Gun dealers often stay in business with new licenses after ATF shuts them down

[onehandle]

About a hundred times a year, regulators strip gun dealers of their licenses for violations of federal law, an extreme step taken only when repeated infractions are deemed a threat to public safety. But a year-long Washington Post investigation documented about 60 cases since 2003 in which the businesses stayed open, often re-licensed through relatives, employees, associates or newly formed companies.

"We'll just have to play musical licenses," the owner of the Highland Gun Barn in Michigan said when a federal inspector served him with a final notice to surrender his license.

A California sports shop had its license revoked after inspectors from the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives said the 87-year-old owner's repeated violations of gun laws showed she was unable to run a gun business. Before she forfeited her license, the woman's son obtained a permit to sell guns at the same shop. He said he would be at the shop two days a week and that his mother would "exclusively direct all day-to-day business."

A Maryland gun store that ATF said lost track of weapons and failed to do background checks was forced to surrender its license after the owner lost a court battle. Six months later, ATF issued the dealer's wife a license at his old shop in Fallston, Md. A Georgia gun dealer had its license revoked after ATF said it could not account for hundreds of guns. The dealer's daughter and son-in-law secured their own license to keep the business going.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/12/13/AR2010121305890.html