Sounds like BS unless PA does this. Who has the facts?

[NJCK 5]

So I was reading a rant over at another forum and this smelled like BS/contrived or simply a misunderstanding of a young NJ gun purchaser. I'll boil down the facts:

 

1. PA Buyer purchases a home-built AR from a PA Seller who built the rifle via FTF in early 2012.

 

2. PA Buyer shoots 500rds through it and decides ARs aren't for him, and puts it up for sale.

 

3. Potential NJ Buyer has interest and they work out a cash deal for the rifle sans the hi-cap mags and the rifle is otherwise GTG with fixed stock and a target crowned barrel.

 

4. The PA Seller lives in far out North-Central PA, and upon receipt of payment from NJ Buyer ships the AR to NJ Buyer's FFL with a Bill of Sale, which reportedly contains the name/address of the seller and the name/address buyer.

 

NJ Buyer goes to FFL to have AR transferred to him, and reportedly says the NJ FFL refuses to transfer the AR because the "seller is not the apparant owner."

 

Now the rest is unclear, and likely the ranting NJ Buyer has it wrong, but is implying that this was learned by way of a NICS check and eluding that the original builder of the AR is the owner and now he has to get the guy he bought it from to contact the original builder and get a bill of sale to prove everything.

 

Correct me if I am wrong, but in PA isn't the FTF sale of a long gun to another PA resident simple cash and carry with no NICS and not even paperwork like our COE? So even if the original builder got a NICS on the lower he used, there's no repository that keeps the serial vs owner (sans tinfoil hat, but I mean one that would inhibit sale), right? Mailing it to the NJ FFL was definitely correct, and a Bill of Sale sufficient so the transfer should have been trouble free with the NJ FFL and NJ Buyer filling out an NJ COE and getting a NICS . It is my thought that the real problem is that the NJ FFL did not want to be responsible for receipt of the AR from a private individual without a copy of the seller's driver license (I know mine will only receive from private party if a copy of DL is included) and/or wanted an explicit statment in the Bill of Sale that stated something like, "I Mr. Seller am the legal owner of .223 AR XYZ having serial ####, and have sold it to NJ Buyer", and wanted to have something more traceable to the seller in his books. Especially in light of not getting any sort of quick NICS in NJ at present and the craziness of the times...

 

What do you guys think?

[RecessedFilter 222]

There is a lot of this and that's in this story, and it doesn't help that it's on a forum...we all know how some of these stories go.

 

That doesn't make much sense though. Isn't this the same as any gun that has been sold a few times? Say I buy a shotgun off gunbroker that has been transferred however many times...the last owner would be the current owner until I received it and registered it. Understand where I;m going with this?

 

Or maybe I'm completely wrong. Who knows.

[GRIZ 3,369]

There is no way a FFL would know who the original buyer was unless they originally sold the lower and they remember the serial number.

[NJCK 5]

There is a lot of this and that's in this story, and it doesn't help that it's on a forum...we all know how some of these stories go.

 

That doesn't make much sense though. Isn't this the same as any gun that has been sold a few times? Say I buy a shotgun off gunbroker that has been transferred however many times...the last owner would be the current owner until I received it and registered it. Understand where I;m going with this?

 

Or maybe I'm completely wrong. Who knows.

 

Totally with you, and a NICS check is to determine whether or not the gun is being transferred to an individual that can possess a firearm. Nothing to do with the specific gun or who has owned it. Hence, I smell BS and a young one creating more drama than probably the real problem of not checking his FFL's requirements for accepting a transfer from a private party.

[Pizza Bob 1,488]

OK, let me posit this - while I'm with you NJCK and think this is largely BS it is possible. PA keeps a registry of handgun purchases. I believe that lower receivers are treated the same way in PA - or at least they were. If the NJ FFL contacted the PASP, they may have told him the person listed as seller on the bill of sale was not the registered owner.

 

This has happened many times in PA in the case of the police checking handguns against PA's registry - it it comes back to someone other than who is in possession of the gun, they confiscate it and then the hoop jumping starts to get it back. Yes it is wrong. PA's registry has been challenged in court, and passed muster, ironically enough, because it was found to not be a "complete" registry - the very reason incidents such as in the OP or the confiscated handgun owner are in the pickle they're in.

 

The only thing I am unsure of is whether lower receivers are, indeed, included on the registry. I think they are because I remember comments about filling out the handgun form (PA specific and the basis for the handgun registry) for lower recievers.

 

Maybe Vlad (although his flight to PA most likely post dates the registry requirement) or mipafox can expand on this.

 

Adios,

 

Pizza Bob

[Turbotezza 1]

You don't need a special form for receivers in PA.

[Pizza Bob 1,488]

You don't need a special form for receivers in PA.

 

Not now you don't - but in the past, I believe the state (PA) handled them the same as handguns. I believe that changed when the federal 4473 created a field specifically for receivers.

[NJCK 5]

Most interesting... Had no idea lowers were possibly treated as such. Maybe this plight is real...

[Njgunowner 2]

More than likely it was reported as stolen, hence the person he bought if from wasn't the owner.

[halbautomatisch 60]

I have heard PA dealers saying that stripped AR lowers needed to have a "pistol form" filled out when sold, starting about 3 years ago. Whether or not they are still doing this, I don't know.

 

How a NJ dealer would know anything about an "original owner", I don't know. Most dealers simply log into their A&D book who they got the gun from, and who it went out to, and that's it. Unless the dealer is some Dick Tracy wannabe, he's not likely to look into it.

[Soju 153]

More than likely it was reported as stolen, hence the person he bought if from wasn't the owner.

 

That is what I was thinking. No idea if it is actually the case, but I am struggling to see how a NJ FFL would know who is or isn't the original owner unless something got flagged...like it being reported stolen.