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He sold illegal AR-15s. Feds agreed to let him go free to avoid hurting gun control efforts
CNN ^ | 11/11/19 | Scott Glover

Posted on 10/12/2019 11:07:34 AM PDT by Yo-Yo

(CNN)For more than a year, Joseph Roh illegally manufactured AR-15-style rifles in a warehouse south of Los Angeles.

His customers, more than two dozen of whom were legally prohibited from possessing a firearm, could push a button, pull a lever, and walk away a short time later with a fully assembled, untraceable semi-automatic weapon for about $1,000, according to court records.

Roh continued his black-market operation despite being warned in person by agents from the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives that he was breaking the law.

But five years after raiding his business and indicting him, federal authorities quietly cut a deal with Roh earlier this year and agreed to drop the charges.

Why?

The judge in the case had issued a tentative order that, in the eyes of prosecutors, threatened to upend the decades-old Gun Control Act and "seriously undermine the ATF's ability to trace and regulate firearms nationwide."

A case once touted by prosecutors as a crackdown on an illicit firearms factory was suddenly seen as having the potential to pave the way to unfettered access to one of the most demonized guns in America.

Federal authorities preferred to let Roh go free rather than have the ruling become final and potentially create case law that could have a crippling effect on the enforcement of gun laws, several sources familiar with the matter told CNN. Each requested anonymity due to the sensitive nature of the case and its possible implications.

(Excerpt) Read more at cnn.com ...


TOPICS: Crime/Corruption; Culture/Society; News/Current Events
KEYWORDS: ar15; atf; banglist; california
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It's a long read, but the heart of the matter is this from the article:

Manufacturers must stamp it with a serial number and licensed dealers are required to conduct background checks on prospective buyers. The restrictions are intended, in part, to keep felons and other people prohibited from possessing firearms from acquiring them piece by piece.

AR-15s, however, do not have a single receiver that meets that definition. They have both an upper and lower receiver — two parts as opposed to the single part described in the law.

At issue in Roh's case was whether the law could fairly be interpreted to apply to just the lower receiver of the AR-15, as the ATF has been doing for decades.

To rule otherwise "would sweep aside more than 50 years of the ATF's regulation of AR-15s and other semiautomatic firearms," prosecutors wrote prior to the judge's order.

Personally, I think the judge's logic was flawed. The legislation says a receiver is "that part of a firearm which provides housing for the hammer, bolt or breechblock, and firing mechanism, and which is usually threaded at its forward portion to receive the barrel."

It doesn't say "must be threaded to receive the barrel," it just says "usually." The AR-15 lower receiver (and the frame of the 1911 for that matter,) does house the hammer and the firing mechanism. They just aren't threaded to receive a barrel.

By this judge's interpretation, just about every semi-automatic handgun ever made also has no receiver, since the vast majority do not even have barrels that thread onto anything. They are captive within the slide by locking surfaces.

1 posted on 10/12/2019 11:07:34 AM PDT by Yo-Yo
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To: Yo-Yo

He sold 80% lower receivers and let them use the tooling to finish them.


2 posted on 10/12/2019 11:10:55 AM PDT by E. Pluribus Unum (We cannot spare this man. He fights.)
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To: Yo-Yo

Yeah. And Eric Holder was probably his biggest customer.


3 posted on 10/12/2019 11:13:19 AM PDT by Texas Eagle (If it wasn't for double-standards, Liberals would have no standards at all -- Texas Eagle)
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To: Yo-Yo

Nice summary. Thanks.


4 posted on 10/12/2019 11:16:30 AM PDT by Magnum44 (My comprehensive terrorism plan: Hunt them down and kill them.)
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To: Yo-Yo
Roh continued his black-market operation despite being warned in person by agents from the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives that he was breaking the law.

A question from the back of the FEMA re-education camp?

Yes, thank you. Uhhhhh, why didn't they just arrest him? I'll take my answer over the loudspeakers as I lead myself to the de-lousing showers.

5 posted on 10/12/2019 11:18:24 AM PDT by Texas Eagle (If it wasn't for double-standards, Liberals would have no standards at all -- Texas Eagle)
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To: Yo-Yo

Personally I think the judges logic is right on the money.

The ATF has been bastardizing the definitions for decades in favor of more control.


6 posted on 10/12/2019 11:18:41 AM PDT by riverrunner ( o the public,)
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To: E. Pluribus Unum
He sold 80% lower receivers and let them use the tooling to finish them.

He also assembled the finished receivers into fully functional ARs and charged $1,000. He was convicted of that by the judge, but the conviction has been set aside in the plea deal to prevent the lower receiver ruling from becoming a permanent part of the judicial record.

