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Arms trafficking or gunrunning is the illicit trade of contraband small arms, explosives, and ammunition, which constitutes part of a broad range of illegal activities often associated with transnational criminal organizations. The illegal trade of small arms, unlike other organized crime commodities, is more closely associated with exercising power in communities instead of achieving economic gain. Scholars estimate illegal arms transactions amount to over US$1 billion annually.
The Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (BATFE), commonly referred to as the ATF, is a domestic law enforcement agency within the United States Department of Justice. Its responsibilities include the investigation and prevention of federal offenses involving the unlawful use, manufacture, and possession of firearms and explosives; acts of arson and bombings; and illegal trafficking and tax evasion of alcohol and tobacco products. The ATF also regulates via licensing the sale, possession, and transportation of firearms, ammunition, and explosives in interstate commerce. Many of the ATF's activities are carried out in conjunction with task forces made up of state and local law enforcement officers, such as Project Safe Neighborhoods. The ATF operates a unique fire research laboratory in Beltsville, Maryland, where full-scale mock-ups of criminal arson can be reconstructed. The ATF had 5,285 employees and an annual budget of almost $1.5 billion in 2021. The ATF has received criticism over its handling of the Ruby Ridge siege, the Waco siege and other incidents.
In the United States, a gun show is an event where promoters generally rent large public venues and then rent tables for display areas for dealers of guns and related items, and charge admission for buyers. The majority of guns for sale at gun shows are modern sporting firearms. Approximately 5,000 gun shows occur annually in the United States.
Sex trafficking is human trafficking for the purpose of sexual exploitation. It has been called a form of modern slavery because of the way victims are forced into sexual acts non-consensually, in a form of sexual slavery. Perpetrators of the crime are called sex traffickers or pimps—people who manipulate victims to engage in various forms of commercial sex with paying customers. Sex traffickers use force, fraud, and coercion as they recruit, transport, and provide their victims as prostitutes. Sometimes victims are brought into a situation of dependency on their trafficker(s), financially or emotionally. Every aspect of sex trafficking is considered a crime, from acquisition to transportation and exploitation of victims. This includes any sexual exploitation of adults or minors, including child sex tourism (CST) and domestic minor sex trafficking (DMST).
The Firearm Owners' Protection Act (FOPA) of 1986 is a United States federal law that revised many provisions of the Gun Control Act of 1968.
Gun show loophole is a political term in the United States referring to the sale of firearms by private sellers, including those done at gun shows, that do not require the seller to conduct a federal background check of the buyer. This is also called the private sale exemption. Under U.S. federal law, any person may sell a firearm to a federally unlicensed resident of the state where they reside, as long as they do not know or have reasonable cause to believe that the person is prohibited from receiving or possessing firearms.
Forced prostitution, also known as involuntary prostitution or compulsory prostitution, is prostitution or sexual slavery that takes place as a result of coercion by a third party. The terms "forced prostitution" or "enforced prostitution" appear in international and humanitarian conventions, such as the Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court, but have been inconsistently applied. "Forced prostitution" refers to conditions of control over a person who is coerced by another to engage in sexual activity.
Anne Melissa Milgram is an American attorney and academic who currently serves as Administrator of the Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) since 2021. She previously served as the 57th Attorney General of New Jersey from 2007 to 2010.
The Youth Crime Gun Interdiction Initiative (YCGII) was led by the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF) during the late-1990s. The program aimed to increase firearm tracing of firearms recovered by law enforcement agencies, learn more about how juveniles and youth obtain firearms, and develop strategies to deal with problems involving illegally obtained firearms.
In the United States, the right to keep and bear arms is modulated by a variety of state and federal statutes. These laws generally regulate the manufacture, trade, possession, transfer, record keeping, transport, and destruction of firearms, ammunition, and firearms accessories. They are enforced by state, local and the federal agencies which include the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF).
Everytown for Gun Safety is an American nonprofit organization which advocates for gun control and against gun violence. Everytown was formed in 2013 due to a merger between Mayors Against Illegal Guns and Moms Demand Action for Gun Sense in America.
Russel Timoshenko was a 23-year-old New York Police Department (NYPD) police officer who was shot on July 9, 2007, and died five days later, after pulling over a stolen BMW automobile in New York City's Crown Heights, Brooklyn, neighborhood. After a four-day manhunt that stretched across three states, all three suspects Dexter Bostic, Robert Ellis and Lee Woods were eventually apprehended and convicted—two of murder, and the third for weapons possession. At his widely attended funeral, Timoshenko was posthumously promoted to the rank of Detective. The case garnered national media attention because the weapons used were all illegally obtained handguns. This sparked widespread debate over gun control laws in New York City, and over the process by which firearms are traced by police departments.
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The United Blood Nation, also known as the East Coast Bloods, is a street and prison gang active primarily in the New York metropolitan area. It is the east coast faction of the California-based Bloods street gang. Their main source of income is the trafficking and sale of illegal drugs.
Project Gunrunner is a project of the U.S. Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF) intended to stem the flow of firearms into Mexico, in an attempt to deprive the Mexican drug cartels of weapons.
