Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: FRIDAY, June 18, 1993 TAG: 9306180259
SECTION: NATIONAL/INTERNATIONAL PAGE: A1 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: Associated Press
DATELINE: WASHINGTON LENGTH: Medium
Guns are "more available to criminals than to citizens," Edward Daily III, now in federal prison, told the House Judiciary crime subcommittee considering changes in the law governing issuance of federal gun-dealer licenses.
It was easy to buy the 150 guns at gun shows in Virginia and North Carolina, using "straw" purchasers who were paid up to $50 cash or drugs to make it look as if they were the real buyers, Daily said.
The dealers - even those who went through the motions of conducting the instant checks required in Virginia on the backgrounds of the "straw" purchasers to make sure they had no criminal records - knew Daily was the real buyer, he said.
"If I was a regular citizen watching a person purchase a handgun this way, I would know this is wrong," said Daily, most recently of Woodbridge, Va.
The son of a former New York City police officer and the nephew of an NYPD captain said he would take the guns to New York and usually trade them for cocaine, which he would then sell, earning up to $150,000.
The Gun Control Act of 1968 established the system requiring only licensed dealers to be able to sell guns and preventing them from selling guns to criminals.
But that system has fallen into "complete disrepair," said panel Chairman Charles Schumer, D-N.Y. "Anyone who can afford the $10-a-year fee can get a license.
"You don't have to actually operate a store, you don't have to show that you are in compliance with state laws or that you will store the guns securely, you don't even have to be a human being, as one journalist showed recently by getting a license for his dog," Schumer said.
Sen. Paul Simon, D-Ill., has introduced a bill that would, among other things:
Raise the license fee to $750 to defray the cost of processing and investigating applicants and holders and to discourage individuals who get licenses simply so they can obtain guns wholesale from manufacturers.
Require dealers to certify that they are complying with state and local laws before receiving a new federal license, a measure introduced by Sen. Daniel Patrick Moynihan, D-N.Y.
Make various changes to give the Treasury Department's Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms more time to investigate applicants and more access to licensees' records.
Daily, who initially was charged in Richmond, Va., with 27 felony counts, pleaded guilty in February to two and was sentenced in April to 72 months in prison in exchange for helping convict two dozen people.
When he was involved in the trade, he said, he "really didn't care" what the guns would be used for, but he said it haunts him to think that innocent people might have been killed with a gun he provided.
"I have to live with it for the rest of my life," he said.
During the hearing, ATF Director Stephen Higgins testified that the number of firearms-dealer applicants zoomed from an average of 2,800 per month in 1992 to about 6,000 per month this year.
by CNB