113 guns missing from Longview shop, audit finds
Wednesday, January 30, 2008 5:38 AM PST
By Tony Lystra
tlystra@tdn.com
Printable version
E-mail this articleA recent federal audit of a Longview gun dealer has found that 113 firearms went missing from the store over a 10-year period.
The audit found that the Gun Shop in Longview couldn't determine where the guns are or
whether they were stolen. Auditors and the store's owner say the major
ity of the weapons probably were sold but can't be tracked because records weren't properly kept.
"We don't know the status of them or where they are," said Detective Sgt. Mike Hallowell of the Longview Police Department. "If they're in the wrong hands, obviously that's a concern."
The federal Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms examined the store's sales between 1996 and 2005, a Longview police report said. Documenting weapons sales is important, the ATF said, because it helps keep guns out of criminals' hands.
John Bridges, who owns the store and pawn shop located on 15th Avenue, said he couldn't guarantee that some of the guns weren't stolen.
"I suppose there's a chance maybe
the oddball gun found its way out of here - maybe by employees or other means," he said.
Bridges said he managed to track down 12 of the guns.
He found two in his shop and located sales records for 10 others.
"I am taking it very seriously," he said. "If I continue to have problems, I could lose my license."
The unaccounted for weapons include Rugers, Glocks, Berettas, Winchesters and other brands of rifles, handguns and shotguns.
The audit was the result of a recent initiative to review the sales practices of every gun-dealing pawn broker in the nation, said Nick Starcevic, a spokesman for the ATF in Seattle.
The audits should be finished sometime this year, he said. The ATF's Washington, D.C, office declined to release the number of Cowlitz County inspections that resulted in missing guns. But a spokeswoman there said that, nationwide, 9 percent of the gun dealers audited by the agency between 2005 and 2007 had at least one gun they couldn't account for.
"A lot of time, it is a paperwork error," Starcevic said. "Things will get filed wrong."
If retailers don't record and keep the names and addresses of gun buyers, they could lose their federal dealers licenses, he said.
Processing the paperwork correctly, he said, ensures the guns can be traced and helps prevent them from ending up in the wrong hands. For example, he said, the records help keep convicted felons or those with misdemeanor domestic violence convictions from illegally buying guns.
"Every gun tells a story," he said. "Pawn shops ... take in a lot of crime guns unbeknownst to them. That's just the nature of their business. ... We want to keep all the crime guns out of the criminal's hands."
Of the 113 missing weapons from the Gun Shop, Starcevic said, "It's a lot. ... They're treated as if they're stolen because we have to assume the worst."
Hallowell, of the Longview police department, said the missing weapons would be entered into a local database so county law enforcement agencies will know what they're dealing with if they encounter them.
Starcevic said he didn't believe the Longview store would face sanctions. Rather, he said, the agency would work with Bridges to ensure documentation is properly recorded in the future.
Bridges said his shop sells and pawns about 1,500 new and used guns each year. He said the audit was conducted between June and September of last year.
Of the missing weapons, Bridges said, "There are guns on that list that I know were sold. I know the paperwork was done on them."
Asked why the records couldn't be found during the audit, he said, "I can't tell you."
He said his store has employed up to five workers at any given time. "I don't see every transaction that takes place," he said.
Regulations were more lax 20 years ago, Bridges said. In those days, Bridges said, if he knew his customer, "I didn't even have to see his identification."
But, he said, "over time, things got stricter and stricter and stricter and our paperwork systems just didn't evolve with that."
The store has recently begun having employees double- and triple-check their paperwork, he said.
Bridges said that if he had been doing something "drastically wrong," the ATF would have closed his shop. "They didn't. That's the bottom line," he said.
"I guess my only job now is to do a much better job than I did before in tracking the stuff."
What? wrote on Feb 9, 2008 5:12 PM:
That sucks! wrote on Feb 9, 2008 5:29 PM:
Reality Check wrote on Feb 10, 2008 8:52 AM:
how many last year? wrote on Feb 11, 2008 8:55 PM:
i'm more interested in knowing how many
guns, and were they rifles or handguns,
were 'lost' last year? "
Reality Check??? wrote on Feb 11, 2008 11:36 PM:
re Reality check??? wrote on Feb 12, 2008 2:04 PM:
Non Issue wrote on Feb 12, 2008 4:16 PM:
to Non Issue wrote on Feb 12, 2008 5:49 PM:
sniper wrote on Feb 12, 2008 7:52 PM:
Gun Haters wrote on Feb 13, 2008 8:07 AM:
to Gun Haters wrote on Feb 14, 2008 7:32 PM:
wally wrote on Feb 16, 2008 4:52 PM:
ArmyDude wrote on Feb 23, 2008 10:07 AM:
Hide Behind wrote on Feb 27, 2008 1:10 PM:
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