In the United States, human trafficking tends to occur around international travel hubs with large immigrant populations, notably in California, Texas, and Georgia. Those trafficked include young children, teenagers, men, and women; victims can be domestic citizens or foreign nationals.
eTrace is an Internet-based firearm trace request submission system, developed by the United States' federal government, Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives, that provides for the electronic exchange of traced firearm data in a secure internet-based environment. Participating law enforcement agencies with access to the internet can acquire 24/7 real-time capabilities to electronically submit firearm trace requests, monitor the progress of traces, retrieve completed trace results, and to query firearm trace related data in Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF) firearms registration database at the National Tracing Center. Firearms tracing is the systematic tracking of the movement of a firearm from its creation by the manufacturer or its introduction into U.S. commerce by the importer, through the distribution chain to the first retail purchase. Release 4.0, a bilingual version of eTrace was deployed in December, 2009 for the benefit of Spanish-speaking countries.
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Mexicans have a right to own firearms, but legal purchase from the single Mexican gun shop in Mexico City, controlled by the Army, is extremely difficult. In other cases the guns are obtained through Guatemalan borders, or stolen from the police or military, or bought from corrupt officials. Consequently, black market firearms are widely available. Many firearms are acquired in the U.S. by women with no criminal history, who transfer their purchases to smugglers through relatives, boyfriends and acquaintances who then smuggle them to Mexico a few at a time. The most common smuggled firearms include AR-15 and AK-47 type rifles, and FN 5.7 caliber semi-automatic pistols. Many firearms are purchased in the United States in a semi-automatic configuration before being converted to fire as select fire machine guns. In 2009, a combined total of more than 4,400 firearms of the AK-47 and AR-15 type, and 30% of AK-47 type semi-automatic rifles seized in Mexico have been modified as select fire weapons.
References
- ↑ Enos, Sandra L. (2012). "Iron Pipeline". In Carter, Gregg Lee (ed.). Guns in American Society: An Encyclopedia of History, Politics, Culture, and the Law. Santa Barbara, cA: ABC-CLIO. pp. 440–44. ISBN 9780313386701 . Retrieved May 7, 2015.
- ↑ Wintemute, Garen J. (2002). "Where the Guns Come from: The Gun Industry and Gun Commerce" (PDF). The Future of Children . 12 (2): 54–71. doi:10.2307/1602738. JSTOR 1602738. PMID 12194613.
- ↑ Spitzer, Robert (2015). Guns Across America: Reconciling Gun Rules and Rights. Oxford: Oxford University Press. p. 168. ISBN 9780190228583.
- ↑ O'Shaughnessy, Patrice (January 15, 2006). "Battling Merchants of Death on City's Streets: In a Deadly Game of Cat and Mouse, Cops Hunt Illegal Guns Coming from Out of State". Daily News . New York. Retrieved May 7, 2015.
- ↑ Mandell, Meredith; Llorente, Elizabeth. "Smugglers Flood N.J. with Guns". The Record . Woodland Park, NJ. Retrieved February 17, 2015.
- ↑ White, Lawrence. "The Iron Pipeline of Illegal Guns". Times Union . Albany, NY. Retrieved February 17, 2015.
- ↑ "NYC Police Make 'Largest-Ever Gun Bust'". Al Jazeera America . Retrieved February 17, 2015.
- ↑ Taylor, Marisa. "Gun Law Loophole Could Have Provided Brinsley's Murder Weapon, Say Experts". Al Jazeera America. Retrieved February 17, 2015.
- ↑ Feinblatt, John. "Death Rides the Iron Pipeline". Daily News. New York. Retrieved February 17, 2015.
- ↑ "The Iron Pipeline Thrives". The New York Times (Editorial). Retrieved February 17, 2015.
- ↑ Dys, Andrew. "Man Pleads Guilty in Rock Hill-to-New York City 'Iron Pipeline' Case". The Herald . Rock Hill, SC. Archived from the original on February 17, 2015. Retrieved February 17, 2015.
- ↑ Klein, Allison. "In Study Of Gun Traffic, Va. Stands Out". The Washington Post . Retrieved February 17, 2015.
- ↑ Aborn, Richard. "States Must Unite to Put an End to Illegal Gun Trafficking". Opinion. Daily News. New York. Retrieved February 17, 2015.
- ↑ "Trekking North: Most Guns Recovered from Crime Scenes Come from Ten Lax States". The Economist . September 30, 2010. Retrieved May 7, 2015.
- ↑ "Sen. Schumer Demands Crackdown on 'Iron Pipeline' Following NYPD Officer's Death". CBS New York. New York: WCBS-AM. May 6, 2015. Retrieved May 7, 2015.
- ↑ "Shutting Down the 'Iron Pipeline'". The New York Times. May 8, 2003. p. A36.
- ↑ Smith, Aaron (January 19, 2016). "How the Iron Pipeline funnels guns into cities with tough gun laws". CNN. Retrieved July 3, 2016.
- ↑ 56 Suffolk Law Review 1 (2023).
Contrast this with the "Iron River" of guns, flowing from the US to other countries. See William Slomanson, Iron River Case: Blueprint for Gun Trafficking Analytics, 56 Suffolk Univ. Law Rev. 1 (2023).