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Judge rules against New York state ban on nunchucks

A federal court has ruled that that a New York state ban on possessing nunchucks is unconstitutional. Judge Pamela Chen issued the ruling about the famous martial arts weapon last Friday in a Brooklyn federal court, according to The Associated Press.

The news service noted that Chen's ruling recounted the history of the nunchucks ban, which was instituted in New York in 1974 "out of a concern that, as a result of the rising popularity 'of 'Kung Fu' movies and shows,′ 'various circles of the state's youth' — including 'muggers and street gangs' — were 'widely' using nunchaku to cause 'many serious injuries.'"

The plaintiff in the case, James Maloney, was charged with possession of nunchucks, two rigid rods connected at one end by a chain or rope, in his home in 2000. Maloney initially filed a complaint in 2003. The AP notes that he was mainly focused on getting that part of the law that bans nunchucks even in private homes overturned.

Chen said in her ruling that the court couldn't just take that part out of the existing law. She ruled that the state law as it pertained to possessing the weapon was in violation of the Second Amendment.

The judge also found that banning the manufacturing, transport, or disposal of nunchaku was unconstitutional.

The case has a long history:

In 2003, attorney James M. Maloney, then a recent graduate of Fordham Law School and a Master of Laws candidate at NYU Law School, brought a pro se federal constitutional challenge to the New York nunchaku ban, seeking a judicial declaration that it is unconstitutional to make in-home possession of nunchaku for peaceful use in martial-arts practice or home defense a crime. The United States District Court for the Eastern District of New York initially dismissed Maloney's Second Amendment claim based on prior case law that the Second Amendment applied only to federal action, and this decision was affirmed by the United States Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit. However, on June 29, 2010, the U.S. Supreme Court granted a writ of certiorari, vacated the decision of the Second Circuit, and sent the case back for "further consideration." It took this action in light of its decision in McDonald v. Chicago, which held that the right of an individual to "keep and bear arms," protected by the Second Amendment, is made applicable to the states by the Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment. At her confirmation hearing before the Senate Judiciary Committee on July 14, 2009, Justice Sonia Sotomayor, referring to the Maloney case and to "nunchuk sticks," opined that "when the sticks are swung... that swinging mechanism can break arms, it can bust someone's skull." In the U.S. Supreme Court's decision of June 29, 2010, in Maloney v. Rice, it is noted that "Justice Sotomayor took no part in the consideration or decision."

As of 2018, the case remains ongoing in the United States District Court for the Eastern District of New York, with District Attorney Madeline Singas as the sole named defendant. Singas has argued that nunchaku are "dangerous and unusual" weapons that may be banned totally even for peaceful use in martial-arts practice or home defense. On December 14th, 2018, the United States District Court for the Eastern District of New York found the ban unconstitutional.

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