How Can You Find Out If A Gun Is Registered In Your Name

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The federal Gun Command Act of 1968 mandated that all firearms take a serial number and that anybody who buys a gun fill out federal Form 4473. The class records the name, address, driver'due south license information and background check data of the buyer as well as the model and serial number of the gun. Licensed gun dealers are required to go on these forms for as long every bit they are in business organisation, then surrender them to the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF). If you are a police officer, you can trace a gun past accessing an ATF data organization chosen "eTrace."

Recover a gun y'all desire to trace. Write downwards the serial number on the gun if it is available. If y'all are trying to trace a gun without a serial number, submit the weapon to the ATF where various techniques may be used to recover serial numbers that accept been mechanically or chemically removed from legally manufactured firearms.

Read More: How to Search for Serial Numbers on Guns

Log on to the eTrace website at https://www.atfonline.gov/etrace. Enter the manufacturer, blazon, caliber, butt length and serial number of the weapon. The ATF answers critical trace requests within 24 hours.

Print out the ATF trace response. The 1-page trace response will include the manufacturer, wholesale gun dealer and retail gun dealer who sold the weapon. The trace response will likewise list previous trace requests for the same weapon.

Get to the retail gun dealer who sold the firearm to a customer. Examine the Form 4473 for that weapon. Determine the offset retail customer for that weapon.

Interrogate the offset retail owner of the weapon. Decide if he sold the weapon and if he required the buyer to complete Course 4473. The last owner of a firearm to consummate Form 4473 is usually called the "registered owner."

Warnings

Firearms are sometimes sold in casual transactions without the completion of Form 4473.

Some firearms manufactured earlier 1968 or exterior of the Us are not marked with series numbers.

Tips

New York, Maryland, California, New Bailiwick of jersey, and Massachusetts as well continue detailed records, similar to the information recorded on Class 4473, of firearms sold in those states.