As we’ve reported, the civilian disarmament industrial complex is preparing to mount a major assault on gun dealers. Sorry “bad apple” gun dealers. This on the heels of the recently introduced Gun Dealer Accountability Act, a piece of legislation that defines “bad apple gun dealers” as “federal firearms licensees who have transferred a firearm unlawfully or had 10 or more crime guns traced back to them in the preceding 2 years.” As you may have guessed, the “unlawfully” bit would make what’s already a crime more criminal. As for the “10 or more crime guns” stipulation, that’s self-evident, isn’t it? Not really . . .
The Act defines “crime guns” as “guns used in crimes.” In practice, the ATF defines any illegally possessed firearm as a gun used in a crime (illegal possession). If the ATF or other law enforcement agency recovers a stolen gun – even without a criminal attached – it’s a crime gun (theft). If the police bust someone with ten illegally obtained or possessed guns, all of them are counted individually as “crime guns.” There is no time limit on recovery time; a “crime gun” could be a firearm stolen decades earlier.
Bottom line: many if not most if not all gun stores will fall afoul of the “10 or more crime guns” caveat simply by force of numbers. If a gun store sells a thousand guns in a year, the police would only have to trace one percent of “crime guns” to the dealer to green light the ATF’s “extra” attention. [Note: my relatively small Austin gun dealer – Sportsman’s Finest – sells over a thousand guns a year.]
The ATF would be able to subject these “bad apple” gun dealers to “temporarily greater scrutiny.” Strangely, the Act fails to define “temporarily.” So we’re talking an indeterminate number of unannounced inspections at the gun stores under review, including a physical inventory of the dealer’s firearms, for an indeterminate amount of time.
Notice I used an example of a gun store selling a thousand guns in one year where law enforcement classifies one percent of guns sold as “crime guns.” If a gun store sold two thousand guns in two years – the period specified by the Act – they’d have the ATF up their you-know-what if one half of one-percent of their sales were classified as “crime guns.”
What are the odds? No odds. It’s a certainty. Which is, of course, the idea: hassling gun dealers out of existence.
The Act is highly discriminatory. If a legal business – any legal business – sells a legal product legally, why should they be held accountable for a legal purchaser’s illegal use of their legally purchased product? Would the Texas Department of Motor Vehicles swoop down on a car dealer if ten drivers used the dealer’s car while driving drunk (a crime) over two years of sales? Would a stolen car be considered a “crime car”?
How can anyone justify this inherently discriminatory legislation? trblive.com has the answer:
PA State Sen. Daylin Leach, D-Montgomery County, welcomed the bill and said more scrutiny is needed.
He has led several efforts in Pennsylvania to reduce gun violence. If 10 crime guns have been traced to a single dealer within two years, that’s “more than bad luck,” he said.
“These are people who at the very least should be looked into further,” Leach said. “Straw purchasers are responsible for much of the slaughter we see on our streets.”
Gun dealers are the people who need more scrutiny? How about looking into the straw purchasers? Speaking of which, how many times do law enforcement agencies follow-up on buyers who lie on the FBI background check form (a crime)? politifact.com tells us that “of 80,000 people who were denied a firearm in 2012 due to a failed background check, only 44 were prosecuted.” Not all successfully, either.
There is but one silver lining: Congress has kept the ATF’s budget from expanding. Although Congress blessed the ATF with $1.18b for its annual operating expenses (2014), it employs “just” 780 industry operations investigators. There are approximately 140,000 licensed gun dealers in the US. In short, the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives doesn’t have nearly enough manpower to enforce the Act.
The Republican-led Congress is unlikely to increase the ATF’s funding or let the Act pass out of committee. But its introduction and promotion shows you the level to which the anti-gun rights movement will stoop to disarm and destroy Americans’ natural, civil and Constitutionally protected right to keep and bear arms. In case you didn’t know.
Any gun shop conveniently located in or near our high-crime, gang-infested urban utopias is bound to see a lot of straw buyers operating for the thugs. It’s a geographic reality. To punish those stores because of where they’re located would be unfair, to say the least.
On the other hand I’d love to see some straw buyers get time.
“…the right of the people to keep and bear arms, shall not be infringed.”
Nothing there about straw buyers, I’ve checked many times. Also nothing there about who the government may decide may not purchase/own/keep/bear arms.
The punishment is not related to some government wet dream of being able to deny a person’s natural, civil and Constitutionally protected right to keep and bear arms, it should be related to what that person DOES with the arms. If that action or activity is criminal (not the possession of the weapon) then the so-called straw buyer, or anyone who provided the weapon used in the crime, if it can be shown that they had reason to believe that was the intended use of the weapon, should be tried as an accomplice, including the charge of felony murder if appropriate. Anything else would be unconstitutional.
+1
First Amendment:
“Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.”
Nothing in there about libel is there? Yet it is illegal. “Freedom of speech” isn’t unlimited.
We should have no problem with REASONABLE limitations on our Second Amendment rights (anything beyond what we have now is UNREASONABLE).
That said, the above bill is a travesty and Gwen Moore of WI should be ashamed for having written/sponsored it.
@Gopher Libel is not freedom of speech, it is an illegal use of speech, speech used to harm. Libel is analogous to injuring another with a firearm. We should not be free to shoot whoever we want (that’s called being a psychopath) but everyone SHOULD be free to own whatever they want.
Only the ATF should be allowed to distribute guns to criminals.
Fast and Furious is supposed to be long forgotten by now. Haven’t you undergone your mandatory TV re-education courses lately????
🙂
We need a Clinton or a Bush to fix the mess Obama made fixing Bushes mess that Clinton began fixing Bushes mess. Whew.
