Reply #43: No indication of how many arms/people involved...

[SteveM]

"The gun show review found that firearms were diverted at and through gun shows by straw purchasers, unregulated private sellers, and licensed dealers. Felons were associated with selling or purchasing firearms in 46 percent of the gun show investigations. Firearms that were illegally diverted at or through gun shows were recovered in subsequent crimes, including homicide and robbery, in more than a third of the gun show investigations."

So how many felons were found in the "46 percent of the gun show investigations?" A thousand? A hundred? Ten, as was indicated in one of Bloomberg's "investigations?" I have no doubt that gun-show bought firearms were "recovered in subsequent crimes.' Again, how many?

Good question about "earlier study." We may have to speculate. I think that a thug would much rather reveal he purchased a gun at a Fud "gun show," than to reveal he had gotten it from some gun-runner; you know, the kind of folks who have good connections among incarcerated felons.

I've been to a number of gun shows. Cops in and out of the place, uniformed and non-uniformed; occasionally, they pick up the tin-horn crim's snot-sniffing girlfriend, "um-uh-ahing" her way through a straw purchase. Eliminate gun shows, and you eliminate the fish in the barrel -- and they just move on to that car trunk in the alley.

Or to the kitchen table of millions of legal buyer/sellers.