Posted on 12/14/2011 7:29:53 PM PST by neverdem
Listings websites "really needs to clean up its act," sez Hizzoner
The notorious “gun show loophole” that gives criminals and maniacs easy access to firearms has gone online.
Undercover investigators for the city found thousands of guns - including one just like the 9mm Ruger that killed Officer Peter Figoski on Monday - being sold online by private peddlers who don’t have to perform background checks on buyers.
Not only did investigators
find it a breeze to buy pistols and assault rifles with no questions asked, but 77 of 125 sellers in 14 states agreed to complete the sale even after the buyer said he couldn’t pass a background check.
At a City Hall press conference, Mayor Bloomberg played tape after tape of drawling Southern gun dealers laughing - a few nervously, most with amusement - when the undercover buyer said he couldn’t have passed a background check.
“I probably couldn’t either!” said a cackling seller in Arizona who was hawking the 9mm Ruger handgun for $500.
Background checks are designed to keep felons and the mentally ill from buying guns.
“Unscrupulous online gun sales pose a significant threat to public safety,” Mayor Bloomberg said Wednesday as he unveiled a report titled ‘Point, Click, Fire: An Investigation of Illegal Online Gun Sales.’
Police Commissioner Ray Kelly said, “I-95 is a very effective way of getting guns into the city. We don’t need an electronic highway to make it easier.”
The city report said a significant portion of American weapons sales have moved from parking lot gun shows to the Internet.
Private sellers are often presumed to be hobbyists making only occasional sales, but they actually carry out about 40% of all U.S. gun sales, the report said.
City investigators found more than 25,000 guns for sale on 10 websites alone.
“It is clear that the market is significant – and that many of these sales are largely unregulated and undocumented,” the report concluded.
Opponents of gun control have successfully kept private sellers exempt from federal laws governing licensed firearms dealers: they don’t have to keep sales records, report multiple purchases or perform background checks.
But they are legally barred from selling to anyone they “have reasonable cause to believe” is a felon, fugitive or fruitcake.
The city found the shadiest gun sellers on Craigslist, where 14 of 17 failed the “integrity test” and agreed to sell to someone who said he couldn’t buy a gun from a licensed dealer.
“Craigslist really needs to clean up its act,” Bloomberg said.
The lightly-moderated listings site officially prohibits firearms listings but investigators found 1,792 guns for sale over three months, the report said.
Armslist.com had 13,660.
“This investigation for the first time takes a snapshot of this new online gun market, and unfortunately it's not a pretty picture,” said John Feinblatt, the mayor’s chief policy adviser.
Bloomberg called on Congress to pass legislation introduced after the January Tucson massacre that would close the loophole.
“Federal law should require a background check for every gun sale - not just those involving licensed dealers,” Bloomberg said.
Kelly said the 1963 revelation that Lee Harvey Oswald bought his rifle through the mail, an outcry led to the banning of gun sales through the mail.
“We shouldn't have to wait for the assassination of a president or the killing of a police officer to dismantle a conduit bringing illicit guns into the city,” he said.
Just for clarity. I don’t own one gun myself. Not a single one:)
But here in Ill-ear-noise it's moot. A felon is a felon, except *maybe* if you know Jesse Jackass Sr. Then laws don't seem to apply to certain people.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.