Agency Doesn't Properly Check Gun Dealers-Audit

[Judi Lynn]

Agency Doesn't Properly Check Gun Dealers-Audit
Mon Jul 19, 2004 02:21 PM ET


WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The U.S. agency charged with licensing gun owners is not conducting adequate checks of licensed gun dealers and does not properly investigate gun law violations, a Justice Department audit showed on Monday.
The department's inspector general released a report that showed the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives conducts inspections on about 4.5 percent of the 104,000 federally licensed firearms dealers each year.

At that rate it would take the ATF more than 22 years to inspect all dealers -- far below its goal of inspecting dealers at least once every three years.

The inspections are aimed at determining whether dealers can account for all guns they have bought and sold, and whether they have reported all multiple handgun sales and firearms thefts to the ATF.
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http://www.reuters.com/newsArticle.jhtml?type=domesticNews&storyID=5708579