Case 6:22-cv-06486-JLS Document 56 Filed 12/29/22 Page 1 of 36
UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT
WESTERN DISTRICT OF NEW YORK
MICHAEL SPENCER and
HIS TABERNACLE FAMILY
CHURCH, INC.,
- Plaintiffs,
- v.
STEVEN A. NIGRELLI,
WEEDEN A. WETMORE, and
MATTHEW VAN HOUTEN,
- Defendants.
22-CV-6486 (JLS)
DECISION AND ORDER
(PRELIMINARY INJUNCTION)
As recounted in Hardaway v. Nigrelli, No. 22-CV-771, 2022 WL 16646220 (W.D.N.Y. Nov. 8, 2022), eight days after the Supreme Court struck down New York’s unconstitutional “proper cause” requirement for conceal-carry licenses, the State responded with even more restrictive legislation, barring all conceal-carry license holders from vast swaths of the State. As in Hardaway, the complaint and motion in this case focus solely on one aspect of the new legislation, namely, the portion making it a felony for such a license holder to possess a firearm at “any place of worship or religious observation.”
Plaintiffs argue that this exclusion is a “direct assault on First Amendment rights”—in addition to running afoul of the Second Amendment as this Court recognized in Hardaway. Dkt. 13-3, at 1. They posit that “New York now puts its
