crosspost Two cases that may make dents in the PLCAA and the gun industry.

[gejohnston]

8. They do intervine

and yes they do issue the licenses. Chances are, the ATF investigated and found no evidence of wrong doing. Under the Gun Control Act, the ATF, then the IRS, conducts regular inspections of inventory and records. The GCA mandates the inventory control system dealers and manufactures must have in place and keep the records for something like twenty years. Chances are, the ATF found that those individual guns were sold to someone else a decade or more before the crime and, in some cases, were reported as stolen in NCIC.
Simply because it traced to some of the largest FFLs, doesn't mean those FFLs sold the guns to the perp. The ATF has a term called "time to crime". That means from the time sold, if it was ever legally sold to begin with, from an FFL to the time the police ask the ATF to trace it for whatever reason, not all of them for criminal cases.

In these cases before PLCAA, the plaintiffs always lost, or the manufactures and dealers settled simply because it was cheaper than going to court. In loser pays, Brady left the plaintiff holding the bag.
https://www.atf.gov/qa-category/record-required-licensees
https://www.atf.gov/qa-category/record-required-licensees