We’ve seen it dozens of times before. An Anti-gun group decides something is horrible, dangerous, and rife with scofflaws so they do an “investigation”.
Remember with Joyce Shill Garen J. Wintemute simply walked around a gun shows and declared whether a sale was legal and which were not?
Or how about when a Boston Globe Reporter attempted to illegally buy a gun in New Hampshire?
Well Bloomberg has been going after online sales that alleged skirt background check laws. It turns out that not only were his findings, like all the others, were spurious, but this case seems directly libelous!
They “estimated” (but failed to prove) that so much as a single firearm was purchased illegally in Vermont as a result of person-to-person sales, despite their outrageous claims that made it seem commonplace.
But it gets worse.
We now know that at least six of the firearm advertisements cited in the report were not from “unlicensed private sellers” as Everytown falsely claims, but from federally licensed firearms dealer Crossfire Arms of Mount Holly, Vermont.
I spoke to Crossfire Arms owner Bobby Richards just a short time ago, and he is understandably livid about Everytown using images of six firearms that he had for sale on Armlist to help falsify the anti-gun group’s dishonest report.
Bloomberg claimed he was selling guns without a background check. Now this is 100% legal between two residents of the State of Vermont, as well as the vast majority of states in the country, but Crossfire Arms is an FFL, meaning all of his sales to private citizens MUST BY LAW go through a background check. So Bloomberg painted owner as committing MULTIPLE Federal Felonies, but felonies that would justify revocation of his license and therefore his livelihood.
This is nothing to take lightly, and he isn’t:
A Rutland County gun dealer said he has retained a Connecticut lawyer to pursue possible claims against a national gun safety group that conducted a recent sting operation for illegal gun purchases in Vermont.
…Richards said he believes Everytown misappropriated his firm’s logo for its report and defamed him as the company’s owner. The pictures of guns with watermarks showing the Mount Holly business could not be found on the website report late this week.
The Everytown report was false by characterizing both Crossfire and Richards “as vehicles for the unlicensed sale of firearms to felons, fugitives from justice, domestic violence abusers, and other unspecified criminals,” a news release said.
Richards said he and Crossfire comply with all federal and state laws pertaining to firearms.
Multiple attempts by the Burlington Free Press to reach an Everytown spokesman on Friday were unsuccessful.
From all I’m seeing, Bloomberg will likely try to settle this out of court, and if Mr. Richards accepts a settlement I’ll be perfectly happy with that, as every dollar he’s paid is a “redistribution of wealth” (I had to) from an evil anti-American organization to a small business owner, as well as dollars Bloomberg won’t have to spend stripping Vermonters or any other US Citizens of their rights.
Best wishes to Mr. Richards and Crossfire Arms. Also if you happen to live in his neck of the woods, send some business his way!
So he hired a Connecticut lawyer to sue in King Bloomberg’s court? 😉
Have no idea how the statute laws work, but I assume the actual entity that hosted the images is in Connecticut, or the lawyer there is on the NY Bar where Everytown is based.
I don’t think he can sue in Vermont because Bloomy has no operations there, but I am NOT a lawyer, and never will be! 🙂
Well, I was playing on A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur’s Court rather than commenting on jurisdiction… but generally, suit for a libel can be filed where the harm happened or where the libelous act occurred.
^^^ That said, in federal court, assuming this is going to be in federal court on diversity jurisdiction, it is generally wise to sue in a place where (in the state court) there would have been personal jurisdiction anyhow since federal courts tend to be accommodating to defendants being sued where least inconvenient. If in state court, one has the question of being best able to attach assets after the judgment. FF&C makes that doable interstate, but it’s certainly less immediate and effective to go the “get judgment in state A, take it to state B to get it enforced” route.