Fight Against Ban Grew Out of Fear, Frustration

Shelly Parker did everything she could to keep her home safe. She owned a dog. She called D.C. police when she suspected illegal activity on her block. She installed a security camera on her front window.

Her crime-fighting efforts made an impression. One night, Parker found her car window smashed and saw rocks scattered around the vehicle. She felt it was retaliation for her vigilance.

"That really disturbed me to my core," recalled Parker, who said she often received verbal taunts while walking her malamute, Barney, near her home on the northeastern edge of Capitol Hill.

A police officer gave her some advice, Parker said.

Get a gun, he told her.

Parker later joined five other D.C. residents who took the District government to court in an effort to overturn the city's 31-year-old handgun ban. In March, a panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit ruled in their favor, striking down key elements of the restrictive statute by a 2 to 1 vote. Among other things, the judges said the Second Amendment gives residents the right to keep loaded guns in their homes.

The lawsuit bearing her name, Parker vs. the District of Columbia, probably will make its way to the U.S. Supreme Court. The D.C. attorney general's office said that the city will file a petition tomorrow to have the case reheard before the full Court of Appeals. The gun law is expected to remain intact while proceedings unfold.

The court's decision has been hailed by gun-rights organizations and others who consider themselves staunch defenders of constitutional rights. But D.C. officials and gun-control advocates fear wiping out the ban will proliferate violence. Some have argued that the half-dozen residents who filed the lawsuit are outside the norm in a city once labeled the nation's murder capital.

For Parker, the court ruling is a victory for District residents who believe a firearm provides protection when fighting for safe communities. "The only thing between me and somebody entering my home are harsh words," Parker said. "That's all I have."

Robert A. Levy, the lawyer who bankrolled the lawsuit, wanted a diverse group of complainants, and Parker, a 44-year-old software designer, is one of two black female plaintiffs. She said the ban on handguns puts neighborhood activists at risk of being subjected to threats and harassment. Having a pistol in her home would level the playing field, she said.

"It's a deterrent. I think it would give a criminal pause," she said.

Her experience living in a gentrifying corner of the city informed her view. When she first considered buying the yellow house in the 200 block of 14th Place NE, Parker recalled recently, she was charmed by the narrow, one-way street with its clumped rowhouses that almost border the sidewalk.