NYC will try gun scanners in subway system in effort to deter violence underground

NEW YORK (AP) — New York City officials announced a pilot program on Thursday to deploy portable gun scanners in the subway system, part of an effort to deter violence underground and to make the system feel safer.

The scanners will be introduced in certain stations after a legally mandated 90-day waiting period, Mayor Eric Adams said.

“Keeping New Yorkers safe on the subway and maintaining confidence in the system is key to ensuring that New York remains the safest big city in America,” said Adams, who also announced a plan to send additional outreach workers into subway stations to try to get people with mental health issues who are living in the system into treatment.

Adams said officials would work to identify companies with expertise in weapons detection technology and that after the waiting period the scanners would be instituted in some subway stations "where the NYPD will be able to further evaluate the equipment’s effectiveness.”

The scanner that Adams and police officials introduced during Thursday's news conference in a lower Manhattan station came from Evolv, a publicly traded company that has been accused of doctoring the results of software testing to make its scanners appear more effective than they are.

Jerome Greco, supervising attorney of the digital forensics unit at the Legal Aid Society, said gun detection systems can trigger false alarms and cause panic.

“This Administration’s headstrong reliance on technology as a panacea to further public safety is misguided, costly, and creates significant invasions of privacy,” Greco said in a news release.

Adams said the city would perform its own analysis of the scanners' accuracy.

“People may have had bad experiences with this technology,” Adams, a former transit police officer, said. “What we witnessed, it's living up to our expectations. And we’re going to do an analysis and determine, hey is it living up to our expectations.”

City officials did not say exactly where the scanners would be installed. The device they demonstrated at the Fulton Street station beeped after brief delay when a police officer with a holstered gun went through but was silent when officers carrying cellphones and other electronic devices passed through.

Overall, violent crime is rare in the city's subway system, which serves about 3 million riders a day, but there have been two recent high-profile shooting incidents. Earlier in March, a man was shot with his own gun and critically wounded during a confrontation with another passenger. Last month, one person was killed and several others wounded when shots rang out amid a fight between two groups on a rush-hour subway car.

There were five killings in the system last year, down from 10 the year prior, according to police. There were three homicides in the first two months of 2024.

The scanner announcement came days after a fatal shove in an East Harlem subway station on Monday once again brought the issue of subway safety to the forefront.

Also on Monday, New York City officials announced a plan to send 800 more police officers into the subway system to crack down on fare evasion.

Before the latest surge, the NYPD had seized 17 guns from people stopped in the system this year, Metropolitan Transportation Authority Chair and CEO Janno Lieber said at a board meeting Wednesday.

In this photo provided by The Metropolitan Transportation Authority (MTA), Mayor Eric Adams, left, points to new portable weapon detectors during a news conference in New York, March 28, 2024. New York City officials announced a pilot program on Thursday to deploy portable gun scanners in the subway system, part of an effort to deter violence underground and to make the system feel safer. (Marc A. Hermann/Metropolitan Transportation Authority via AP)

In this photo provided by The Metropolitan Transportation Authority (MTA), Mayor Eric Adams smiles during a news conference about new portable weapon detectors in New York, March 28, 2024. New York City officials announced a pilot program on Thursday to deploy portable gun scanners in the subway system, part of an effort to deter violence underground and to make the system feel safer. (Marc A. Hermann/Metropolitan Transportation Authority via AP)

In this photo provided by The Metropolitan Transportation Authority (MTA), new weapon detectors that can be deployed at subway entrances are displayed during a news conference in New York, March 28, 2024. New York City officials announced a pilot program on Thursday to deploy portable gun scanners in the subway system, part of an effort to deter violence underground and to make the system feel safer. (Marc A. Hermann/Metropolitan Transportation Authority via AP)

In this photo provided by The Metropolitan Transportation Authority (MTA), new weapon detectors that can be deployed at subway entrances are displayed during a news conference in New York, March 28, 2024. New York City officials announced a pilot program on Thursday to deploy portable gun scanners in the subway system, part of an effort to deter violence underground and to make the system feel safer. (Marc A. Hermann/Metropolitan Transportation Authority via AP)

In this photo provided by The Metropolitan Transportation Authority (MTA), new weapon detectors that can be deployed at subway entrances are displayed during a news conference in New York, March 28, 2024. New York City officials announced a pilot program on Thursday to deploy portable gun scanners in the subway system, part of an effort to deter violence underground and to make the system feel safer. (Marc A. Hermann/Metropolitan Transportation Authority via AP)

AUSTIN, Texas (AP) — A federal judge has blocked the Biden administration from enforcing a new rule in Texas that would require firearms dealers to run background checks on buyers at gun shows or other places outside brick-and-mortar stores.

The decision by U.S. District Judge Matthew Kacsmaryk, an appointee of former President Donald Trump, came before the rule had been set to take effect Monday. The order also prevents the federal government from enforcing the rule against several gun-rights groups, including Gun Owners of America. It does not apply to Louisiana, Mississippi and Utah, which were also part of the lawsuit.

“Plaintiffs understandably fear that these presumptions will trigger civil or criminal penalties for conduct deemed lawful just yesterday,” Kacsmaryk said in his ruling.

The federal Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives declined to comment. The Justice Department didn’t immediately respond to a request for comment.

Twenty-six Republican attorneys general filed lawsuits in federal court in Arkansas, Florida and Texas aiming to block enforcement of the rule earlier this month. The plaintiffs argued that the rule violates the Second Amendment of the U.S. Constitution and that President Joe Biden, a Democrat, doesn’t have the authority to implement it.

The new requirement is the Biden administration’s latest effort to curtail gun violence and aims to close a loophole that has allowed unlicensed dealers to sell tens of thousands of guns every year without checking that the potential buyer is not legally prohibited from having a firearm.

Kacsmaryk wrote that the rule sets presumptions about when a person intends to make a profit and whether a seller is “engaged in the business.” He said this is “highly problematic” for multiple reasons, including that it forces the firearm seller to prove innocence rather than the government to prove guilt.

“This ruling is a compelling rebuke of their tyrannical and unconstitutional actions that purposely misinterpreted federal law to ensure their preferred policy outcome,” Gun Owners of America senior vice president Erich Pratt said in a statement Monday.

Biden administration officials proposed the rule in August and it garnered more than 380,000 public comments. It follows the nation's most sweeping gun violence prevention bill in decades, which Biden signed in 2022 after lawmakers reached a bipartisan agreement in the wake of the Uvalde Elementary School shooting that killed 19 children and two teachers two years ago this week.

The rule implements a change in the 2022 law that expanded the definition of those who are “engaged in the business” of selling firearms, are required to become licensed by the ATF, and therefore must run background checks.

“This is going to keep guns out of the hands of domestic abusers and felons,” Biden said in a statement last month. “And my administration is going to continue to do everything we possibly can to save lives. Congress needs to finish the job and pass universal background checks legislation now.”

Kacsmaryk is the sole district court judge in Amarillo — a city in the Texas panhandle — ensuring that all cases filed there land in front of him. Since taking the bench, he has ruled against the Biden administration on several other issues, including immigration and LGBTQ protections.

FILE - Pistols sit on display during the first day of the Silver Spur Gun and Blade Show, Jan. 22, 2022, in Odessa, Texas. On Monday, May 20, 2024, a federal judge blocked the Biden administration from enforcing a new rule in Texas that would require firearms dealers to run background checks on buyers at gun shows or other places outside brick-and-mortar stores. (Eli Hartman/Odessa American via AP, File)