The pizza delivery driver who shot two would-be robbers in seven months was allowed to get one of his two seized Beretta pistols back Friday.
After shooting one assailant in July 2006, Andres Vegas had one gun seized and was warned he would face prosecution if he continued to carry a pistol in his car in Milwaukee's central city.
He shot a second would-be robber in January. That gun was confiscated, too, and prosecutors charged him with concealing a handgun, a misdemeanor. However, Milwaukee County Circuit Judge Daniel A. Noonan said the statute violated Vegas' constitutional right to carry a gun for self-defense and threw the case out in September.
Circuit Judge Jeffrey A. Kremers reached a different conclusion Friday after Vegas asked for both guns back. Kremers said Vegas could reclaim the gun from the case Noonan threw out, but in the other shooting - which was never prosecuted - Kremers found Vegas was carrying the gun illegally and declined to return it.
"I am not prepared, nor am I inclined, to find the statute unconstitutional" in that case, Kremers said.
Vegas' attorney Craig Mastantuono said he may appeal and called the idea that Vegas couldn't carry a gun for self-protection "nonsensical" because of the danger of his job and the fact that he has been robbed four times.
"We have a constitutional amendment, and people's rights within that amendment are defined differently by both judges and prosecutors," Mastantuono said.
