Bad FFL experience in FL.

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Hoplophile

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Wednesday: I call to inform him I'm having a rifle transferred to him. Out of curiosity, I ask him what he has in stock. I ask him if he has any AK type rifles. He says no, and I ask him if he has any Saigas, and he politely informs me that Saigas explode and are unsafe to fire. Okay, fine. I'm not going to argue.

Friday: Rifle arrives at FFL.

Okay, here we need an explanation: I'm a college student. I live in Student Housing, off campus, not owned by the college. It's private. It's arranged such that everything, utilities included, is included in the rent. College students have two addresses: Their hometown address, where they stay during breaks, and their school address. There are no utility bills here and my driver's license is from my hometown.

Sunday: I drive 40 minutes to sign my papers (I get lost a lot). Owner repeatedly asks me for my CCW. I inform him that I am 19 and do not have a CCW, and thusly must, per Florida law, wait three days after signing. This does not stop him from asking for my CCW again. I go in and he asks me if I'm here for the "romanian thing or whatever". I say yes, and fill out the paperwork, making the Ultimate FFL Transfer Mistake: I put my school residence on the paperwork. It did not match my driver's license. Instantly, I was flagged as a wanted terrorist, placed on the no-fly list, wiretapped, and actually told to leave.

I drive home and ask for a copy of my lease, the ONLY thing I can get out of the apartment staff. I call FFL and inform him that I cannot present him with a utility bill. He says that won't work, and I ask if I can simply go get a new license. He tells me to call another FFL, because he "doesn't know what's up with why I have two addresses", a clear sign of being an anti-American flag burner who routinely melts down 1911s. He thusly had my rifle (for which I paid quite a chunk of money for) and refused to do business with me. That made me nervous.

To his credit, the very next day, I found a slightly more expensive FFL and asked him to transfer the rifle there. It was there that very afternoon, for which I'm thankful. I picked the rifle up and I've enjoyed it thoroughly since. Whether he just wanted to dump it off on someone else ASAP or he wanted to make up for being unable to render me a service is another matter.

Do I understand how pissy the ATF is? Yes, I do. I don't want to get anyone in trouble, but he lives in a college town, he should know why I have two addresses. I'm apparently not allowed to change my address on the form, so I understand that too. Regardless, I felt treated like a criminal. I get that he wanted to cover his own ass, but he does so at the expense of someone who specifically chose him on the advice of friends. Also, to refuse to deal with me kind of made me wonder if I'd be allowed to take possession of my rifle. The idea of having a completely clean record and STILL being denied a rifle is sort of frightening, isn't it? I haven't got so much as a speeding ticket on my record! He apparently told the story to the new FFL, who was a bit more understanding.

I acknowledge that it may have been I who was wrong, but I'm not sure. If I wasn't in the wrong here, I'll tell others who it was, but I won't cost the man business if I was truly the jerk in this situation.

Judge me, THR. Spare me no flame, but tell me if I'm wrong here.
 
while it does not sound like he handled it well, obviously you are aware of mistakes you made in the transaction. You HOME address is your legal address. Your college address is you temparary address.

Hope it all works out for you.
 
Your address HAS to match your government ID, no questions. It's their butt they are covering as they can lose everything.

BTW, he does not sound that smart.
 
The businessman has the FFL license, he's held to a higher standard of knowledge. He's the one who should have reminded you that if you are a student, you need to put down the address on your picture I.D.

The FFL's I've bought from have 'coached' me on what the BATF wants on the form. Here in Nevada, putting down your full middle name (not an initial) is something that the BATF gets on FFL's about. The last revolver I purchased they told me that I needed to put down my full middle name--no big deal. They don't have a hassle with the BATF and I get the gun.

I darn sure wouldn't deal with this guy again and I wouldn't beat myself up over this numbskulls' actions. Congrats on the new gun, and get yourself down to the range. Gun therapy time!!!
 
I have my PO Box address on my ID. I've bought from several gun shops locally and have not had a problem buying guns. We have gun registration here in Hawaii and the local PD registers the guns and the PO Box address on my ID doesn't cause a problem with them either.
 
I have bought many guns while in Florida as a college student, here is my understanding. In the state of Florida you can only buy a gun if you are a resident of Florida. Now I will use the term resident loosely because you dont have to be a resident, just have a Florida address. What the gun shop guy should have told you is that you need to go to the DMV and get an ID card with your name and Florida address on it. The gun shop near my school use to use school id's as verification that one was a student and thus had a temporary address in Florida. However after being audited by the ATF, that changed to "you have to have a Florida ID". You can easily get an ID card from the DMV with your name and temporary address. (ID card, not driver's license) I would recomend you doing this before trying to transfer or buy another gun in Florida. Thats what I did and never had a problem.
 
I also bought several guns in FL while I was a college student there. The FFL I dealt with was great. I put my MD address from my MD license on the paperwork, and he sold me rifles at age 19 with no problem and no waiting period (FL only has a waiting period for handguns with no CCW License). When I wished to buy a handgun, I changed my residence to FL, got a FL drivers license to match my address in FL, and bought a handgun. I had a CCW, so no wait.
Now I'm active duty military, and Texas is my legal state of residence. I'm on temporary duty in Arkansas, and I bought a rifle at a gun show a couple weeks ago. I started filling out the papers with my temporary Arkansas address, which is not on any of my ID's. I politely told the dealer I had made a mistake and he ripped up the form and gave me a fresh one, which I put my legal address from my DL on. No problems. Sounds like your dealer is just being a pain.
 
