Glock challenges Connecticut’s convertible-pistol ban

What Glock is challenging

Glock Inc. has filed a federal lawsuit against Connecticut prosecutors over a state law banning pistols that can be readily converted into machine guns. The company is challenging both the law’s reach over its firearms and prosecutors’ ability to enforce the ban against Glock.

The first part of the dispute concerns which pistols fall within the ban. The law focuses on whether a pistol can be “readily converted” into a machine gun. That standard makes convertibility central to the case: The firearm does not have to already function as a machine gun for the ban to apply.

Glock’s challenge places the company’s pistols and the meaning of that standard before a federal court. The court’s treatment of the law’s scope will determine how the challenged language applies in this case.

Why prosecutors are named

The second part concerns enforcement. Glock sued Connecticut prosecutors, the state officials positioned to apply the challenged law. By bringing the case against them, the company is contesting their authority to enforce the convertible-pistol ban against Glock under the law as written.

The lawsuit does not involve an election or a candidate’s policy platform. It is a public-safety dispute between a firearms manufacturer and Connecticut prosecutors over the permissible reach and enforcement of a state gun law.

The next steps will occur in federal court, where Connecticut prosecutors can respond to Glock’s claims. The court will then consider the company’s challenge to the ban and its enforcement.