Brady, Team ENOUGH Release Video Showing Ghost Guns Threat to Communities

HIGHLIGHTING THE GROWING ISSUE OF UNTRACEABLE FIREARMS, BRADY RELEASES NEW VIDEO SHOWING THE EASE OF PURCHASING AND ASSEMBLING A ‘GHOST GUN’ KIT

Following President Biden’s instruction to the U.S. Department of Justice to help stop the proliferation of ghost guns, Brady and Team ENOUGH released a new video showing Team ENOUGH Executive Council member Stephan Abrams purchase of a ghost gun kit. This video demonstrates how any person can purchase the parts needed to assemble a fully functioning firearm without any background check or other public safety regulation, as Abrams, then a minor, was able to order this kit online. Brady and Team ENOUGH call on state legislatures across the country to do everything in their power to stop the proliferation of these weapons. As President Biden shared yesterday and as this video shows, it cannot be this easy for any person to purchase a firearm.

Team ENOUGH Executive Council Member Stephan Abrams shared:

“Purchasing a kit and assembling a ghost gun is dangerously simple, underscoring how accessible these untraceable firearms are to any person, including those who should be prohibited from buying a firearm. As a minor when I purchased this kit, I was prohibited from purchasing a firearm, yet could easily purchase all the parts. These kits are designed and marketed as a way to skirt existing gun laws, making it easier for individuals who should not possess a firearm to acquire one. Overwhelming majorities of Americans support common-sense measures like universal background checks to stop just this from occurring. I hope this video demonstrates the ease of acquiring a ghost gun kit and therefore the danger that these weapons present to the public.”

Brady Program Manager Steve Lindley, the former Chief of the California Department of Justice’s Bureau of Firearms, added:

“This video shows a 17-year-old easily purchasing a ghost gun kit online, with no background check and no questions asked. I watched ghost guns emerge as a direct response to comprehensive gun laws. They are designed and marketed to circumvent the laws that overwhelming majorities of Americans support and that keep firearms out of the hands of those who should not have them. These untraceable firearms threaten public safety, as they can be easily purchased, assembled, and then trafficked into communities anywhere. They threaten law enforcement, as they provide an unmitigated avenue for prohibited purchasers to acquire deadly weapons. We need to close this dangerous loophole in our laws at once.”

About Ghost Guns

Ghost guns are unserialized and untraceable firearms that are often made from "ghost gun kits," that can be bought online, at gun shows or at gun stores and assembled at home. "Ghost gun kits," include all of the parts and often the equipment necessary to build these weapons at home. These kits are widely available and can be purchased by anyone, including prohibited purchasers, domestic abusers, and gun traffickers — without a background check. As these kits and guns are sold at gun shows and online every day throughout the country, they undermine all of the life-saving policies that state legislatures have fought so hard to put in place. We have seen ghost guns used in crimes already, such as in New York, where six-year-old Miguel Everson was shot in the back by his uncle, who was a prohibited purchaser but obtained a ghost gun, and in the 2019 Saugus High School Shooting, where a minor used a .45 caliber pistol that was assembled from a kit.

This is a growing concern, as:

• The ATF estimated that in just 2019, over 10,000 ghost guns were recovered by law enforcement.

• The CA Bureau of Firearms seized 512 percent more ghost guns from persons identified through the Armed Prohibited Persons System database in 2019 than in 2018.

• In January 2020, the ATF’s Los Angeles Field Division reported that over 40 percent of its cases involved ghost guns.

• In just one week in January 2021, 17 percent of firearms recovered by the Metropolitan Police Department in Washington, DC were ghost guns.

• In San Francisco, the number of ghost guns seized by local law enforcement jumped 600 percent between 2017 and 2019

• In Onondaga County, in New York State the number of ghost guns recovered jumped 188 percent between 2018 and 2019 and in 2020, the county was again on track to break their record for recoveries - halfway through the year, more ghost guns had been recovered than in all of 2019.

• Ghost guns have been used in a wide variety of crimes in all over the country, including homicides, robberies, school shootings, mass shootings, killings of law enforcement, and domestic violence.

About Brady’s First-of-its-Kind Lawsuit, McFadyen v. Ghost Gunner Inc.

Represented by Brady and the international law firm Orrick, Herrington, & Sutcliffe the survivors and the families of the people killed in the 2017 mass shooting in Rancho Tehama, California, recently brought forward McFadyen v. GhostGunner Inc., the nation’s first two civil lawsuits by victims of gun violence against the ghost gun industry.

Plaintiffs allege in the complaint that the defendants have chosen to engage in a business that utilizes online loopholes that enable prohibited purchasers to acquire weapons without a Brady Background Check or any interaction with a Federal Firearms Licensee (FFL). In doing so, Brady alleges that the defendants have chosen to intentionally undermine federal and state gun laws by designing, marketing, and selling ghost gun kits and firearms parts, which allowed the Rancho Tehama gunman, who was barred from purchasing or possessing a firearm, to obtain two AR-15-style ghost guns. During the gunman’s shooting spree in November 2017, he killed five people and injured 18 others at eight separate crime scenes, including an elementary school.