Judge who blocked California's ban on high-capacity magazines halts their sales for now

Breaking News EmailsGet breaking news alerts and special reports. The news and stories that matter, delivered weekday mornings.SUBSCRIBEApril 6, 2019, 12:38 AM GMTBy Associated PressSACRAMENTO, Calif. — A federal judge on Friday halted sales of high-capacity ammunition magazines in California, giving state officials a chance to appeal his order last week[1] that allowed their sale for the first time in nearly 20 years.U.S. District Judge Roger Benitez barred further sales until the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals considers whether to reinstate the state's ban on magazines holding more than 10 bullets.But the judge said those who bought the extended magazines since his initial order a week ago may keep them without fear of being prosecuted while the appeal proceeds.Hundreds of thousands of gun owners may have bought the magazines since Benitez threw out the state's ban last week as infringing on their Second Amendment right to bear arms, said Chuck Michel, an attorney for the National Rifle Association and the California Rifle & Pistol Association who filed the lawsuit that led to the ruling.Under Benitez's order, no one in California is permitted to manufacture, import, buy or sell large-capacity magazines as of 5 p.m. Friday.California has prohibited such magazines since 2000, though people who had the magazines before then were allowed to keep them. Benitez last week threw out both the 2000 law and a 2016 law and ballot measure banning possession even by those who had owned them legally."All the people who bought the magazines in the last week are protected from prosecution, but any further purchase of these magazines is illegal for the moment," Michel said. "There was 20 years of pent up demand for these self-defense tools, and several hundred thousand people bought them in the last week, maybe more than several hundred thousand."Attorney General Xavier

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