On Friday, Attorney General William Tong released a statement announcing that his office secured a dismissal of Freeman v. Bondi, et al, a federal lawsuit which challenged Connecticut’s laws barring convicted felons, even non-violent ones, from possessing firearms.

“This decision reaffirms that Connecticut’s gun safety laws are constitutional,” said Tong. “Keeping firearms out of the hands of convicted felons is a commonsense safeguard that continues to keep our communities safe. We will continue to vigorously defend our gun laws to protect families in our state.”

Justin Freeman, a Manchester, Connecticut-based attorney, filed the suit on June 9, 2025, naming then-U.S. Attorney General Pam Bondi, all 13 of Connecticut’s State’s Attorneys, and Ronnell Higgins, the Commissioner of the Department of Emergency Services and Public Protection, as defendants. In his complaint, Freeman argued that non-violent felons who seek to own a gun face a “federal statutory maze designed to permanently keep them in limbo.” Connecticut’s non-violent felons, Freeman asserted, “also face a myriad of statutory barriers” that bar them from purchasing firearms.

“No one is the sum of their worst moments, and America is a nation of second chances and redemption stories,” argued Freeman in his complaint. “Its encouragement of redemption and offering of second chances, however, do not encompass the Second Amendment.”

In November 2018, Freeman pleaded guilty to one count of filing a false tax return after the IRS found that he had underreported more than $1.2 million in income for the fiscal years 2010, 2011, and 2012. As of May 2019, Connecticut’s U.S. Attorney’s Office said Freeman paid approximately $3.75 million in back taxes, penalties, and interest, and still owed an additional $1.3 million. He was hit with an additional $4,000 fine and sentenced to eight months in prison, a stint which began in July 2019.

Freeman was readmitted to the bar on March 28, 2025, and claims he has “returned to living the productive and law-abiding life” he lived before committing tax evasion. In the judge’s decision to dismiss, it was noted that he had “no prior or subsequent criminal record,” as well as “no history of violence, no mental health or substance abuses issues, and is not subject to any restraining orders.”

“After paying his debt to society, including the financial debt he owed to the Internal Revenue Service, Freeman has explored for years how to regain his right to purchase, possess, and lawfully use arms,” reads Freeman’s complaint. “He has repeatedly met a two-headed monster – federal criminal prohibitions that deny him any meaningful opportunity to petition for the restoration of his firearms rights and state criminal prohibitions that permanently bar him from ever possessing firearms, ammunition, or electronic defense weapons again.”

Freeman laid out various federal and state laws and explained their pertinence to his suit. Federal law stipulates that it is illegal for any person convicted of “a crime punishable by imprisonment for a term exceeding one year” to own a weapon, and Freeman’s only avenues of appeal at the federal level would be to petition the U.S. Attorney General’s Office, through U.S.C. Section 925(c), or to seek a presidential pardon, neither of which, Freeman argued, are feasible. At the state level, Connecticut’s General Statutes Section 53a-217 bars convicted felons from owning or purchasing guns, ammo, or tasers, and several other laws require DESPP to enforce these bans.

Freeman’s suit sought the court to declare the various federal and state laws which keep him from owning a gun to be unconstitutional, and sought a permanent injunction barring both the State and Federal government from enforcing such laws against him. He claimed the laws violated his 2nd Amendment right to bear arms, his 14th Amendment right to equal protection, and that U.S.C. 922(g) specifically, violates the Constitution’s Commerce Clause.

Both Connecticut’s Attorney General’s Office and the U.S. Attorney General’s Office argued that Zherka v. Bondi, a case decided the same day that Freeman filed his, rendered his 2nd Amendment arguments moot. In that case, Selim Zherka, a New York resident and non-violent felon, also sought to challenge the constitutionality of U.S.C. 922(g) on 2nd Amendment grounds. His appeal to the U.S. Second Circuit Court was denied, and the U.S. Supreme Court denied review of the decision in January. Connecticut’s U.S. District Judge Sarah Russell cited the case when dismissing Freeman’s 2nd Amendment claims.

“I agree with the parties that Zherka squarely forecloses Freeman’s claims under the Second Amendment,” wrote Russell. “As Freeman’s Second Amendment claims are squarely governed by binding Circuit precedent, I am bound to follow that precedent.”

Freeman argued that because other, lesser fraud offenses are “intrinsically the same” as the crime he was charged with, and because those offenses are misdemeanors, the state’s prohibition on his owning firearms violates the 14th Amendment’s Equal Protection Clause. Again, Russell disagreed.

“Federal and state law both classify false statements on income tax returns as felonies,” wrote Russell. “The other state fraud laws Freeman identifies… are not ‘intrinsically the same’ as laws criminalizing false statements on income tax returns because they have different elements and because the state classifies them as misdemeanors.”

Freeman’s other 14th Amendment claim argued that the 925(c) process through which he could appeal to the U.S. Attorney General’s Office is arbitrary and favors the affluent and well-connected. The U.S. Attorney General’s Office argued the complaint should be dismissed because Freeman hadn’t actually tried a 925(c) appeal before filing, and because the Attorney General invited Freeman to do so in September 2025.

“I agree with the USAG that this case is not fit for judicial resolution because it is not clear, at this point, whether Freeman in fact has been ‘selectively treated’ compared to others similar situated,” said Russell. “The result of the § 925(c) process as it relates to Freeman is itself a critical factual component of this case; without that result, I cannot compare Freeman’s process and outcome to the processes and outcomes of those similarly situated.”

Russell denied the motion to dismiss this claim outright, instead deciding to stay it until such time as Freeman exhausts his right to appeal under the 925(c) process.

Russell denied Freeman’s last claim, that U.S.C. 922(g) is an overreach of Congress’s power to regulate interstate commerce, because another Second Circuit case, United States v. Sorrentino, had already ruled against the same challenge.

“The Second Circuit’s holding that § 922(g) is a constitutional exercise of the Commerce Clause power has not been overturned by the Supreme Court or the Second Circuit and it controls the outcome of Freeman’s claim,” said Russell. “I am therefore bound to apply it here.”

Republish This Story

Republish our articles for free, online or in print, under a Creative Commons license.