BLOOMBERG CHARGED WITH GUN CRIME:

A Georgia gun dealer that Mayor Bloomberg sued as part of his effort to get firearms off the city’s streets hit the mayor with a lawsuit of his own yesterday, saying Mr. Bloomberg slandered his business and broke federal law.

Adventure Outdoors Inc., which is being represented by a former Republican congressman of Georgia, Bob Barr, filed a $400 million lawsuit in Superior Court of Cobb County.

The business was one of 15 so-called rogue dealers in five states that Mr. Bloomberg sued two months ago after an undercover sting operation. The 13-page complaint filed yesterday said that Mr. Bloomberg and several others in his administration smeared the dealer’s reputation and that its undercover investigators lied on federal Bureau of Alcohol, Firearms, and Tobacco forms.

Observers say the legal action could be the first in a string of lawsuits against the city in connection with the mayor’s lawsuit.

I’m sure the Cobb County jury will be appropriately sympathetic to Mayor Bloomberg’s civic-minded goals. And hey, if he loses he can just pay ’em off with the money from his own lawsuit against tobacco wholesalers. Even better, lawyers are getting a cut of all this action!