Category: A Victory!
After five days of deliberations, a jury in New York on Friday held the National Rifle Association liable for financial mismanagement and found that Wayne LaPierre, the group’s former CEO, corruptly ran the nation’s most prominent gun rights group.
LaPierre and a senior executive at the NRA must pay a combined $6.35 million “for abusing the system and breaking our laws,” New York Attorney General Letitia James, whose office brought the lawsuit against the organization, said following the verdict.
The jury determined that LaPierre’s violation of his duties cost the NRA $5.4 million in damages, though he already repaid more than $1 million to the organization. He must pay $4.35 million, the New York Attorney General’s Office said.
LaPierre, staring forward with his hands clasped in his lap, sat in the first row of the gallery while the jury read the verdict. He did not speak to the press upon leaving the courthouse Friday.
The New York Attorney General’s Office sued the NRA and its senior management in 2020, claiming they misappropriated millions of dollars to fund personal benefits — including private jets, family vacations and luxury goods. The accusations came at the end of a three-year investigation into the NRA, which is registered in New York as a nonprofit charitable corporation.
The jurors, who began deliberating on Feb. 16, were asked to weigh transactions like hair and makeup for LaPierre’s wife, payments or speaking fees to board members, and contracts with favored vendors willing to pay kickbacks.
LaPierre announced his resignation from the organization on Jan. 5, days before the start of the trial, citing health reasons, according to the NRA.
The lawsuit alleged that LaPierre filled executive positions at the NRA with unqualified loyalists in order to maintain control and conceal self-dealing, including co-defendants John Frazer, corporate secretary and general counsel, and Woody Phillips, the former chief financial officer and treasurer, the attorney general’s lawsuit said. The three of them stand accused of breaching the trust of donors by using charitable money for luxury travel, private planes and five-star hotels, along with entering into multimillion-dollar contracts with favored vendors willing to pay.
The jury found that Frazer and Phillips were liable for violating their duties to the organization. Philips was ordered to pay $2 million in damages, the attorney general’s office said.
The jury also found that the NRA failed to properly administer charitable funds and violated state whistleblower protections, the office said. Frazer and the NRA were also found liable for making false statements on the NRA’s regulatory filings, the office said.
The jury found that there was not enough evidence to provide cause for removing Frazer as secretary of the NRA.
James said the verdict is a “major victory” for her office and the people of New York and that LaPierre and the NRA “are finally being held accountable for this rampant corruption and self-dealing.”
“In New York, you cannot get away with corruption and greed, no matter how powerful or influential you think you may be,” she said in a statement on X. “Everyone, even the NRA and Wayne LaPierre, must play by the same rules.”
The NRA said the verdict confirmed that it was “victimized” by former vendors and fiduciaries “who abused the trust placed in them.”
“We appreciate the service of the jury and the opportunity to present evidence about the positive direction of the NRA today,” NRA President Charles Cotton said in a statement, adding that NRA members “should be heartened by the NRA’s commitment to best practices.”
“To the extent there were control violations, they were acted upon immediately by the NRA Board beginning in summer 2018,” the statement continued.
The next phase of the proceedings will be a bench trial in which Justice Joel Cohen is expected to rule on any final remedies against the defendants, the NRA said.
A fourth defendant, former NRA operations director Joshua Powell, settled civil claims of fraud and abuse brought by James prior to the start of the trial.
As part of his settlement, Powell admitted he breached his fiduciary duties of care, loyalty and obedience by using the NRA’s charitable assets for his own benefit and the benefit of his family. He also admitted he failed to administer the charitable assets entrusted to his care properly.
During closing statements on Feb. 15, LaPierre’s lawyer argued the lawsuit was politically motivated and that he “acted in good faith and with honesty, sincerity and intention,” according to The Associated Press.
The state told jurors that the NRA and its executives were “caught with their hand in the cookie jar” and were trying to deflect, while the NRA’s lawyer said that any corruption was committed against, not by, the group, according to the AP.
Lawyers for Frazer and Phillips told jurors their clients acted in good faith and in the best interests of the NRA, the AP reported. Phillips’ lawyer said his client “doesn’t deserve to be made penniless,” according to the AP.
James’ lawsuit seeks to recoup lost assets and permanently ban LaPierre and the others from serving on any charitable boards in New York. Powell accepted that ban as part of his settlement agreement. He also agreed to pay $100,000 in restitution and to testify against LaPierre and others at trial.
The lawsuit additionally seeks an independent monitor to oversee the NRA’s finances.
The NRA tried to file bankruptcy in 2021 but a federal judge rejected its petition, saying, “The NRA did not file the bankruptcy petition in good faith.”
LaPierre previously said the New York attorney general’s lawsuit was an “unconstitutional, premeditated attack aiming to dismantle and destroy the NRA — the fiercest defender of America’s freedom at the ballot box for decades.”
In 2020, following the attorney general’s filing of the suit, an NRA spokesperson said in a statement that at the time that LaPierre was “required to travel private for security purposes, in accordance with NRA Board policy,” and that he was “asked by the NRA’s former advertising agency to incur certain wardrobe expenses given his enormous public profile.”
Maybe its time to start shooting some stupid rich folks? Grumpy Asking for a Friend
BELLEVUE, WA – The Second Amendment Foundation is cheering the decision by a 9th Circuit Court panel to deny the State of California an en banc hearing in a case known as Junior Sports Magazines, Inc. v. Bonta, in which the state tried to prohibit firearm advertising which it claims, “reasonably appears to be attractive to minors.”
SAF is joined in the case by Junior Sports Magazines, the California Youth Shooting Sports Association, Redlands California Youth Clay Shooting Sports, California Rifle & Pistol Association, CRPA Foundation, Gun Owners of California and Raymond Brown, a private citizen.
