Thursday, January 12, 2012

Scofflaw Gun Dealers

This is over a year old, but it still applies, the problem continues, as the recent post from MikeB illustrated.  We have real rot in the FFL process, and we need to correct it.

from the WaPo:

Gun dealers often stay in business with new licenses after ATF shuts them down

By David S. Fallis
Washington Post Staff Writer 
About a hundred times a year, regulators strip gun dealers of their licenses for violations of federal law, an extreme step taken only when repeated infractions are deemed a threat to public safety.
But a year-long Washington Post investigation documented about 60 cases since 2003 in which the businesses stayed open, often re-licensed through relatives, employees, associates or newly formed companies.
"We'll just have to play musical licenses," the owner of the Highland Gun Barn in Michigan said when a federal inspector served him with a final notice to surrender his license.
A California sports shop had its license revoked after inspectors from the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives said the 87-year-old owner's repeated violations of gun laws showed she was unable to run a gun business. Before she forfeited her license, the woman's son obtained a permit to sell guns at the same shop. He said he would be at the shop two days a week and that his mother would "exclusively direct all day-to-day business."
A Maryland gun store that ATF said lost track of weapons and failed to do background checks was forced to surrender its license after the owner lost a court battle. Six months later, ATF issued the dealer's wife a license at his old shop in Fallston, Md.
A Georgia gun dealer had its license revoked after ATF said it could not account for hundreds of guns. The dealer's daughter and son-in-law secured their own license to keep the business going.
It is all legal.
"This is the way Congress wrote the law," said James Zammillo, who was with ATF for four decades and served as deputy assistant director of industry operations before retiring this year. "The spirit of the law is that unless the applicant is prohibited, you have to issue a license. There is no discretion." 
Because of the secrecy Congress imposed on federal gun records in 2003, the details of inspection violations are typically redacted from public records unless a case ends up in court. When revocations are pursued, the problems can include sales done without background checks, improperly completed forms or missing weapons, one of ATF's chief concerns.
Revoking a gun dealer's license is ATF's most aggressive enforcement action short of criminal prosecution. It is a rare last resort for less than one-quarter of 1 percent of dealers annually. It often follows years of warnings for serious violations and sometimes leads to years of appeals. Although gun dealers complain that ATF harps on clerical errors, the agency says it revokes licenses only when dealers continually fail to comply with gun laws and the violations threaten public safety.
The Post investigation is the first to document the extent of the re-licensing practice, in which about 7 percent of the gun merchants that had licenses revoked continued to operate.
Several merchants involved in the re-licensings told The Post it was the only way to keep their family businesses going.
And yet...........the progunners wouldn't change a thing, except to make it easier for bad, prohibited people who use firearms to harm other people, innocent people.

6 comments:

  1. I would change a lot. It's somewhat offensive that a small business has to have any kind of licensing, but certainly, a gun dealer shouldn't have to have any more licenses than a taco stand.

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  2. Well it seems to me that if we regulate food preparation businesses with reasonable measures to minimize the distribution of food products that will make the population ill, and if we regulate chemical businesses with reasonable measures to make sure they don't release chemicals into the environment that will make the population ill, it would be consistent to regulate firearms dealers with reasonable regulations to avoid "distributing" firearms into the population that would make the public "ill". So at first thought I don't object to reasonable regulations on firearms dealers.

    Maybe a firearms dealer license has to be tied to both a person and a location? Lose the license and no one can have a new license at the old location? And the original license holder cannot have a new license for any location.

    While we shouldn't stop trying to uphold both the letter and spirit of the law, this illustrates how criminals will always find ways to obtain anything they want short of a nuclear bomb. And given how relatively easy it is to simply make a gun yourself, I don't see how any efforts to eliminate criminal possession of firearms will ever be very effective.

    It's a classic example of, "It looks great on paper," but in the real world it isn't very effective. It's like the movie Back to School. There is a college class assignment where the students have to make a business model for some fictional business project. The professor is really pleased with one student's proposal until Rodney Dangerfield points out critically,
    "First of all, you have to grease the local politicians for the sudden zoning problems that always come up. Then there's the kickbacks to the carpenters. And if you plan on using any cement in this building. I'm sure the teamsters would like to have a little chat with you, and that will cost you."

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  3. "It's somewhat offensive that a small business has to have any kind of licensing, but certainly, a gun dealer shouldn't have to have any more licenses than a taco stand."

    January 12, 2012 6:39 PM"

    And Greg Camp, legal scholar that he is, knows what licenses are required to sell arms and to sell tacos. Tell me, genius, what are those licenses, what are the fees and what are the penalties for violating the statutes that those licenses are issued under?


    "It's a classic example of, "It looks great on paper," but in the real world it isn't very effective."

    Bullshit.

    When laws are ineffective it is because they are not enforced or when those who break them are caught and are not punished in any meaningful way. Make the penalty for selling a gun used in a crime, by a dealer who violated the law in so doing, a crime of accessory before the fact and a whole lot of assholes would pucker up in a hurry.

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  4. Democommie,

    I said we should still try.

    What I pointed out is to realize that there will be limited effectiveness.

    How can you say, "Things will be different ..." Why will things be any different? Why will some new laws be enforced any better than they are now? Why have laws and punishment hardly dented the illegal drug activities?

    I will say it again. We can certainly try. We also have to realize that for several reasons whatever it is you want to implement is not going to be anywhere near as effective as you think. If you still disagree, then answer my questions above. And while you're at it, tell me why government will function any better than it does now.

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  5. Capn Crunch made the most sensible statement I've ever heard from a pro-gun guy.

    "Maybe a firearms dealer license has to be tied to both a person and a location? Lose the license and no one can have a new license at the old location? And the original license holder cannot have a new license for any location."

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  6. "How can you say, "Things will be different ..." Why will things be any different? Why will some new laws be enforced any better than they are now? Why have laws and punishment hardly dented the illegal drug activities?"

    Where did I say, "things will be different"?

    The reason why most people obey laws that they think are stupid is because the penalty for breaking them is not one they want to pay.

    I note that, once again, Greg Camp is too busy to defend his idiotic assertions. Not a surprise.

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