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In 1994, we passed the Brady Law, putting an end to the days when criminals could "lie and buy" guns from dealers without a background check. The Brady Law requires that every person who wishes to buy a gun from a licensed gun seller undergo a background check to make sure that the buyer is not a criminal or other prohibited person. Brady background checks have been a resounding success.

However, the Brady background check system has a major gap. Because it requires background checks only for gun sales by licensed dealers, criminals can obtain guns with no questions asked from unlicensed sellers, as they are allowed to sell guns without conducting a check in most states. In effect, we have two gun markets: A regulated one, where buyers are checked to see if they can legally buy guns, and an unregulated one, where they are not.

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Exploiting weak American gun laws that allow gun traffickers and criminals easy access to high firepower weapons, Mexican drug cartels are fighting an escalating war that has killed thousands, threatens to destabilize our Southern neighbor, and poses an increasingly grave security risk to the U.S.

Unless existing gun laws are strengthened, drug cartels and criminals in Mexico and the U.S. will continue to amass arsenals that threaten families and communities in the United States.

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Assault Weapons: Mass Produced Mayhem, highlights how the availability of assault weapons has changed the balance of power between law enforcement and criminals, endangering police officers and communities. At least 15 police officers have been killed and 23 wounded since the ban expired in September 2004.

Brady President Paul Helmke said that "Our communities are less safe today than they were four years ago, when devastating weapons like AK-47s were not readily available to thugs and other dangerous people." Helmke urged policy makers to take action immediately to get military-style assault weapons off our streets.

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Guns for Gangs tells the story of Frank D’Andrea’s Connecticut gun shop - “a convenient, one-stop shopping place for violent and prolific narcotics traffickers, convicted felons and other prohibited persons,” according to law enforcement.

D’Andrea’s gun store sold hundreds of guns to gangsters and drug traffickers and was cited for hundreds of legal violations.

Weak gun laws allowed D’Andrea to stay in business for more than two decades, until he was finally arrested and pled guilty to violating federal gun law..

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This report goes inside the gun stores to reveal the ways that licensed gun dealers enable gun traffickers to acquire guns for the illegal market through large-volume sales of handguns, sales to the same buyer over and over, sales to straw purchasers, repeated sales of the same model gun, and sales to traffickers at gun shows.

All of these mechanisms have clear red-flags for the gun dealer, yet the dealers completed the sales anyway. While the gunrunners in each case were prosecuted, the dealers remain open for business.

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This report shows how the National Rifle Association's claim that we just need to "fully enforce existing federal gun laws" rather than "pass new gun laws" is utter hypocrisy. It exposes how the NRA has tirelessly worked to handcuff the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF) to prevent the enforcement of federal gun laws.

The NRA: A Criminal's Best Friend examines decades of concerted NRA action, illustrating how the NRA's campaign against federal gun law enforcers has made it far too easy for gun traffickers and criminals to obtain firearms. It reveals how the NRA has undermined ATF's ability to crack down on rogue gun dealers and prevent illegal sales at gun shows. It shows how the NRA has repeatedly attacked ATF agents for doing their jobs, branding them as "a jack-booted group of fascists" and comparing them to Nazis and murderers. It reveals the NRA's true colors, as a criminal's best friend.

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"Trivial Violations"? examines every published Federal court decision over the last five years — 21 in all — in which gun dealers challenged ATF's license termination actions. Instead of "trivial violations," as the supporters of H.R. 5092 allege dealers commit before having their licenses terminated by ATF, the cases are replete with frequent and serious illegal conduct by dealers, including:

• Selling guns to straw buyers, and even advising criminals to bring straw buyers into the store to fill out the paperwork;
• Selling an assault pistol with its serial number obliterated;
• Selling guns to juveniles;
• Having no record of sale for hundreds or thousands of firearms that were acquired by the dealer but were no longer in store inventory;
• Failing to conduct Brady background checks on gun buyers.

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Lethal Lou's exposes Lou's Loan's twenty year history of supplying guns used in crime. Lou's Loan of Upper Darby, Pennsylvania sold guns used in crime for over two decades, yet its license was not revoked by federal law enforcement authorities until this summer.

Drawing on exclusive interviews obtained by the Brady Center with a former employee of Lou's, a former gun trafficker who purchased numerous guns from Lou's, and law enforcement officials, Lethal Lou's chronicles how for years the shop sold guns to gun traffickers and straw purchasers, including Saad Abdul Salaam, who supplied a co-conspirator in the 1993 World Trade Center bombing.

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Death Valley profiles rogue gun dealer Valley Gun of Baltimore, Maryland. Valley Gun, owned by NRA Board Member Sandy Abrams, is one of the leading suppliers of crime guns in America, ranking 37 out of nearly 80,000 gun dealers nationwide in total crime guns traced to their stores. The Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives has documented over 900 violations of federal law at Valley Gun, including illegal gun sales.

The report exposes how the NRA has come to Sandy Abrams' defense, providing him with an attorney to help him continue selling guns and re-electing him to its Board despite his many legal violations. The NRA is also lobbying Congress to pass legislation which would gut ATF's ability to revoke corrupt gun dealers' firearms licenses and allow shops with revoked licenses to continue selling guns through years of legal appealse.

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Trading In Death profiles rogue gun dealer Trader Sports of San Leandro, California. Trader Sports has been the second largest supplier of crime guns of any retailer in the nation. In 2005, 447 crime guns were traced to Trader Sports. Law enforcement has also repeatedly cited Trader Sports for massive violations of federal law, including failing to account for at least 1,723 guns reported as acquired by Trader Sports but missing from its inventory with no record of sale.

Trader Sports' federal firearms license was revoked in 2006, although the shop is challenging this license revocation in the courts. Trader Sports has also encouraged Congress to enact gun lobby-backed legislation that could allow the gun shop to continue operating, despite revocation of its license, through years of litigation.

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In the first report of Gun Industry Watch, Without A Trace exposes how the gun lobby, working with the Bush Administration and its allies in Congress, has protected corrupt gun dealers by systematically blocking the release of information identifying the gun dealers responsible for selling most of the crime guns recovered in America. Without a Trace explains the development and value of ATF's crime gun trace data - data which has established that strong gun laws have a profound impact on access to guns by criminals in the illegal market, and identified the gun manufacturers, distributors, and dealers most responsible for supplying crime guns.

Without A Trace exposes the gun lobby's efforts in Congress to prevent ATF from releasing any more crime gun trace data, thereby helping the gun industry cover up its participation in supplying the illegal gun market.

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