Eric M. Larson P.O. Box 5497 Takoma Park, Maryland 20913 (301) 270-3450 larsone@erols.com January 29, 2000 The Honorable Jim Kolbe, Chairman Subcommittee on Treasury, Postal Service and General Government B-307 Rayburn House Office Building Washington, D.C. 20515 Dear Mr. Chairman: I am enclosing a copy of ATF's plan to correct some (but not nearly all) of the errors the Treasury Department Office of Inspector General (IG) identified in ATF's firearm registration data base. I will refer to this document in my upcoming testimony, but want to point out two things: 1. ATF's plan may establish an orderly process on record to try and ensure that registered NFA firearms in estates are transferred to qualified persons after the owners' death, in year 2000 and thereafter. But how would ATF's plan reach the heirs of people who died 20 or 30 or more years ago, many of whom aren't in the mainstream of gun collecting. How does ATF propose to evaluate its plan, which is supposed to address this problem and doesn't? To many heirs the gun is simply an heirloom stuck in a closet, den or attic; they have no reason to contact ATF or read anything on ATF's Web Site. These firearms would still not be effectively controlled. 2. ATF's memo appears to be partially incorrect. ATF states: "We found that while we can match names in our locator systems, such as decedent files maintained by the Social Security Administration, we cannot identify whether the record is for our registrant because some of the information (e.g., date of birth, social security number) is not on the registration documents." ATF's statement is true for the earliest Form 1 registrations, which do not list name or social security number. But on page 61 of my 1997 testimony is a copy of a Form 4467showing date of birth and social security number are required data fields. I also note on page 78 that 58,904 NFA firearms were registered or transferred in 1968, according to ATF's 1996 data; 54,505 of the 58,904 (about 93%) were registered on Form 4467 during the 1968 amnesty period. Further, according to ATF, 50,314 of the total 58,904 (about 85%) are still registered to their 1968 owners. Thus, the majority of guns which the IG identified as being at risk of being registered to deceased persons are registered on Forms 4467. To the extent ATF's records have this information (social security death records, which are virtually 100 percent complete, include the last address of the deceased, which ATF may not have), it may be a more reliable and cost-effective way to locate at least some address. page 2 But there is more to question about ATF's plan, as follows. To the extent that ATF's Form 4467 records may not contain date of birth and social security number, one could reasonably question both the completeness of ATF's records and the extent to which ATF's current plan is likely to successfully correct an inaccurate record that is now more than 30 years old. ATF states that it plans to "Send a notice concerning updating the registry to registrants we have complete addresses for." This is a very troublesome admission, but it seems to be a true fact, because otherwise ATF would have no logical reason to make such a statement. Since the registry is _already_ [NOTE: "already" is underlined in Larson's letter] supposed to contain current and accurate addresses for the owners of all registered NFA firearms, so the firearms can be controlled as the Congress intends, the fact that ATF has stated that it apparently does not have complete addresses, seems to be further cause for concern and all the more reason to establish a new amnesty period. How else can these records logically be corrected? Mr. Chairman, a national, well-publicized amnesty is likely to be the most effective way to correct all the foregoing records, in my opinion, because it would reach the most people, and an amnesty would be fair. An amnesty would strengthen ATF's records and future court cases, and increase public and Congressional confidence in its firearm registration practices, but ATF has apparently not considered those benefits. Sincerely, (signed---Eric M. Larson) Enclosure