(WXYZ) — Ghost guns are a serious problem including in Detroit. Just three weeks ago police and the ATF put it all on the table after a bust on the east side - several guns used by gangs in shootings including one involving a child.
Some of the guns on the table were ghost guns Police Chief James Craig said were made inside a house.
“A manufacturing operation in a residential community,” he called it.
How easy it is? Kits called Buy, Build and Shoot are for sale online. The company that makes there was raided by the ATF in December but is still in business. Some websites show the kits are sold out.
Tom Lambert is the legislative Director of Michigan Open Carry.
He tells 7 Action News, “with $5 you can go down to your local hardware store and purchase the materials to make a firearm.”
That’s if you know what you’re doing.
Jayson Bauer is a federally licensed small arms dealer in Warren. He buys parts, makes them into guns, and sells them legally. He says there’s an 80% rule enforced by the feds. You can’t just go buy Lego pieces and put a gun together.
“It doesn’t work like that. Unfortunately, the ATF looks at a firearm it has to be less than 80% completed in order for it to be shipped to your home,” Bauer says.
The Second Amendment gun advocates say the bad guys will do what it takes to get ghost guns and ignore what’s illegal.
Lambert says, “Why in the world would a criminal go tell the police or the government that they have a firearm they can’t possess.”
Terry L. Johnson is a metro Detroit attorney and Vice President of Firearms Legal Protection.
He tells 7 Action News, “It’s just another gun grab. There’s no law or proposed law that Joe Biden is putting on the books that would have stopped anything that’s happened.”
During the Biden event at the White House, the Attorney General said the Justice Department will be issuing a proposed rule limiting ghost guns within 30 days. But no details have been released.