7 posted on 10/12/2019 11:35:48 AM PDT by Yo-Yo ( is the /sarc tag really necessary?)
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To: riverrunner

I took it another way. Strange how we can all look at the same thing, and interpret what we see so differently. You are right in that “The ATF has been bastardizing the definitions for decades in favor of more control”, but I saw it as another good reason for less government in that overall this decision protects BIG government, and doesn’t help protect the citizenry one iota as the judge literally swapped our safety to protect BIG government gun control.


8 posted on 10/12/2019 11:44:40 AM PDT by rockinqsranch ("Democratic" party sold out to the ICP. It is now the Communist Party USA.)
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To: Yo-Yo
I think the key point in this case is whether any person has a legal duty to prevent another person from making a firearm.

I don't think our Founders would agree that the Second Amendment has an exception involving persons that the government has decided do not have a right to keep and bear arms.

The complication becomes even more evident when you consider the limits of the duty. CNN shows the bill of sale for an "80% lower" sold to a person who may later have killed people. The bill of sale basically describes the sale of a piece of metal. The question then becomes, "Does a person have a legal duty not to sell pieces of metal to other persons who are prohibited by federal law from having them?" I don't think our Founders meant for the Second Amendment to allow such interference in the right to keep and bear arms.

The ATF would not have made the deal with the defendant if they were confident that they were in the right. Eventually the Supreme Court will have to eliminate the ATF.

9 posted on 10/12/2019 11:55:16 AM PDT by William Tell
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To: Yo-Yo
Personally, I think the judge's logic was flawed. The legislation says a receiver is "that part of a firearm which provides housing for the hammer, bolt or breech block, and firing mechanism, and which is usually threaded at its forward portion to receive the barrel."

The judge didn't base his decision on the wording, but that the ATF had violated federal law by not providing clear guidelines on what the law prohibits.

The judge's tentative order also found that the ATF's in-house classification process failed to comply with federal rule-making procedures. Changes to substantive federal regulations typically include a notice-and-comment period and eventual publication in the Federal Register.

Here's a link to the full text of the judge's ruling.

See: United States v. Roh, Case No. SACR 14-167 JVS

The real bummer is that the ATF gets to continue using a vague law as it sees fit.

10 posted on 10/12/2019 12:00:26 PM PDT by Ol' Dan Tucker (For 'tis the sport to have the engineer hoist with his own petard., -- Hamlet, Act 3, Scene 4)
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To: Yo-Yo

I thought CNN liked sanctuary policies.


11 posted on 10/12/2019 12:01:10 PM PDT by georgiarat (The most expensive thing in the world is a cheap Army and Navy. - Carl Vinson)
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To: Yo-Yo
I find that the judge made an interesting comment that has implications for the House’s impeachment charade that is currently taking place. One of the things that occurred during the filing of the so-called “Whistleblower’s” complaint was that apparently the Intelligent Community’s regulations and subsequently its “Urgent Concern” report Form 401 were modified to more comport to the second-hand nature of that complaint and those modifications were back-dated from September 2019 to August 2019. Yet no notices were given of those modifications and no publication in the Federal Registry was made. Here is what the Judge in this case said:

“The judge's tentative order also found that the ATF's in-house classification process failed to comply with federal rule-making procedures. Changes to substantive federal regulations typically include a notice-and-comment period and eventual publication in the Federal Register.”

This conclusion of the judge’s in this case shows that the IC IG did an in-house modification of a substantive regulation without going through proper process and further violated the law by not having the required notification-and-comment period and never bothered to publish his changes in the Federal Register before uploading the backdated change in a Federal Form to the DNI’s website for use of the Intelligence Community AFTER THE FACT, so as to allow the WB to use an entirely new standard for reporting something that would never have been accepted before under the old regulations and form 401. Strange timing, don’t you think?

By the way, Yo-Yo, it is not just the “usual” ability to receive a threaded barrel that’s listed for it to be a regulated receiver, but also it lists a bolt and bolt block in that definition of a regulated receiver. The lower receiver portion of an AR-15 has neither of those, either. Nor for that matter do most semiautomatic pistols where those parts are part of the unregulated slides and barrels themselves.

This is the result of laws being passed and regulations being written by people who do not understand how guns operate. If the law were actually followed for AR-15s and other guns of their type, it would be the upper receiver that would be serialized and regulated, not the lower which carries the magazine, bolt spring, and trigger assemblies. The upper has the bolt, bolt block, and (sometimes) threaded barrel receiver. That shows how ignorant the regulators are in the ATF&E are. . . But that is the state of the law and how it has been since the laws and regulation have been in effect.

