The ATF is prohibited by federal law from creating a centralized database of registered gun owners. Instead, they must sort through a system of records, of which they are sent millions per month, according to [ATF Director Steve] Dettelbach.
The director said tracing crime guns is one of the areas of intelligence that is “so important.” But the process isn’t especially straightforward.
“The way it doesn’t happen is we punch in a person’s name, and up comes ‘oh, they own so many guns,'” Dettelbach said. “Congress has prohibited us from doing that.”
Dettelbach said that the agency pays to have the search function taken out of their software, explaining that the function that other customers use must be removed in order to comply with U.S. law.
Instead, the ATF works to find the initial purchaser of the firearm through its system of records, before being able to confirm whether they or someone else committed the crime.
“We have to do an old-fashioned investigation, go to them, find out what they did with it, who they are,” Dettelbach said. “So this is an investigative intensive process that we work on with state and local law enforcement every day.”
Dettelbach said that as the the only federal law enforcement agency to solely deal with violent crime, “if you’re really concerned about violent crime in the United States, this agency is way, way, way too small” with 5,000 people total.
Still, despite the cumbersome process and size of the agency, Dettelbach said that last year, the ATF did 645,000 traces, noting that “we work within the law as best we can with our resources to turn these things around.”
— Kaia Hubbard in ATF Director Steven Dettelbach Says “We Have to Work Within That System” Since There Is No Federal Gun Registry
6 Responses
How many times has gun trace information been central, or even demonstrably helpful, in solving a crime and obtaining a conviction?
As a fraction of executed traces would be great, but absolute numbers would also be fine.
But let’s have some relevant info as to why this work is being done in the first place, and how useful it actually is.
“How many times has gun trace information been central, or even demonstrably helpful, in solving a crime and obtaining a conviction?”
Rarely.
It was so bad in Canada with their ‘mandatory registration’ that they abandoned it all together a few years back….
Whether such a database is effective for any purpose the government desires does not justify its existence
This article provides further insight into the ongoing disaster that is the Biden ATF. Steve Dettelbach has publicly admitted that he is ignorant about guns (and demonstrates it every time he discusses guns in public or on camera, cf. his recent CBS appearance). He is not, and never has been, an LEO. He is what he appears to be – a Leftist/fascist “lawyer”. Oh, and a liar, as well:
“Dettelbach said that as the the only federal law enforcement agency to solely deal with violent crime, . . . ” Please tell me what “violent crime” is involved in an FFL making innocent and unintentional typos on ATF paperwork, would you??
He is certainly an idiot, but he is hardly “useful”, so I can’t call him one of Lenin’s “useful idiots”. He’s just a lying, anti-gun propagandist.
Never, not once has registerting fire arms ever prevented crime!
Hopefully Trump will win, again, and fire this POS and put the ATF on a very short leash.