Staying in business even after repeatedly selling weapons to criminals isn’t difficult for gun stores. An investigation by the Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel found dozens of stores across the country that avoided being shut down by federal regulators by turning over licenses to relatives, thus allowing the business to continue as usual.

 

“The newspaper identified more than 50 stores in 20 states over the past six years where such a move was made, wiping the operation’s slate clean,” according to the Journal-Sentinel. It also discovered 34 other stores where a revoked license holder maintained connections to the business that they no longer officially operate.

 

The Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF) reportedly inspects less than 20% of the 61,822 federally-licensed firearms dealers in the U.S. each year, and it attempts to close barely 1% of them. Only half of the time does ATF succeed in revoking a license.

-Noel Brinkerhoff

 

Ineffective Rules Let Gun Stores Endure (by John Diedrich and Ben Poston, Journal Sentinel)