. Claims can still be made due to production defects.
Those who brought a claim in Sig Sauer in the New Hampshire and elsewhere are police, federal law enforcement officers and other experienced weapon users from several states who say they were injured by a pistol.
In some cases, the manufacturer prevailed. In Pennsylvania and Georgia, this attracts two recently -held several million dollars.
George Abrahams, a US Army veteran and painting contractor in Philadelphia, who won his case, said he collected his P320, put him in his athletic pants and pulled him down before walking down.
“All I did was a staircase and a loud explosion, and then extraordinary pain and bleeding,” he told Associated Press in 2022. He said the bullet torn through his right thigh.
The company, which employs more than 2,000 people in a country with permissible weapons law, says the P320 has internal safety mechanisms and “was the strictest test and evaluation of any firearm, carried out by military and law enforcement agencies worldwide.” It is said that the problem is a user error or incompatible cases, not design.
“Do you want people to bring an action for car manufacturers because they sell cars with no air conditioner?” May Republican from Deerfield State Representative Terry Roy.
Opponents criticized the draft law as a special exception to the Law Law, which has never been granted to any other company of New Hampshire.
“I think there is a difference between aid for a major employer and the creation of an exception that really hurts people and does not give them a day in court,” state spokesman David Meuse, Democrat from Portsmut, said in an interview. His district includes NewlynoTon, where Sig Sauer is headquartered.
2005 The federal law gives the weapons the industry a wide range of legal immunity. The new Hampshire was already among the 32 states, which had adopted weapon immunity laws in some form, says the Gifford Law Center to prevent weapon violence. Some states have also abolished or weakened the laws of the weapon industry.
Sig Sauer is looking for help
The Sig Sauer CEO asked the new Hampshire legislators’ help in April, two weeks after the Pennsylvania law firm, March 26. The Concord in the Federal Court filed a statement in the Federal Court for the P320 project. The firm represents more than 100 people who have filed such actions, including more than 70 in the New Hampshire.
“We are fighting all these court cases from the city and in every court case we need to fight, we are deprived of money from the Granite state’s residents and employees, which we can use and technology,” the Bobby Cox testimony to the company’s government’s government affairs.
The measure came into force when the Republican government signed it on 23 May. Legislators said it did not apply to current claims. However, Sig Sauer’s lawyers mentioned this as part of their argument to dismiss the march case or to split and transfer 22 plaintiffs’ claims to the courts in which they live. The hearing on this issue is scheduled for July 21.
The Ayotte’s office did not respond to the AP request asking for comment, but he said Keen Sentinel said she was “proud to defend new Hampshire companies that create thousands of well -paid jobs from easy claims.”
“Non-state court lawyers who want to make money will not find space in the New Hampshire,” said Ayotte’s office by email. By email to the newspaper.
Robert Zimmerman, the plaintiffs’ main attorney in Pennsylvania, said the purpose of the claims was to change the design of the weapon to make it safe for the people using it.
The new Hampshire was a place chosen because the federal rules allow lawsuits for its home country, Zimmerman said. These actions were appointed to one federal judge Concord.
“SIG is trying to strategically decentralize this case and force each client to enter 100 different courts and slow down the process of both sides to get the right result, that is, the lawsuit determined by merit,” Zimmerman said in an interview.
Sig Sauer gets guard
Court lawsuits accuse Siga Sauer for designing and marketing and negligence on a defective product.
During the discussion at home, Roy said he owns the P320 and is one of his favorite weapons: “But you can buy them with or without security.”
The plaintiffs say that the “vast majority” of P320 models sold by the “majority” are not security, “even as a choice”.
SIG Sauer says that some users choose a faster drawing time, which is devoted to the absence of external safety; Others want additional security features.
SIG Sauer 2017 Offered a “voluntary update” to include alternative design, which, among other features, reduces the weight of the trigger. The plaintiffs’ lawyers say the update did not stop the release of accidental discharge.
State, industrial and immunity
“This is not a great look” when the manufacturer can write an exception to the law, but it is also not uncommon, said Daniel Pi, an associate professor at the Franklin Pierce Legal School of the New Hampshire University.
In Tennessee, the head of government Bill Lee signed a bill in 2023. After a deadly shooting school, which provides weapons and ammunition vendors, manufacturers and sellers, additional protection against claims. This year, the Tenesis lawmakers adopted another bill to further restrict the responsibility of weapons companies.
In another industry, the pesticides – the governors of the North Dakota and Georgia – have signed laws this year to ensure legal protection for the Bayer, Roundup manufacturer, a popular weed killer. Bayer suffered from 181,000 claims that the main ingredient in Roundup causes non -Hodgkin’s lymphoma. Bayer disputes those statements.
The Louisiana legislator adopted a bill to protect the nursing home from many claims and the upper limit. Republican governor Jeff Landry has not done yet.