Let me take a guess - is this one of our wonderful Orlando FFL's that I constantly complain about? You are lucky to find one that would be bothered to do a transfer for you at all. The 3rd degree treatment is free.
 
you can buy rifles as a resident from any state (Assuming the rifle ur buying is legal in your home state).. handguns only require Florida resident. There is no 3 day wait on rifles or shotguns, CCW or not. The guy is a moron.. dont go there and spread the work.. I dont like bad business practices of alot of FFLs.
 
This FFL was around Tampa, FL. I'm not sure how well-known he is, but he owns a range around here.

Thanks for the feedback, keep it comin'.
 
UPDATE: I just got off the phone with a police detective. He wants to meet with me on Tuesday. Apparently, the first FFL called the police. I don't know why. This definitely far departs from "refusing to do business with".

I'm not gonna jump the gun and post the unedited story, but on Tuesday, if I don't like what I hear, I'm going public.

I wonder if anyone will come to my defense if I need to go to court to exercise the rights I was born with. I can't afford a lawyer.
 
I don't want to step on toes, but I ran into something that might help;

as per the BATFE, their FEDERAL FIREARMS REGULATIONS (2005) on page 126 and 127. It states that:

"State of residence" is defined by
regulation in 27 CFR 178.11 as the
State in which an individual regularly
resides or maintains a home.
The regulation also provides an example
of an individual who maintains a
home in State X and a home in State
Y. The individual regularly resides in
State X except for the summer
months and in State Y for the summer
months of the year. The regulation
states that during the time the individ-
ual actually resides in State X he is a
resident of State X, and during the
time he actually resides in State Y he
is a resident of State Y.

Applying the above example to out-
of-State college students it is held,
that during the time the students ac-
tually reside in a college dormitory or
at an off-campus location they are
considered residents of the State
where the dormitory or off-campus
home is located. During the time out-
of-State college students actually
reside in their home State they are
considered residents of their home
State.



I called the Regional office of the BATFE to confirm this. The man I spoke with was very helpful, he confirmed everything listed in the above regulation.
 
I wouldn't talk to the police without a lawyer - you've done nothing wrong, no crime occured you have nothing to gain by doing so.

They will try to build a case against you for anything they can find. I would contact the LEO under the pretext of rescheduling the appointment. Ask for the scope of the meeting/what kinds of questions will be asked (DO NOT ANSWER ANYTHING OVER THE PHONE!!! IT IS RECORDED!) I would also use this line: "Sure Detective, I'll be happy to answer all of your questions after the D.A. grants me full immunity in writing from any investigation based on testimony I may freely provide."

I bet you $100 that they won't be very interested in talking to you under those conditions. If you don't talk to them, there is no chance of them using your words against you, and they don't have a case and they go away.


IANAL, but thats how I would handle the situation if I were in your shoes.

Good luck!
 
I would tell the cops sorry, but you are too busy to talk to them.

There is no good that can come of it. As another poster said, they will be looking for a way to try to nail you for something!! They might interpret the "you must be a resident to buy a gun" thing a little too tightly, and the next thing you know, you will be charged with a firearms violation.

Do not talk to them! If they arrest you, you may only repeat one phrase:
"I WANT A LAWYER!"
 
Do not talk to the police. It's an extremely bad idea.

The problem is that you want to help them, because we've all been trained to be helpful to the police. But in this case, you're the object of their investigation. Anything you say CAN AND WILL be used AGAINST YOU in a court of law. That sound familiar? It's true.

On the other hand, most folks don't realize this, but anything you say that helps you CAN'T be used BY YOU if you ever show up in court.

That's because there's a rule against hearsay. Anything you said to the cops out of court is hearsay. There's an exception that allows them to bring anything you said that hurts you (it's called an admission against penal interest) but anything you say that helps you won't be admissible at trial.

So nothing you tell the cops will ever help you.

Let's apply it to the case here. If you don't talk to the cops, they will either charge you with something based on what they already know, and you'll have to defend yourself. Or they'll drop it because they don't have enough evidence of wrongdoing.

On the other hand, if you go talk to them, they will use the bad things to say to hurt you. If you say things that would normally seem like they'd help you, they'll assume you're lying to save yourself. So they'll still probably charge you with a crime.

You really need to call and cancel your appointment with the cops. If you can't get in touch with them to cancel, just don't go. It's not illegal to blow off an appointment to talk to the cops.

Seriously, whatever you do, don't ever talk to the cops without a lawyer present. Don't say anything, no matter how innocent it seems.

Finally, as I've seen someone else on here say, I'm a lawyer, but I'm not your lawyer.

Aaron
 
gosh and I though the Orlando FFL's were a PITA!

Good Luck and Best Wishes. Please post this guy's business name so others can avoid him like the plague.
 
What is it with FL dealers?

The ones around the west palm area are the WORST places to deal with as well.
 
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