Hawaii

A 48-year-old man was arrested Monday at his residence and charged with possessing a fully automatic rifle in a joint sting operation conducted by the Honolulu Police Department's Career Criminal Unit and the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco & Firearms.

A federal criminal complaint charges Randy Imoto of 3024 Seaview Rise in Woodlawn with possessing a converted fully automatic SGW Model XM-15 A1 .223-caliber machine gun. He is being held by the U.S. Marshals Service until a hearing tomorrow before Magistrate Leslie Kobayashi.

This one is interesting for a number of reasons. For one, the BATF claims they uncovered the following in their search of the man's apartment (it is unclear on what authority they conducted the search):

• A handgun
• ammunition
• "drug paraphernalia"
• "child pornography"

Somehow, I have trouble believing their search warrant specified child pornography or drug paraphernalia, but they make a great way to demonize the suspect, yes?

They also claim that the individual was willing to trade two commonplace, stolen handguns for a machine gun. Somehow, that seems like a deal that's just too good to be true -- read, bait.

Senate Bill 2170 has passed to the House and is awaiting hearing in two committees. SB 2170 would PROHIBIT the sale of ammunition unless the purchaser can prove the firearm for which the ammunition is being purchased is registered. This will require retroactive registration of all long-guns in Hawaii and necessitate the creation of a new bureaucracy to track ammunition sales.

This one came from the NRA-ILA; thanks. You can use their site to contact your representatives about this bill.

From the description here, I assume that Hawaii already has handgun registration, and this bill requires that purchasers of ammunition prove that the gun is registered, thus requiring long guns to be registered if you want to shoot them. Underhanded, sneaky, and pointless.