If I were prez, I'd make a deal with the NRA

[Taverner]

All guns legal - yes that means tommy guns, machine guns, assault rifles whatever...

In exchange for every gun to be fingerprinted and sent to a national database.

Sounds fair to me

[ThomCat]

1. Unfortunately, real life is messy.

Guns change hands. So you can have as much forensic information as you want on every gun, it won't help you after that gun has changed hands a few times.

You'd just end up with more guns, and more dangerous guns, loose on the streets.

[Taverner]

2. Ah but for every sale, the database needs to be updated

Fingerprinting, even if guns change hand secretly, can still narrow any searches down.

Ask any cop what they'd want and this comes to the top of their list.

[ThomCat]

4. Even private sales?

But even if you somehow manage that, there are a vast amount of guns that are "stolen" every year.

Do a cash sale, report the gun stolen, and now the new owner has a gun and isn't registered as the owner. It already happens, and it would happen even more. No clerical system ever created has managed to keep track of everything. There are always loopholes.

[Taverner]

5. Yep - but then you could nail the search down to the original owner

Get a supoena for the info on who he sold it to.

Better than what we have now

[ThomCat]

7. If the original owner says it was stolen

even if it was really sold, you now have a dead end. "Sorry officer. Someone broke in and took it. I have no way of knowing who."

[Taverner]

8. "Why didn't you file a report?"

At this point we have probable cause to investigate the owner. Knowing this would be hanging over his or her head, he or she would see it in their best interests to register the sale or report the crime.

[ThomCat]

9. People file reports for stolen guns all the time

to cover up illegal gun sales. That practice would just be more common.

[Taverner]

10. And at that point the cop would reinvestigate the "robbery"

And if statements didn't match, we'd again have probable cause

[ThomCat]

11. Never happens.

The police don't waste time on blind leads. You're expecting the cops to somehow get the sellers to talk. what are they going to do, torture them until they admit that they sold the guns? Wave their magic wands to make the information appear?

Lies work.

[Taverner]

13. They do - but still there will be a number of cases where

The fingerprint leads to a suspect.

It will give cops an edge - the right kind of edge. Evidence based edge.

[taterguy]

3. But will you be able to take your machine gun to the Olive Garden?

I think that's what the Lounge wants to know

[Taverner]

6. Only in conceal and carry states

;)

[Wapsie B]

15. Exactly. And what about Veal eaters

and those of us who like cornflakes on our fried chicken? Don't we have the right to take our Uzi and our AK-47 anywhere we want?

:cry:

[ContraBass Black]

12. Finger print which part of the gun?

Barrels and firing pins are interchangeable, and prints are easily altered with abrasive tools.

[Taverner]

14. Both

They can be changed, but they aren't always

IT gives investigators an edge