New Yorkers may be able to carry a firearm for self-defense, but those seeking a less-lethal option will continue to be out of luck following a new federal court ruling.

On Monday, US District Court Judge Edgardo Ramos upheld a New York state ban and a separate New York City ban on the sale and possession of stun guns and tasers. He determined that the plaintiffs had the burden of introducing specific evidence of how common those weapons are and that they failed to show they were popular enough to be protected by the Second Amendment.

“In sum, because Plaintiffs have failed to provide any evidence that stun guns and tasers are in ‘common use’; they have clearly not ‘set forth significant, probative evidence on which a reasonable fact-finder could decide in [their] favor,’” Ramos wrote Calce v. City of New York.

The ruling makes Ramos the first and only federal judge to uphold a stun gun ban in the decade since the Supreme Court of the United States (SCOTUS) issued a unanimous decision signaling that such bans are likely unconstitutional. Elsewhere, more than a dozen states and localities have had their bans overturned in court or voluntarily repealed to avoid similar losses.

In 2016’s Caetano v. Massachusetts, SCOTUS unanimously vacated a Massachusetts Supreme Court ruling upholding that state’s ban on stun guns. While SCOTUS did not rule on the merits of the ban directly, its opinion dismantled the Massachusetts court’s argument that such bans are constitutional.

“[T]he court concluded that stun guns are ‘unusual’ because they are ‘a thoroughly modern invention,’” the justices wrote in an unsigned opinion. “By equating ‘unusual’ with ‘in common use at the time of the Second Amendment’s enactment,’ the court’s second explanation is the same as the first; it is inconsistent with Heller for the same reason.”

The Court reiterated that the Second Amendment “extends, prima facie, to all instruments that constitute bearable arms, even those that were not in existence at the time of the founding.” It also emphasized that the Second Amendment protected more weapons than just those useful for military service.

Justice Samuel Alito, joined by Clarence Thomas, also penned a concurrence. It went further than the majority opinion, citing statistics suggesting there were as many as 200,000 stun guns in civilian possession by 2009, and declaring a ban on them flatly violated the Constitution.

“While less popular than handguns, stun guns are widely owned and accepted as a legitimate means of self-defense across the country,” Alito wrote. “Massachusetts’ categorical ban of such weapons therefore violates the Second Amendment.”

Judge Ramos acknowledged the Caetano ruling but disagreed that it implied stun gun bans are unconstitutional.

“The Caetano Court did not, however, conclusively determine, because it was not required to, that stun guns and tasers are in ‘common use,’” he wrote.

That burden, he said, was on the plaintiffs in this case to show that stun guns are both in “common use” today and that they are “typically possessed by law-abiding citizens for lawful purposes.” He concluded that the challengers of New York’s bans failed on that front.

“Here, Plaintiffs have not provided any studies, reports, or data for the Court to conduct a ‘statistical inquiry’ into whether stun guns and tasers are in common use,” he wrote. “Plaintiffs do not ‘even identify the most basic of statistics including, for example, the number of stun guns and/or tasers purchased in the United States for any given year.’”

He also dismissed Justice Alito’s earlier entry offering a stun gun ownership estimate, stating that “a concurrence is not binding precedent.”

A spokesperson with the New York City Law Department told The Reload that city officals “are pleased with the decision.”

The Second Amendment Foundation, joined by the Firearms Policy Coalition, first sued New York over its ban in October 2021 on behalf of four New York City residents. The group said in a social media statement that its attorneys “are reviewing the disappointing opinion and strategizing next steps.”

UPDATE 3-25-2025 4:30 PM EASTERN: This piece has been updated to include a comment from the New York City Law Department.