Stage set for major appeal in ‘Docs vs. Glocks’ case

A politically contentious legal fightover a Florida law that restricts doctors from discussing gun ownership with patients will be taken up by a federal appeals court after it threw out a prior decision upholding the statute as constitutional.

The case, dubbed Docs vs. Glocks, will likely be heard this year by the 11th Circuit Court of Appeals in Atlanta. OnWednesday, the 11-member court vacated last year’s ruling by a smaller appellate panel that backed the law adopted by the Republican-controlled Florida Legislature and signed by Gov. Rick Scott.

The full court’s brief decision, issued on one page after taking a poll of its members, means the state lawcannot be enforced.

The legal dispute between groups of Florida doctors and the Scott administration— with theNational Rifle Association playing a supporting role — has raged for the past five years. In 2012, a Miami federal judge blocked the state fromenforcing the law, concluding it violated the free speech rights of doctors under the FirstAmendment and that it did not interfere with the right to bear arms under the Second Amendment. But last year, a threejudge panel of the Atlanta appeals court overturned that ruling.

Now, the stage is set to resolve the ideological battle, unless the U.S. Supreme Court intervenes.

“Finally, a federal [appeals] court will have an opportunity to end the nonsense that doctors talking about gun safety somehow threatens the right to own a gun,” said Howard Simon, executive director of the ACLU in Florida, which joined various physicians who filed suit challenging the constitutionality of the state law. The ACLU organized a coalition, including the BrowardCountyPediatric Society and Florida Public Health Association, to file amicus briefs supporting the doctors.

The 2011 law includes a series of restrictions on doctors and other healthcare providers, requiring them to refrain from asking about gun ownership by patients or family members unless the physicians believe in “good faith” that the information is “relevant” to medical care or safety. The law also seeks to prevent doctors from discriminating against patients or “harassing” them because of owning firearms.

The state Legislature adopted the Firearm Owners’ Privacy Act in 2011 after an Ocala couple complained that a doctor asked them about guns and they refused to answer. In turn, the physician refused to see them anymore.