No good deed goes unpunished.
That phrase feels especially appropriate after what happened to 19-year-old Martinez Long at Fairlane Town Center in Dearborn, Michigan. On July 3, 2026, what began as an altercation inside the mall turned deadly. According to the City of Dearborn, Cameron Watkins and Keonte Seaborn, both 19, produced weapons during the initial confrontation. Watkins obtained a handgun from another person’s purse and shot Seaborn, killing him. But Watkins didn’t stop there.
Authorities say Watkins continued firing recklessly inside the public mall and shot another person during a struggle, causing a non-life-threatening injury. Then Martinez Long acted. Long drew the handgun he was carrying and shot Watkins, killing him and ending the threat. After investigating, prosecutors reached the conclusion that Long’s actions were carried out in defense of himself and others and he was not prosecuted for killing Watkins.
In other words, the government agreed that when Long pulled the trigger, he was legally justified in doing so, but the Dearborn prosecutors charged him anyway.
Long was carrying his handgun concealed without a Michigan Concealed Pistol License. He was charged with carrying a concealed weapon and ultimately sentenced to two years of probation. As part of that probation, FOX 2 Detroit reported that Long cannot possess guns or ammunition, must undergo cognitive behavioral therapy and must take court-offered handgun safety classes. Because he was sentenced under Michigan’s Holmes Youthful Trainee Act, his record can be cleared if he successfully completes probation. Long reportedly had no previous criminal record.
At sentencing, the judge acknowledged that Long acted in self-defense or defense of others but questioned why he had brought a gun into the mall in the first place.There is an uncomfortable irony in that question. We know exactly why having that firearm mattered that day; a man had already been killed, and another person had been shot. Long was armed and because of that he stopped what could have been a horrific tragedy.
While we will never know how many additional people might have been injured or killed had Long not intervened, what we do know is that Long stopped Watkins before he killed countless innocent people. So why was Long convicted despite being a hero?
Interestingly, he was not convicted simply because he was 19 and possessed a handgun. Surprisingly, Michigan does not categorically prohibit a 19-year-old from possessing a handgun. The problem is that he was concealed carrying.
Michigan requires an applicant for a Concealed Pistol License to be at least 21 years old. That means that at 19, Long could not have obtained the Michigan license that would ordinarily have authorized him to carry that handgun concealed. That raises a legitimate question: if an adult is legally permitted to possess a handgun, why should that same adult be categorically prevented by age from obtaining the license necessary to carry it concealed for self-defense? Long’s case makes that question impossible to dismiss as merely hypothetical.
The 19-year-old whom Michigan considered too young to receive a CPL was apparently old enough, and capable enough, to recognize a deadly threat and use his firearm in a manner prosecutors concluded was legally justified. This brings up the larger problem with permit-based restrictions. As we all know, someone willing to commit murder is already willing to violate the law. A person intent on shooting someone inside a shopping mall is unlikely to stop and ask whether his firearm possession, method of carry or licensing status complies with every provision of state law. Fact is, the people most affected by those requirements are necessarily the people who care whether they’re breaking the law. But we should distinguish between laws targeting violent conduct and laws that criminalize otherwise peaceful conduct involving a firearm with Martinez Long providing a striking example.
Prosecutors determined that his use of the firearm was justified. Yet his possession of that same firearm in a concealed manner made him a criminal defendant. And this is why national constitutional carry matters and why the right to bear arms should not depend upon a patchwork of state licensing schemes.
Today, crossing a state line can dramatically change the laws governing how an otherwise lawful gun owner may carry a firearm. Even Michigan State Police warns CPL holders that they are responsible for complying with the laws of whatever state they enter. A federal proposal currently before Congress takes a somewhat narrower approach than true nationwide permit-less carry. H.R. 38, the Constitutional Concealed Carry Reciprocity Act of 2025, would generally establish nationwide reciprocity for people who have a qualifying state permit or are entitled to carry concealed in their state of residence.
But Long’s case raises an even broader policy question: should an otherwise lawful adult need government permission at all before exercising the right to carry a handgun for self-defense? Clearly Long’s case shows the answer is no. The Second Amendment does not stop at the border between two states. And the ability to defend your life should not depend on whether you remembered that a neighboring state has different licensing requirements. Nor should an otherwise lawful 18, 19 or 20-year-old automatically be denied the ability to carry concealed simply because he or she hasn’t reached the magical government selected age of 21.
Truth is, when an otherwise lawful citizen uses a firearm in legally justified defense of himself or others, we should be extremely reluctant to turn around and prosecute him because he lacked a government-issued piece of plastic authorizing the way he carried it.Martinez Long didn’t start the confrontation. Prosecutors determined his shooting was justified. He stopped a man who had already killed one person, wounded another and was reportedly continuing to fire inside a crowded mall, and Long still walked into a courtroom as a defendant.
We should punish people who use firearms to commit violent crimes, not the people who use them to stop one. If there was ever a case that should force Americans to reconsider permit requirements, age restrictions on concealed carry and the need for nationwide protection of the right to bear arms, Martinez Long’s is it.
Editor’s Note: The radical Left will stop at nothing to enact their extreme gun control agenda and strip us of our Second Amendment rights.
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