Now that The New York Times devotes a portion of its editorial space to gun violence, we are treated to the contribution of op-ed writer Charles Blow. And what Blow has decided to talk about is what is truly the elephant in the living room when it comes to gun violence, namely, the issue of stolen guns. Obama mentioned the issue twice in the official White House press release outlining his new EO agenda on guns, but he tied it to expanding background checks by bringing more gun transactions under the rubric of regulated sales.
To his credit, Blow dug up Sam Bieler’s 2013 article which cites data from Phil Cook’s 1997 article which estimates that as many as 500,000 guns might be stolen each year. And having discovered this incredible number, Blow then throws up several remedies for the problem which will have no real impact at all. They won’t have any impact because registering guns or requiring insurance for their ownership simply isn’t going to occur. As for the idea that gun theft will go down as safe guns enter the civilian arsenal, even if a few were to finally hit the market, we still have 300 million+ unsafe guns lying around.
On the other hand, there are some steps that could be taken right now that would, I believe, have a substantial impact on the ability of law enforcement to identify and trace crime guns, a process which right now occurs in the most slipshod or piecemeal fashion when it occurs at all. And these steps wouldn’t even require any legislation or executive orders; they could be accomplished easily and quickly if someone, anyone, would make the regulatory division of the ATF do what it is really supposed to do.
Why does the GVP advocacy community put so much time and effort into pushing the expansion of NICS-background checks into secondary transfers and sales? Because the ATF has been whining for 20 years that they can only trace a gun through its first, legal sale. This is a lie. The fact is that every time a gun is acquired by an FFL dealer it must be listed in his Acquisition & Disposition book. This A&D book, along with the 4473 forms used to conduct background checks, can be inspected by the ATF whenever they enter a store. Now It happens that 40% or more guns that are sold by retail dealers are used guns, many of which were sold previously out of the same store. Or they were first sold by the gun shop in the next town. Can the ATF ask a dealer to tell them the particulars of the last, as opposed to the first sale of a particular gun? Of course they can – they own the entire contents of the A&D book.
The ATF trumpets the development of time-to-crime data which, they say, alerts them to questionable dealer behavior because the average TTC right now is about 12 years, so if guns sold by a particular dealer have a much shorter TTC, that dealer must be pushing guns out the back door. But the fact is that since 40% of the sale dates of guns used to calculate TTC might not represent the last, legal sale, the TTC numbers published by the ATF are, to be polite, meaningless at best.
The ATF still sends trace requests by fax; the rest of the world, including all gun dealers, has discovered email as a more accurate and certainly efficient way to communicate back and forth. If the ATF required dealers to keep their A&D book in Excel (which they actually recommend,) the dealer could scan his entire book immediately looking for a particular serial number and the ATF and local police would have a better chance of figuring out how and when a crime gun moved from legal to illegal hands.
You don’t need a new law, you don’t an Executive Order, you don’t need anything except some basic knowledge about the gun business in order to figure this out.
Jan 11, 2025 @ 14:16:28
Again, an enlightening post Mike. It’s gotta’ be true that gun theft is a bigger source of crime guns than purchase w/o a background check. It’s too bad because the theft source will be tough to plug unless safe gun storage becomes a priority - maybe even become federally mandated (& that’ll go over big with the gun lobby).
Jan 11, 2025 @ 15:46:57
If we can figure out how to make it next to impossble to walk out of WalMart with a bra or panties that you didn’t pay for, we can’t figure out how to use technology to secure guns? Give me a break and thanks for our comment.
Jan 11, 2025 @ 18:09:33
Mike: I saw your comment on goods not being able to walk out of Walmart I first thought I had missed something obvious but perhaps you have. There are people in the Walmarts who respond to the alarms set off by goods walking out. Putting something on a gun that sets off an alarm would be good perhaps in a store with clerks to hear them but in homes where there are guns there also need to be people who hear the alarms. When the people are gone the ‘gun stolen alarms’ could call an alarm monitoring service like burglar alarms do. But this is the catch. When people are not home they can set their burglar alarms and those would be set off before burglars had the chance to steal the guns protected with the technology to set off the stolen gun sensors. I do not know how many guns are stolen when people are at home so the idea would work in those cases.
Jan 11, 2025 @ 19:12:35
Well done.
Jan 13, 2025 @ 09:56:44
Good point pankr003.
I think a gun safe, though a pricey & bulky item, would prevent the largest percentage of gun thefts. Or for securing a pistol or two, one of those lock boxes which allow quick access in time of need. There are also some pretty crafty ways to hide guns within the home which would deter would-be thieves.