D.A. says she cannot enforce Philadelphia's new gun laws

The Philadelphia Inquirer reports:

Just four days after Mayor Nutter and City Council celebrated enactment of a package of five gun-control laws, reality arrived in the form of District Attorney Lynne M. Abraham.

Speaking yesterday at a City Council meeting, Abraham told members that she believed the new laws were unconstitutional and that she would not enforce them.

"They are, on their face, illegal acts," said Abraham, who predicted that the first arrest under the new laws would result in a lawsuit challenging their constitutionality.

Abraham said that as a lawyer and elected official, she was bound to obey rulings of the Pennsylvania Supreme Court. In 1996, the state's high court threw out a city ordinance to regulate assault weapons, ruling that the state legislature had passed a law in 1994 that specifically barred municipalities from regulating guns.

The Supreme Court also dismissed on the same grounds a 1999 move to hold gun manufacturers liable for Philadelphia's toll of gun violence.

In a later statement, Abraham said she was "in complete agreement with the intent of the ordinances passed by City Council; in fact I have testified countless times before the state legislature in support of gun-control laws."

But as a prosecutor, Abraham added, "I know that the ordinances are invalid and unenforceable according to the Supreme Court of Pennsylvania."

This is a very interesting story.