https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/1678155-robinsonmotion.html
MEMORANDUM, ORDER AND JUDGMENT
Justice Story once wrote that the right to keep and bear arms is
the "palladium of the liberties of a republic," and the people of
Missouri echoed that sentiment by a substantial margin in 2014, when
they amended the Bill of Rights of their constitution, art. I, §23, to
read as follows:
That the right of every citizen to keep and bear arms,
ammunition, and accessories typical to the normal function of
such arms, in defense of his home, person, family and property,
or when lawfully summoned in aid of the civil power, shall not be
questioned. The rights guaranteed by this section shall be
unalienable. Any restriction on these rights shall be subject to
strict scrutiny and the state of Missouri shall be obligated to
uphold these rights and shall under no circumstances decline to
protect against their infringement. Nothing in this section shall
be construed to prevent the general assembly from enacting
general laws which limit the rights of convicted violent felons
or those adjudicated by a court to be a danger to self or others
as result of a mental disorder or mental infirmity.
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To survive strict scrutiny, a restriction on possession of
firearms by non-violent felons requires more than the justification
proffered by the State.
Given that §571.070.1(1) fails to
differentiate among classes of felonies, fails to define criteria
whereby non-violent felons can be assessed for future dangerousness,
and fails to impose any standard of proof before a non-violent felon
can be stripped of his constitutional right to keep and bear arms, the
Court concludes that the statute is unconstitutional as applied to
defendant in this case.
The Court is not at liberty to rewrite statutes so as to supply criteria for
denying the right to bear arms to persons convicted of non-violent felonies.
See State v. Hart, 404 S.W.3d 232 (Mo.banc 2013). The Court does not mean to
imply that, if the State proved future dangerousness, the defendant's
constitutional attack would fail. The problem is that the statute simply
does not afford any basis to differentiate among persons convicted of nonviolent felonies.