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Not at work, not in the kitchen, not even at a restaurant.

Last week, the 54-year-old Omaha man filed a complaint in U.S. District Court challenging the constitutionality of the Nebraska law that prevents convicted felons or anyone with an arrest warrant or who has violated a protection order or been convicted of a misdemeanor crime of domestic violence within the past seven years from possessing deadly weapons.

In it, Muhannad's attorney, Travis Penn, asked a federal judge to stop the state from enforcing the statute and to direct Nebraska Attorney General Doug Peterson to take steps to ensure the effects of the statute are eliminated.

Penn said the laws "penalize a haphazard, open-ended list of conduct and lack any discernible method for an average citizen to determine whether one has acted in conformity to the law, rending them unconstitutionally vague and over broad."

He said his client started Muhannad Halal Meats, slaughtering and packing animals in the manner permitted by Islamic dietary law, in 2006.

Muhannad stopped about five years later after learning about the state law that bars him from possessing knives and other deadly weapons because he's a felon stemming from 1980s convictions on providing false information to federal officials and a gun charge.

Around 2011, he went to jail and later prison on false imprisonment charges. Muhannad got out in January.

Now, he's arguing not only that the law is too broad and violates his Second Amendment right to bear arms, but also that it is a burden on his religious exercise.

Penn said Tuesday part of the problem is people aren't really sure what they can and can't do under the law, and it doesn't take into account all the legitimate uses for knives.

"It's a little bit too much big brother that a basic tool of human existence is totally banned for lifetime for people," he said.

Spike Eickholt, a lobbyist for the Nebraska Criminal Defense Attorneys Association, said Wednesday that the group already has been talking about asking a state senator to introduce a bill to fix the statutes defining all knives over 3½ inches as deadly weapons in response to a state Supreme Court opinion May 6.

In that case, defense attorney Jerry Soucie argued that for Bao Nguyen of Lincoln to be found guilty of carrying a concealed weapon for the knife found in a sun visor of the car he was driving the state had to prove he had deadly intent.

But the court found otherwise.

In the opinion, Justice John Wright wrote that the court declined to comment on the rationale behind defining all knives with blades longer than 3½ inches as a deadly weapon per se.

"That is the province of the Legislature," he said.

State statute defines a knife as "any dagger, dirk, knife or stiletto with a blade over 3½ inches in length or any other dangerous instrument capable of inflicting cutting, stabbing or tearing wounds."

The opinion left attorneys abuzz with scenarios that could lead to charges.

Eickholt said felons who carry utility knives for construction work or use knives at meatpacking jobs, even who wash silverware at a restaurant or eat with a steak knife all technically are violating the law.

He called it another obstacle felons have to face in getting their lives back on track.

Suzanne Gage, a spokeswoman with the attorney general's office, declined to comment on the lawsuit or the law in general, saying in an email Wednesday that they believe the Supreme Court decision "speaks for itself."

But prosecutors in general have taken the position that it comes down to a matter of discretion, and they won't charge cases like that.

Eickholt said that puts police in a bad spot.

"The problem is the Legislature says what's a crime and what's not, or the courts do," he said. "It's the not the prosecutor's call to say."

Eickholt said it's in everyone's best interest to do something to fix it, but they're still looking at what could be done. One option would be to add criminal intent to the statute.

"The uncertainty is what bothers us, and I think it ought to be a concern for policymakers as well," he said.