On the Democrat side, O’Malley has pledged to introduce similar legislation or act by executive fiat, if elected President. Unlikely, I know.
Under this proposal, if a legally-sold gun is subsequently stolen and ten years later it’s used in a crime, it’s a crime gun and counts against the dealer’s allotted ten crime guns.
There is a special place in hell reserved for all Democrats. I think it’s called New Jersey.
And consider how antis like to stretch definitions when convenient (ie suicide = gun violence) and legally sold firearm stolen from the legal owner will be counted as well even though the gun shop did everything right and has nothing to do with the crimes.
I loved that line in the video earlier today:
Suicide/Homicide – “If doing something to yourself was the same as doing it to someone else then I was a real stud in middle school.,”
Well, suicide is illegal in most states, and has to medically supervised in others, so I guess crime gun would work.
I wonder how that would get handled in states where adultery is illegal – would cc’ing while cheating make that a crime gun?
Only if you had 11 rounds in the magazine in a 10 round state!
Is it a crime to fail a back ground check? Is it a crime to try and buy a gun if you’ve failed to pass a background check, or is it a crime to actually complete the purchase? Is it a crime to try and buy a gun if you know you won’t pass a background check?
My guess, not being familiar enough with the law regarding this is, no. That you could only be prosecuted for either lying in an attempt to purchase or for your answers. I’m even less sure how it would work for a felon.
In this state, once you’re off paper for ten(10) years, your rights are automatically restored, including 2A. So answering on the form, “Have you ever been convicted of a felony?” Would be yes, but you are instructed by local PD and Sheriff to answer no.
Hi Jon, I’m curious to know more about this…can you give me a CO statute or a link to further info?
@Cincinattus
http://www.lexisnexis.com/hottopics/colorado/?app=00075&view=full&interface=1&docinfo=off&searchtype=get&search=C.R.S.+18-12-108
Jon what you cited there just says that possession of a gun is a class 6 felony if they’ve been clean for at least 10 years, or a class 5 felony if they haven’t (they being someone who has been convicted of a felony, conspiracy to commit a felony, or attempt to commit a felony).
Nothing in that says that they are allow to buy (or own) a gun after 10 years. In fact, it seems to indicate the opposite: after 10 years they are still not allowed to own a gun, it is just a lesser (but still felony) crime. Perhaps somewhere else?
I believe that the supposed crime regarding the unconstitutional NICS system is to perjure yourself by knowingly answering the questions untruthfully in an attempt to purchase a weapon the government has decided (unconstitutionally) that you are not allowed to keep or bear, or to claim the purchase is for yourself when the intended owner of the gun is some other supposed unqualified person (straw purchase).
If the Supreme Court was on our side, it’s possible we might eventually see someone take a law like this to court. Some of the garbage proposed in these laws is very close to unconstitutional.
The garbage proposed in these laws is unconstitutional.
FIFY.
“He has led several efforts in Pennsylvania to reduce gun violence…”
Citation needed. Wait, that would be journalism…
Every time someone misuses food or, gulp- commits a crime with it, are we going to hold supermarkets responsible under a Grocers’ Accountability Act??
Well, now…
I suppose new car dealers who sell cars used in DWI fatalities should be held accountable for drunk drivers.
Unless I’m missing something here…
It the firearm was purchased legally from the dealer and the buyer passed the NICS check (or NICS failed to respond within the legal time frame) than how is the dealer responsible? This is like making the local gas station responsible for arson because the arsonist bought gas in a can from them. Dealers are in business to sell, if the almighty BATFE tells me I can legally sell a person a firearm, I’m damn well going to. WASN’T THAT THE WHOLE IDEA BEHIND BACKGROUND CHECKS????????????
The grabbers always ask “Why is your answer to violent crime always more guns?!!!” To which I answer “Because your answer to “Why haven’t gun control laws reduced violent crime?” is “Because we need more laws!””
There is a Republican majority in the House and the Senate.
This bill is a PR stunt that will go nowhere.
I hope but I bought my first gun at Chuck’s Gun Shop/Riverdale,IL…Jesse J,Fadder pfegma and Brady bunch favorite whipping boy. Very close proximity to Chiraq-vast majority of customers are black-and it’s an awful gang infested town. Other than leaving town I know they’ll get straw buyers. And they run an above board,strict shop and close on Sunday ’cause they go to church. That’s the true goal-disarm good people.
I propose an amendment.
With MVA and DUI morbidity and mortality dwarfing gun related statistics, something needs to be done about automobile violence – for the children. I propose that the bad apple car dealerships be subject to the same measures.
In fact, what about liquor stores? With the liver illness alone those bad apple package stores should be closed.
Perhaps a nation wide ban on alcohol sales!
Wait.
That reminds me of something.
They can introduce all they like. It will never gets out if committee.
Don’t let one representative speak for the whole state of Pa.
This wont work anyhow, it wold mean places like walmart, dicks, cabelas, cheaper than dirt, etc… would all be out of business, and they have money, and money buys politics.
IRS style harassment anyone?
A little “inside” info here: ATF (at least in my locality) has been advocating that a “trace” be initiated on ANY firearm that law enforcement comes in contact with. Get stopped for speeding? Got a firearm in your vehicle? The Officer runs the serial number to make sure it isn’t stolen and bingo the “Firearms Task Force” initiates a trace. I don’t believe this is a written policy, mind you, but it helps the ATF justify it’s existence buy the number of traces it generates through it’s West Virginia facility and puts many honest law abiding FFL’s on the ATF’s “Time to Crime” list. Another shining example of Bureaucrats Gone Wild.
Gun control advocate’s definition of “bad apple gun dealer”: anyone who sells guns to the public.