GunsATF: store which sold guns to Lanza’s mother committed more than 500 firearm violations

Published 12 April 2013

The Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF) found that the gun store which sold the mother of Adam Lanza the guns he used to carry out the Sandy Hook Elementary massacre, had been cited for more than 500 violations of federal firearms laws and regulations. The store’s license has now been revoked.

The Riverview gun shop, where Adam Lanza's mother purchased the weapons used in the Sandy Hook massacre // Source: acum.tv

The Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF) found that the gun store which sold the mother of Adam Lanza the guns he used to carry out the Sandy Hook Elementary massacre, had been cited for more  than 500 violations of federal firearms laws and regulations. USA Today reports states some of the violations date back to 2007, but the store owner did not lose his federal firearms license until after the shooting.

The violations found at Riverview Gun Sales between January 2010 and July 2011 included an employee who “sold ammunition on at least two occasions” to a man “he had reason to believe was a felon.”

According to ATF records, the employee was the same person who sold the Bushmaster XM15 rifle to Nancy Lanza on 29 March 2010, which her son, Adam Lanza, used to kill twenty-six people last December.

 ATF inspectors, in 2007 and 2009, found that the store failed to “correctly and completely record” all the required information on ATF 4473 forms, which are firearms transaction forms. The store also failed to “properly maintain acquisition and disposition records as required, by entering incorrect serial numbers into the records,” as well as failing to submit reports of some handgun sales to the ATF.

USA Todaynotes that the revocation notice  the ATF gave to owner, David LaGuercia, stated that he knew how to conduct proper transactions, and received “11 separate instances of instruction from ATF regarding how to comply with federal firearms laws and regulations” between 2004 and 2010.

“Although the licensee committed over 500 violations, and thus clearly did many things incorrectly, the licensee also successfully completed hundreds of transactions where all the requirements were completed correctly,” the letter states. “This conclusively demonstrates that the licensee knew how to do things the right way, and was capable of getting things right when appropriate attention and effort were devoted to the job, but simply did not focus sufficient attention to ensure that he complied with the GCA (Gun Control Act) each time he sold a firearm.”

Robert Altchiler, LaGuercia’s lawyer, hinted that the revocation was not being considered before the Newtown incident, as well as a separate incident involving Jordan Marsh, a man accused of stealing a rifle from the store three days before the Sandy Hook shooting.

“I think that it was a panicked public relations response to things that happened in December between Newtown and Jordan Marsh,” Altchiler told the (Westchester County, N.Y.)  Journal News. “I do not think for a second that they thought my client posed a danger to the community that would warrant an emergency revocation like that.”

“I believe that had they allowed the dust to settle rather than rushing to the revocation, that Riverview would have been able to resume negotiations and conversations with the ATF and come to a settlement more consistent with the conversations that were taking place in August 2012 during the revocation hearing, rather than rush into this extreme and draconian result that up until December 2012 apparently never ever had been contemplated or considered by the ATF.”