Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: TUESDAY, January 11, 1994 TAG: 9401110192
SECTION: VIRGINIA PAGE: A-1 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: MARGARET EDDS STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: LENGTH: Long
Simple, federal officials and law-enforcement agencies say.
First, raise the license fee high enough to weed out the thousands who are interested only in discounted prices and a way to avoid pesky laws such as Virginia's one-handgun-a-month purchase limit.
Second, unfetter federal and state law enforcers from decades of gun policies set by the allies of the National Rifle Association.
Give the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms more than 45 days to review an application, for instance.
Or allow the ATF to demand proof that an applicant actually intends to open a business.
Or let the ATF revoke licenses of individuals who violate state or local zoning or tax laws.
Or create a state license so states can prosecute violators the feds miss.
But will decreasing the number of licensed dealers do anything to serve the larger public interest: keeping guns out of the hands of criminals?
There, consensus stops.
In proposing last week to increase to $600 per year a license fee that until recently was $30 for three years, the Clinton administration weighed in with a resounding "yes."
The system of gun-dealer licensing "encourages a flourishing criminal market in guns," President Clinton said in an August memo urging the ATF to tighten its enforcement within legal boundaries. "Federal firearms licensees represent the first line of defense in our efforts to keep guns out of the hands of criminals."
But in rural areas, many scoff at that notion.
"You can buy a gun anywhere. You don't have to go to a dealer to get a gun," said Sgt. William Gibbs Jr. of the Christiansburg Police Department, who last fall turned in the license he had been using to sell guns from his home. Gibbs said he was tired of the paperwork and worried that a gun he had sold might turn up in a crime.
"You can get in more trouble trying to be honest," he said.
With an estimated 200 million guns already circulating in America, tightening up on dealers "is going to have a very tiny impact," insisted Bob Miller, a Richmond gun dealer whose main job is as a paramedic - often working on gunshot victims.
"I need my license like a hole in the head," admitted Miller, who said he would not object to requiring photo identification or fingerprints from dealers. But he also thinks the flurry of gun legislation before Congress and state legislatures is going to impact crime minimally.
"Prohibition didn't work in the '30s. This isn't going to work on guns," he said.
Those who disagree point to a recent Justice Department survey of state prison inmates in which 27 percent acknowledged buying their firearms from a licensed dealer. In another study, the Detroit field office of the ATF found 13 licensed dealers who were routinely supplying criminals with guns. The office estimated that three of the dealers had sold more than 3,000 firearms after filing off the serial numbers.
Still, even gun-control advocates acknowledge that guns can easily be bought from nondealers at gun shows, flea markets and through newspaper and shopper Virginia's 7,900 licensed dealers are split on whether charging a higher fee and toughening licensing requirements are the best way to clean up the system. publications - not to mention on the streets.
Duane Casada, a Norfolk gun dealer, recalls being offered a gun by a stranger last year. While working as a security guard, Casada said, a man approached him and offered to sell a $600 Smith & Wesson 9mm gun for $75.
Newspaper ads also are a steady source of guns sold by unlicensed owners. Federal and state gun laws exempt private sales from regulation; there is no numerical threshold to say when someone crosses over from private seller to dealer. Federal law says a dealer is someone for whom selling guns is "a regular, recurring course of conduct."
Maj. Chuck Bennett of the Richmond Police Department recalled a case in which an unlicensed person was selling 52 guns in the Trading Post shopper, more than many licensed dealers sell in a year. State Trooper Ed Melton, assigned to the firearms investigation unit, said he knows of several cases in which unlicensed individuals had as many as 100 guns for sale in shopper publications.
Virginia's 7,900 licensed dealers are split on whether charging a higher fee and toughening licensing requirements are the best way to clean up the system.
Many say oversight is far too lax. "It's way too easy. . . . I was just amazed at how easy it is," said Norfolk businessman George Crump. Crump got his license about a year ago to buy guns for a raffle conducted by the General MacArthur Association and because he collects antique guns.
But other dealers say it is unfair to penalize small-time business people or deprive individuals of a second income by charging hundreds of dollars for a license. "This knocks a small person right out of the ballgame. I'm sure the big dealers are loving it," said Lawrence Bobbitt, a patrolman with the Norfolk Police Department and a part-time gun dealer.
ATF Washington spokesman Jack Killorin is sympathetic but unpersuaded. While most gun sellers are honest, he said, "the bad action of some of them is a clarion call to clean up the system."
by CNB