The owner of Nova Armory, a gun store just outside Washington, D.C., that opened last month—despite protests, an online petition urging its landlord to deny the gun store a lease, and even pressure from elected officials—has filed a lawsuit for $2.1 million in lost revenue and damages against 64 people, including seven Virginia state legislators, claiming they conspired to quash the business and citing online, email and telephone harassment, even a mailed death threat against the owner’s 16-year-old daughter.
Attorney Daniel Hawes, who represents Broadstone Security, which does business as Nova Armory, told the Washington Post, “People generally don’t like it if you try to destroy their business. That’s malicious behavior.” Worse, the harassment has continued, even after the store opened, Hawes said, with someone following and photographing the cars and license plates of customers, “all sorts of creepy stuff by people with a neurotic obsession with firearms.”