“A Vermont “environmental” court judge has ordered that shooting range owner Daniel Banyai be arrested and held in state prison until he or the town he’s been feuding with for years over zoning issues – Pawlet, Vermont, population 1,386 – destroy all the structures on his private range…
Banyai and Pawlet town officials have been feuding over his 30-acre range, which Banyai calls Slate Ridge since he purchased the property in July 2013. Initially, his neighbors complained about the noise. Town officials said Banyai built structures on his land without applying for the proper zoning permits…
After their initial zoning efforts failed, they sued Banyai in Vermont’s environmental court, which ordered Banyai to remove the unpermitted structures and earthen berms within 135 days. Banyai ignored the ruling, and in February the environmental court held Banyai in contempt of court. He has been racking up civil fines at the rate of $200 per day ever since… after municipal and environmental laws failed, Pawlet officials approached Vermont State Senator Phillip Baruth for help. He quickly sponsored a bill making it a felony to operate a ‘paramilitary training camp’ within the state.
Baruth, a liberal Democrat from Burlington, admitted he introduced the bill after Pawlet officials complained there was no state law that they could use to force Banyai to shutter his private range on his private property…
Banyai had no choice but to file a federal civil rights lawsuit, which alleges violations of his Second Amendment and Fourteenth Amendment rights. The defendants include the Town of Pawlet, Judge Thomas S. Durkin and 20 unnamed defendants identified as John and Jane Does, because their identities are not known. “
Analyst Comment: Banyai claims on his GiveSendGo page that he obtained a permit for the structures and that’s when city officials pursued environmental violations to shut down his range. Link to the GiveSendGo below.