D.C.'s Strict Gun Laws Are Being Put to the Test

Recent cases have challenged prohibitions on assault rifles, high-capacity magazines and felons owning guns.

A Washington Metropolitan Police Department car is parked at the Third District headquarters near U St NW.

Lillian Bautista/NOTUS

In June 2025, Lorenzo Redman was sentenced to 18 months in a D.C. prison after he was convicted of possessing a gun as a felon. His public defender filed an appeal.

But that appeal wasn’t based on a procedural mistake or legal technicality. Rather, his attorney argued that in disarming felons, D.C. has been violating the Second Amendment.

Redman’s case — one of two pending before the D.C. Court of Appeals that challenges the District’s felon-in-possession law — is an example of what has become a legal assault on the city’s restrictive gun laws, including litigation around D.C.’s ban on high-powered rifles and high-capacity magazines.