Overview
- A federal judge granted a narrow preliminary injunction that prevents Montgomery County from enforcing its indoor firearms ban as applied to the Silver Spring Jewish Center and its members, allowing the congregation to deploy trained volunteer armed security for upcoming High Holiday services.
- The order is temporary and limited to the synagogue and its members, so it does not invalidate the county’s separate 100-yard buffer zones or lift the ban for other houses of worship in Montgomery County.
- In finding a likelihood of success at this early stage, the court said the indoor ban likely violates the Second Amendment and burdens the congregation’s Free Exercise rights, and the judge credited plaintiffs’ evidence that their religious practices sincerely prefer volunteer security.
- County officials say the revised ordinance was written after guidance from the Maryland Supreme Court to keep guns out of sensitive locations such as schools, parks, and houses of worship, and the court treated the buffer-zone provision under a different legal standard.
- The case will proceed in federal court and could shape how courts treat as-applied challenges by religious groups that rely on volunteer security and how counties balance local public-safety rules with religious autonomy and cost constraints for smaller congregations.