“It seems like forever since the 9th Circuit has refused to hear a gun case en banc,” said SAF founder and Executive Vice President Alan M. Gottlieb. “Hopefully, this is a new trend.”
SAF attorney Donald Kilmer noted, “This means that our win before the three-judge panel will become the case law on this issue in the Ninth Circuit. It means the trial court’s denial of a preliminary injunction remains reversed and that court will be required to enter a preliminary injunction, preventing enforcement of this law while the case proceeds to final judgment.”
SAF Executive Director Adam Kraut said the court’s decision is a victory for the First Amendment as well as the Second.
“The state was determined to regulate the First Amendment as well as the Second,” Kraut stated, “and we prevented California from continuing to enact unconstitutional laws. We’re pleased the 9th Circuit has decided to leave the panel’s decision undisturbed.”
This is a ground-breaking First Amendment case, which defends the right of Junior Sports Magazine and other periodicals to publish Second Amendment-related material in California.
“[Minnesota’s] House File 3570 was referred to the House Committee on Public Safety Finance and Policy and would ban so called ‘assault weapons by expanding upon an existing statute used to define these firearms,” NRA-ILA reported Wednesday. “The bill would also prohibit the sale or transfer of ‘assault weapons’, establish a buyback program, and call for an appropriation from the general fund.”
“HF 3570 uses a broad list of different firearms to define ‘semiautomatic military-style assault weapon’,” NRA continued. “Additionally, varying models of a specific gun or models similar to those listed in the bill are prohibited. Modifications and accessories like protruding grips and barrel shrouds, are features that would also cause a gun to be banned. The transfer of semiautomatic military-style assault weapons is prohibited, with very limited exceptions for law enforcement and the military.”
It’s like Minnesota Democratic–Farmer–Labor Party Second Amendment haters have taken all the various iterations of semi auto bans from “by name” to “by characteristics” and added steroids to the mix. Whereas 1994’s federal ban included semi-automatic rifles able to accept detachable magazines with two or more of the “evil” mods like folding stocks, pistol grips, flash hiders and the like, taking a page from California, HF 3570 reduces rejection criteria to “one or more.”
It also lines out a section ceding that “a firearm is not a ‘semiautomatic military-style assault weapon’ if it is generally recognized as particularly suitable for or readily adaptable to sporting purposes under United States Code.” While Jews for the Preservation of Firearms Ownership was the first to warn about the Nazi origins of the “sporting purposes” term, the elimination of even that tells us much about the authoritarian mindset of Minnesota’s violence monopolists.
HF 3570 adds another curious disqualifier, “thumbhole stocks.” That’s because initially, thumbhole stocks were offered as stability and comfort workarounds to the federal pistol grip ban. So, California and other Democrat states decided their priority was for firearms to be less steady and therefore less accurate, ludicrously in the name of “commonsense gun safety.”
And naturally, no attack on armed citizens would be complete without special carveouts for the “Only Ones” expected to enforce the infringements.
There’s one other disqualifier though that should clear up ATF Director Steve Dettelbach’s inability to define what an “assault weapon” is, itself reminiscent of Judge Ketanji Brown Jackson taking a pass on defining “woman.” He should have just said “A Marlin 70620 Model 60 .22 Long Rifle.”Read
After all, the bill text says on line 2.26:
(b) Semiautomatic military-style assault weapon also includes any…
Then go down to line 3.5 and it includes:
…rimfire rifle with a fixed magazine that has the capacity to accept more than ten rounds of ammunition;
And the Marlin advertises a 14 + 1 capacity.
This is what these maniacs are demonizing as a “weapon of war” that “has no business on our streets” and no other purpose but the mass slaughter of innocents. After all, you can’t hunt deer with it! All that’s missing is some lefty vet saying it’s the same gun he carried in Iraq and Afghanistan.
No matter how much they scoff, deny, and lie, of course they’re talking about taking your guns.
And Minnesota’s not alone—California’s right with them on “large capacity magazines,” albeit they exempt “.22 caliber tube ammunition feeding devices or tubular magazines contained in a lever-action firearm” (emphasis added)—at least until the grabbers decide otherwise. And it would appear to be the same in New York, while Illinois, surprisingly, hasn’t “caught up” yet.
It’s interesting to note the backgrounds of the bill’s authors, Leigh Finke, Esther Agbaje, Alicia ‘Liish’ Kozlowski, Larry Kraft, and Samantha Sencer-Mura, DFL stalwarts and darlings of the prohibitionists all, and not a farmer or a laborer in the bunch. (That’s OK—it’s not like Antifa is comprised of those workers” they say they champion.) Ask them about the specifics of what they’re banning, aside from “everything,” and it’s highly likely that an on-the-spot challenge would result in a “shoulder thing that goes up” answer.
While HF 3570 is in its initial stages and has a long way to go, the dominant DFL is using momentum it gained getting due process-denying “red flag” gun confiscations mandated beginning this year. Meanwhile, Minnesota’s denying 18 to 20-year-old adults their right to carry firearms is being challenged.
Don’t look to formerly NRA-endorsed Gov. Tim Walz to honor any of the promises he made before he decided he didn’t need them anymore. That’s what happens when gun owners are led to believe a Democrat Fudd believes in their rights or has anyone’s interests at heart but his own.
The question now is, when is the Supreme Court going to use Bruen to put a stop to this nonsense? They will, won’t they?
About David Codrea:
David Codrea is the winner of multiple journalist awards for investigating/defending the RKBA and a long-time gun owner rights advocate who defiantly challenges the folly of citizen disarmament. He blogs at “The War on Guns: Notes from the Resistance,” is a regularly featured contributor to Firearms News, and posts on Twitter: @dcodrea and Facebook.