Ghost Stories

I’ve got a ghost story for you…and it’s reeeeally scary. It goes a little something like this:

Way back in olden times, back before 1968, guns weren’t required to have serial numbers. Police never solved murders, because they couldn’t trace the gun used in the killing. Because without a serial number on the gun, they had no way of knowing who the murderer was! Scary, right?

There’s no serial number!!!

Of course, my ghost story is only partly true. While it is true that prior to the passage of the Gun Control Act of 1968 guns weren’t required by law to have a serial number, it isn’t true that murders committed with unserialized guns were unsolvable. Quite the opposite. What’s more, it turns out that tracing a serial numbered gun is almost never an essential factor in crime solving.

But bear in mind that what we’re talking about with tracing serialized guns is solving crimes after they’ve occurred. Requiring a gun to be serial numbered prevents nothing. Let’s look at two recent, high-profile crimes involving unserialized guns…

Remember this guy?

That’s Ryan Routh, who was arrested for attempting to kill then-presidential candidate Donald Trump (illegal) using a rifle with an obliterated serial number (also illegal). But the lack of a serial number had absolutely nothing to do with Routh being tracked down and arrested, and if the lack of a serial number on his gun gets him acquitted at trial, I’ll eat my hat. On top of that, he is a convicted felon and prohibited from possessing firearms in the first place, but none of these gun control laws did anything to prevent him from obtaining a gun…and none of them played a part in solving the crime.

On to our most recent example, and the catalyst for the current scaremongering over ghost guns…Luigi Mangione, accused of murdering United Healthcare CEO Brian Thompson.

According to news reports, Mangione used a 3D printed 9mm pistol (most likely only the lower frame component was 3D printed) to commit his crime. Again, tracking down and capturing the killer was obviously not dependent on a serial number from the gun, as he kept the gun with him and it was not available to law enforcement until after his arrest.

But might it be useful to have caught him with a serialized gun that could be traced to his purchase of same? Trick question! NO! You’ve still only proven that it’s his gun. Other investigative and evidentiary techniques have to be applied to prove that this was the gun used in the crime…which really isn’t all that critical when you think about it. What if the gun was never recovered at all? Do you suppose the lack of a recovered firearm would mean he gets away with it? Again, NO! There’s still plenty of other evidence to connect him with the crime.

It is important to note that Thompson’s killer used a silencer/suppressor, which also appears to have been 3D printed and thus likely unserialized. What impact does this have? None at all. For starters, use of the silencer did not (as in the movies) make the shooting undetectable. If you watch the security camera video of the shooting, which occurred during daytime on a busy New York street, you can see that others in the area were quite aware of what was happening. Also, since Mangione was captured with the silencer still in his possession, tracing a serial number is obviously unnecessary to determine that it was his.

I’d also point out that, at least as far as we know so far, there is no reason that Mangione couldn’t have purchased both the gun and silencer legally, as there doesn’t appear to be anything in his back ground that would have prevented it. Perhaps…just like the gun control crowd…he bought into the myth that serialized firearms would get him caught, or that unserialized guns would help him get away with it. Guess he’s finding out the hard way…that’s just another ghost story.