Sarah Hopkins provided the guns as a Straw Buyer to the Kansas shooter. Here is a new plank for the antigun crowd.  As long as there are fat ugly chicks with little or no self esteem and Spandex made in sizes ranging from Large to XXX large convicted felons will get guns.  I do not use shooters names, preferring not to give them the notoriety some of them seek.  

She ended a relationship with him seven months ago. She purchased the guns from a pawn shop and gave them to him.  When they broke up she had to get the Newton police to help her get them back. Then she turns around and gives the guns back to him.

So it looks like the police might have had the opportunity to arrest him as a convicted felon in possession of a firearm.  I say might have, because the Kansas statute is conditional, in that it requires a conviction for specific crimes.  My understanding is that all of his felony convictions occurred in Florida.

A cautious prosecutor in Kansas may have been unwilling to charge based on an NCIC or III criminal history hit. This means that officers would have had to request certified copies of his convictions or his “prison pen pack” in order to satisfy a prosecutor, that he met the criteria for prosecution under Kansas law.  If that is the case, it is not something that happens overnight, despite what they say on the latest TV police show.

The other thing that the press misses is that Federal Law is pretty useless without a Federal Investigator.  City, County and State cops arrest people all the time and those people get charged in Federal Court.  But they get charged in Federal Court after a Federal officer arranges to adopt the case.

What I am saying is to the average patrol officer Federal Law may has well be written in Sanskrit. They may not be aware that a particular fact situation lends itself to federal prosecution.

To give ATF their due, of all the Federal Agencies their investigators were the most approachable.  Every once in a while one would show up unannounced and say I heard about this arrest, let me see the paperwork, maybe I can take this guy off your hands.

Working narcotics we made a lot of felon in possession cases and had a good working relationship with ATF.  When executing search warrants it was not unusual to recover firearms and the all important box they came in.  Almost invariably the receipt for the transaction was in the box and nine times out of ten, girlfriend’s name was on the receipt.

We almost never were able to obtain a charge against the girlfriend for making a straw purchase.  We almost never were able to make a drug case against the girlfriend even when the drugs were in her home, stashed in her underwear drawer.

The reluctance, of the AUSA to charge stemmed in part from the belief that the girlfriend was trapped in a situation, not entirely of her making.  Due to economic or family violence factors her ability to refuse was limited.

Generally, I agree.  However there were lesser charges available  “keeping a dope house” or “Straw purchase”. Each is a two year felony upon conviction, rather than a ten year hit. Under two years is important in the Federal system because it opens up possibilities for community supervision.

If you want to tighten up on the availability off firearms to felons, I suggest banning fat ugly chicks wearing spandex from purchasing firearms. Try this the next time you go to a gun show.  Find a fat ugly chick in spandex, follow her around, from about 30 feet away.  I guarantee you won’t be able to make a complete pass of the venue before you find a couple of scumbags traveling along in her substantial wake.

It makes as much sense as anything the liberals are proposing.