 |
 |
to fill out a simple form to connect to Personal Injury Lawyers in your area.
|
|
|
|
|
City of Chicago v. Beretta U.S.A. Corp.11/18/2004
ce of an injunction is contingent on plaintiffs' prevailing at trial on the merits of their claim. Concerns raised by defendants about the availability of a remedy at law and breadth of the injunctive relief sought are, therefore, merely speculative and we decline to address them.
Similarly, because this case has been resolved on other grounds, we have not considered defendants' arguments that dismissal of this action is warranted on the basis the injunctive relief sought by plaintiffs would violate the commerce and due process clauses of the United States Constitution (U.S. Const., art. I, §8, cl. 3; amends. V, XIV) and the state constitutional provision addressing the powers of home rule units (Ill. Const. 1970, art. VII, §6). Lyon v. Department of Children & Family Services, 209 Ill. 2d 264, 271 (2004).
IV. CONCLUSION
Plaintiffs and the amici supporting their position advocate expansion of the common law of public nuisance to encompass their novel claim. They anticipate our reluctance to expand nuisance liability in an area highly regulated by both state and federal law and urge that it is not only within our inherent authority, but it is also our duty, to construe the common law to aid a local government's effort to protect its citizens from gun violence.
To do so, we would have had to decide each of the issues raised in this appeal in plaintiffs' favor. In effect, we would have had to resolve every "close call" in favor of creating an entirely new species of public nuisance liability. Instead, after careful consideration, we conclude that plaintiffs have not stated a claim for public nuisance. Even granting, arguendo, that a public right has been infringed, we conclude that their assertions of negligent conduct are not supported by any recognized duty on the part of the manufacturer and distributor defendants and that, under the Gilmore rule (Gilmore, 261 Ill. App. 3d at 661), their allegations of intentional conduct are insufficient for public nuisance liability as a matter of law. In addition, we hold that proximate cause cannot be established as to the dealer defendants because the claimed harm is the aggregate result of numerous unforeseeable intervening criminal acts by third parties not under defendants' control. By implication, proximate cause is also lacking as to the manufacturer and distributor defendants, who are even further removed from the intervening criminal acts. Finally, we hold that plaintiffs' action for damages is barred by the Moorman doctrine and the municipal cost recovery rule.
Any change of this magnitude in the law affecting a highly regulated industry must be the work of the legislature, brought about by the political process, not the work of the courts. In response to the suggestion of amici that we are abdicating our responsibility to declare the common law, we point to the virtue of judicial restraint.
We, therefore, reverse the judgment of the appellate court and affirm the judgment of the circuit court, which properly granted defendants' motion to dismiss.
Appellate court judgment reversed; circuit court judgment affirmed.
JUSTICE FREEMAN, specially concurring
For the reasons given in my special concurrence in Young v. Bryco Arms, No. 93678 (November 18, 2004), I specially concur.
CHIEF JUSTICE McMORROW and JUSTICES FITZGERALD, KILBRIDE and RARICK join in this special concurrence.
|