World | Wed Mar 9, 2016 5:28pm EST

Pennsylvania gun control advocates challenge law on city gun rules

PHILADELPHIA | BY DANIEL KELLEY

Pennsylvania gun control advocates on Wednesday asked the state's top court to knock down a 2014 law allowing gun-rights lobbying groups to sue cities that adopt gun restrictions and recoup legal costs if they prevail.

Firearms advocates, including the National Rifle Association, contend the law is necessary to prevent gun owners from becoming ensnared by a patchwork of municipal ordinances that violate their right to bear arms.

Gun control advocates challenged the law on a technicality - that it passed as part of what they called an unrelated piece of legislation.

"These two bills were cobbled together for political expediency at the end of the legislative session," Martin Black, representing five Democratic lawmakers who sued to overturn the law, told the Pennsylvania Supreme Court.More than 80 towns across Pennsylvania repealed gun laws - ranging from requirements that owners report lost or stolen firearms to bans on guns in public parks - rather than face hundreds of thousands of dollars in legal bills to defend ordinances that were seldom enforced. Five municipalities, including Philadelphia and Pittsburgh, have faced lawsuits under the law.

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