Posted on 05/18/2006 6:22:58 AM PDT by freepatriot32
Traders Sports, one of the biggest gun dealers in the state, hopes a hearing in U.S. District Court next week will keep them in business.
Traders has been under scrutiny for several years by the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms (ATF), which is trying to shut down the gun dealer. The ATF decided to revoke Traders gun permit on June 1. After an audit in 2003, the ATF claims that Traders can’t account for 1,767 weapons, and that guns sold at Traders turn up in crimes at an alarming rate.
ATF spokeswoman Marti McKee said she couldn’t comment on the hearing, which is coming up next Thursday, May 25 in San Francisco before Judge Vaughn Walker.
Traders’ owner Tony Cucchiara also declined to comment on the hearing, deferring questions to his lawyer, Malcolm Segal.
The gun shop claims the ATF’s figures don’t add up because of human error, filling out paperwork wrong. They also say the ATF is unfairly targeting the store and going beyond reasonable annual inspections.
“The law allows one inspection a year — that’s a law passed by Congress — and the ATF inspected twice in one year,” said Segal.
Segal said the ATF decided to close Traders after their own hearing in which they used records going back 30 years.
“The errors they claim are really human errors,” Segal said. “Any time there are thousands of transactions with serial numbers in dozens of digits, there is always bound to be human error.”
The ATF initially claimed in its audit that Traders couldn’t account for 7,477 weapons, but the number in the final account was reduced to 1,767. Customers going to Traders this week tended to be on the gun shop’s side.
“I don’t like what they’re doing because it’s a good store,” said Sonny Verde, who comes from Marin County to shop at Traders. “They should go after the criminals not the gun stores.”
Last week the U.S. Department of Justice filed papers saying that guns sold by Traders have been recovered in a crime at a rate of nearly one per day.
About one in every eight guns sold by Traders between 2003 and 2005 has wound up in a crime, the second highest number of guns traced to crimes of any dealer in the nation, according to the Department of Justice.
In 1994, Muckraker magazine featured a story on Traders, listing violations found by the ATF going back to 1970, including sales to people who couldn’t legally buy guns and “straw sales,” which is a purchase by a legal buyer who turns the gun over to someone who can’t legally buy a gun.
ping
ping
Is there even the remotest chance thaat the JBTs are right on this one case?
This one defys logic. If "Traders" doesn't have the records, how does the ATF know the guns were purchaced in his store? The dealer keeps the records. They are not forwarded to the ATF. As usual, the ATF is a cancor on Freedom.
My guess would be that the gun manufacturers track who they sell their guns to. If this store has bought 10,000 guns from the manufacturers and can only account for 8,700 of the guns it's sold, I'd say there's a problem.
What would happen to a car dealership that couldn't account for 1,700 cars that it sold? I think the BATF might be on the right side on this one.
Wouldn't they have receipts of what they bought from the manufacturers? It would be a simple matter of comparing the invoices from manufacturers to purchase paperwork, then adding in the current in-store inventory...
I don't think Bush is pro gun. He is a globalist and gun grabbing fits into their agenda. If he was pro gun rights the ATF would not be doing the things they are doing.
The ATF should be disbanded and the agents barred from any position in law enforcement.
they (the ATF) inspect your "bound book" in which all transactions must be recorded. As a small dealer selling only 50 to 75 guns a year I can attest that it is easy to make a error in the book. The ATF will go back to the manufacturer of a gun used in a crime and look to whom it was shipped. You had better have your I's dotted and your T's crossed as the ATF will not have mercy on you.
I bet the ATF can't account for the billions of tax dollars they have spent!
The problem is if you have an error in your books even a simple error you can find yourself sitting next to the perp who ended up with the gun in question fighting a prosecutor who has unlimited money to make the case you (the dealer) is the root of the crime.
Are there actual "books" or is there a computer program that can help correct errors, etc.?
I doubt it if there was a real problem with this gun dealer the atf wouldnt haveto go all the way back to 1970 to find transaction that may be bad and the store owner himself said the some of thethings the atf are pointing out are just paperwork errors like an mistyped serial number if the irs acted the same way the atf acts almost everyone would be in jail for some paperwork mistake if they went back through all the tax records for 20 or 30 years
no it is an actual book that must be filled out by hand. Every gun must be entered even if it is a repair that will take five minutes to fix.
This store can't account for almost 2 thousand guns. Seems a trifle strange. Are they arming terrorists, street gangs, both?
If Bush is not pro gun then 99% of Americans are not pro-gun. Being certifiably insane is not a necessary qualification for being Pro-gun.
BTW you don't even know what a "globalist" is.
That's just moronic. There's no reason why there can't be certified software available to do it. I can see gun stores scanning in a barcode on the box to enter the serial number of the firearm, then scanning in a driver's license for the customer information. Then re-enter by hand as a double-check.
It's been a number of years since I purchased a firearm, but you'd think the record keeping system would have at least kept up with technology.
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