12 posted on 10/12/2019 12:11:57 PM PDT by Swordmaker (My pistol self-identifies as an iPad, so you must accept it in gun-free zones, you hoplaphobe bigot!)
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To: Yo-Yo

“the rights of the people to keep and bar arms SHALL NOT BE INFRINGED...”


13 posted on 10/12/2019 12:16:32 PM PDT by faithhopecharity ( “Politicians are not , born; they are excreted.” Marcus Tullius Cicero (106 to 43 BCE))
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To: Yo-Yo
He also assembled the finished receivers into fully functional ARs and charged $1,000. He was convicted of that by the judge, but the conviction has been set aside in the plea deal to prevent the lower receiver ruling from becoming a permanent part of the judicial record.

According to the department of commerce, there is a difference between “manufacturing” and “assembly” of which both have distinct definition in the law. He perhaps should have broken down his services and sales better on his invoicing and he could have avoided any problems. He could have sold the 80% lowers and a separate kit of upper receiver parts, or even a completed upper, along with a trigger assembly kit. He could then rent time on his Computer assisted Machinery to finish the 80% lower, and also charged for his expertise as an advisor to assist the customer in assembling their own AR. Thus, the customer would meet the letter of the law in making their own gun. By billing it out that way, Roh would not then be the “manufacturer” of the firearm, but merely a retailer of the parts, a renter of machine and bench/tool time, and for his expertise as a technical advisor and trainer on how one can assemble a firearm, all perfectly legal to do. Thus, no crime, no time.

14 posted on 10/12/2019 12:20:24 PM PDT by Swordmaker (My pistol self-identifies as an iPad, so you must accept it in gun-free zones, you hoplaphobe bigot!)
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To: E. Pluribus Unum

AR-15 80% LOWER RECEIVER AND JIG KIT - POLYMER80

Your Price:$83.99

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AR-15 lower receiver

AR-15 jig

Includes Allen wrench and drill bits

15 posted on 10/12/2019 12:38:08 PM PDT by Viking2002
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To: riverrunner
Personally I think the judges logic is right on the money.

The ATF has been bastardizing the definitions for decades in favor of more control.

As I said before, under strict interpretation of the statute then even the 1911 has no legally-defined frame or receiver.

I highly doubt that strict of an interpretation of the law would hold up on appeal.

16 posted on 10/12/2019 1:02:37 PM PDT by Yo-Yo ( is the /sarc tag really necessary?)
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To: Swordmaker
He could then rent time on his Computer assisted Machinery to finish the 80% lower, and also charged for his expertise as an advisor to assist the customer in assembling their own AR. Thus, the customer would meet the letter of the law in making their own gun. By billing it out that way, Roh would not then be the “manufacturer” of the firearm, but merely a retailer of the parts, a renter of machine and bench/tool time, and for his expertise as a technical advisor and trainer on how one can assemble a firearm, all perfectly legal to do. Thus, no crime, no time.

The ATF had already ruled that pushing the start button on a CNC does not qualify as a person finishing his own 80% lower, and that was not disputed in the court case. What was disputed was the definition of a firearm frame or receiver.

17 posted on 10/12/2019 1:11:56 PM PDT by Yo-Yo ( is the /sarc tag really necessary?)
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To: Yo-Yo
The ATF had already ruled that pushing the start button on a CNC does not qualify as a person finishing his own 80% lower

Wonder if they can draw a line. After all CNC machine operators aren't expected to be designers or mechanical engineers. There isn't a federal license required to operate CNC machinery either.

18 posted on 10/12/2019 1:30:43 PM PDT by no-s (when democracy is displaced by tyranny, the armed citizen still gets to vote...)
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To: Yo-Yo

The Dems want to pass gun control laws but they don’t necessarily want to enforce them. They are counting on voluntary compliance which means they are only trying to disarm the law abiding citizens.


19 posted on 10/12/2019 1:33:17 PM PDT by Brilliant
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To: Swordmaker
This is the result of laws being passed and regulations being written by people who do not understand how guns operate.

Right you are. My older son was a firearm enthusiast and a budding mechanical engineer. Always making pencil sketches of firearms he imagined. My remaining son is a talented machinist with an appreciation of firearms.

There are some weird firearms out there that don't have a bolt/block or a firing pin or a hammer or perhaps some other component in combination. Designers are clever.

20 posted on 10/12/2019 1:39:03 PM PDT by USMCPOP (Father of LCpl. Karl Linn, KIA 1/26/2005 Al Haqlaniyah, Iraq)
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