Gun Store Owner Refuses to Sell Weapon to Man Suspected of Planning Mass Shooting at Ohio University

[flamin lib]

9. It is almost impossible to prove straw purchases unless they are completely

outrageous. Examples would be the case of two police officers awarded $6 mil when injured by a gun straw purchased. The buyer entered the store with the shooter who selected the gun and left. When the buyer was short of cash the store clerk and the buyer went into the parking lot to get the extra cash from the eventual shooter and complete the sale. Pretty blatant, right? The award is being appealed under the protections of the PLCAA.

Second example of an award is the woman in Kansas who got $400 k from a gun store who sold a shotgun to the mother of a felon who then used it to kill his ten year old son and himself. During the sale the clerk asked "have you been a good boy?" to which the felon answered "no, that's why she's filling out the forms." Even with that testimony it took 10 years to work it's way to the Kansas Supreme Court.

Straw buyers are almost impossible to prove. It comes down to he said, they said and that's just not going to fly in a criminal court. The same is true of guns trafficked through "theft". Should a gun store be audited and come up several hundred guns short on the inventory the dealer just declares them stolen. They must have been stolen, right? No record of sale or anything. How else did they go missing? How is the ATF to prove the guns were trafficked under those conditions?

So, yeah, the PLCAA is a hindrance to prosecution of dealers AND shields the manufacturers from responsibility for selling to unscrupulous dealers. Without the PLCAA a manufacturer could be civilly sued if they sold to a FFL that they "knew or should have known" was illegally dealing in guns. As it is the manufacturers don't care to police their dealers because there is no penalty for not doing so.