Posted on 08/05/2011 5:47:44 AM PDT by marktwain
MARTINSBURG, W. Va. — No signs mark the outside of the hidden 1960s-vintage government facility in the bucolic countryside of West Virginia's panhandle.
Even the parking lot is obscured by black tarps lining a cyclone fence.
But just inside the warehouse-like brick building is the National Tracing Center, the epicenter of the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives' effort to combat and control illegal gun use.
When police need to trace a captured gun - be it from Durango, Mexico, or Durango, Colo. - the request lands here, where 375 ATF employees and contractors handle more than 340,000 gun inquiries a year, foreign and domestic.
They search for the purchase trail of guns used in crimes, trying to give law enforcement investigative leads that might result in arrests. Average turnaround time is seven to 10 days, but an urgent request goes to the top of the pile and can be answered within 24 hours.
They labor under the watchful eyes of gun advocacy groups and members of Congress, who have written language into appropriations bills aimed at limiting the center's ability to amass information about legal gun purchases nationwide. Easier to check cars
"It's easier to look up who owns a car than who owns a gun right now," said Charles Houser, chief of the tracing center. "That's because no one is worried about anyone taking their car away."
The tracing center is akin to ATF's central nervous system and has become a focal point of controversies like Operation Fast and Furious, in which Phoenix-based ATF agents were instructed to follow the trail of guns purchased for Mexican drug traffickers instead of interdicting them.
(Excerpt) Read more at chron.com ...
Gunwalker ping.
As it is in WV, I suppose this is another edifice to their former senator and Grand Kleagle Bobby Byrd. Of course, if they had some facility that was dedicated to eliminating untaxed WV corn liquor, I could probably support that.
The BATFE's leash is still not short enough.
Where do 1,000 requests a day come from? That seems like too many.
Perhaps exactly what this puff piece wants you to think?
I’d like to know why they cut the number of agents who did the FFL dealer inspections in half years ago. Either that was done in recognition of the fact that the FFLs were not a significant source of firearms for criminals or it was a huge bureaucratic screwup.
Anyone?
West Virginia also has the Treasury office that deals with savings bonds. That predates Bryd’s reign.
Great post in an interesting post/thread.
Too bad it isn't in California on the fault line.
Consider all this expense and furious motion, and I bet virtually no real criminal activity is prevented. Almost certainly it is all used to prevent “crimes of prohibition”, laws that are not against acts that are evil of themselves, but simply against the law because some busybody thinks it should be so.
It’s just the normal Gunwalker ping. You never know who might need, or want, to get up to speed because so much is dripping out so slowly every day. Eventually the dripping acid will cause an explosion or melt through the wall of silence. Then....look out.
Yeah, I know. It's updating constantly with valuable information. Very important to these threads for anyone (myself included) wanting to get up to speed. Thanks again.
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