Restaurant Carry Lawsuit
WizardPC notes the ruling went the other way. I don’t see how this ruling will stand. Seems that they presumed the onus of knowing restaurant laws was on permit holders. Bonnyman’s ruling is pretty asinine. I mean, it’s easy to tell if a restaurant serves food five days a week. They usually 1) have food and 2) post their hours of operation. Looks pretty weak.
Update: more from the city paper.
November 20th, 2009 at 3:48 pm
Looks like those restaurant owners in the suit just lawsuited themselves to stricter regulations coming next legislative session.
November 20th, 2009 at 5:40 pm
The thing I don’t get is that the lawsuit was brought by Randy Rayburn, who owns the Sunset Cafe, among other places. A few months ago, I had gone there with the wife, and there was a clear sign on the door stating “no guns”. Considering that sign carries the weight of law, I don’t quite know why he cares.
November 20th, 2009 at 6:07 pm
Because if only he had a no guns sign you could always choose to go somewhere else. But if *all* places are no-gun then you might as well go ahead and eat at his place.
This way he doesn’t have to choose between banning guns and getting your money. He can get both.
November 20th, 2009 at 6:40 pm
I’m glad of this ruling only so far that it shows how lazy our legislature is. That and I always carried anyway so who cares.
November 21st, 2009 at 2:17 am
Well, it was good while it lasted. I can’t see the TN legislature enacting laws that will treat us CCW’ers like our counterparts in 38 (39?) other states.
November 21st, 2009 at 4:47 am
The whole business of serving food or not serving food seems pretty foolish as a determining factor in being allowed to carry. The judge was right in many cases it wouldn’t be clear.
November 23rd, 2009 at 9:20 am
Mikeb: the parts of the law that were deemed “unconstitutionally vague” were lifted verbatim from the rules for a restaurant to have a liquor licence. The restaurant associations arguement boiled down to: “we don’t actually follow the rules to sell alcohol in our establishments, so permit holders won’t know if we meet the definition of ‘place that serves alcohol’ whlie we are holding ourselves out as a restaurant that serves alcohol”. There ar no bars under tennessee law: to serve liquor or wine, you must be a restaurant, and you must meet all the same requirements that were put in the carry law.
Respectfully,
Pol