Gonzales settles gun-carrying man’s lawsuit

• By BILL LODGE
• Advocate staff writer
• Published: Aug 31, 2008 - UPDATED: 12:05 a.m.

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Mark Marchiafava says he’s earned the right to wear his .357-caliber Magnum pistol in a hip holster in Gonzales.

And, he says at a local mall, city residents paid him to demonstrate that right.

“I wish the taxpayers of Gonzales knew just how much money it is,” the 55-year-old Marchiafava adds.

In January 2006, the longtime Baton Rouge resident was at the same mall, wearing the same pistol, when a Gonzales police officer asked him why he was carrying a gun.

Marchiafava says he told the officer that non-felons can legally carry firearms that are not concealed.

That exchange led to Marchiafava’s arrest on a count of illegal carrying of a weapon. The arrest led to an hours-long stay at the Ascension Parish Prison.

But the case later was dismissed, and Marchiafava’s bond and weapon were returned to him.

Marchiafava didn’t let the dispute fade away. He sued for violation of his constitutional right to bear arms. The city recently settled the case by paying Marchiafava an undisclosed amount of money.

“I can’t disclose any client confidences,” said Bradley C. Myers, a Baton Rouge attorney for the Gonzales Police Department. “The details are confidential, not the fact of the settlement.”

So why pay Marchiafava?

“It was just a business decision that everybody makes during a civil suit,” Myers said.

“There are risks in all litigation and costs to defend litigation,” Myers said, adding that city officials weighed those risks and costs before opting for a settlement.

Marchiafava won’t talk dollars and cents, either.