Gun show dealers discuss effort to close 'gun show loophole'

January 10, 2016 at 12:04 AM CST - Updated July 9 at 4:18 PM

BOSSIER CITY, LA (KSLA) - President Obama's effort to close the so-called gun show loophole prevents anyone without a license from selling guns.

But organizers of the first gun show in Shreveport-Bossier City said the president's executive order affects only 5 percent of their tables those that belong to unlicensed gun collectors.

Organizers of the Classic Arms Productions Gun and Knife Show in Bossier City told KSLA News 12 that Obama's order also is ineffective because such sales happen everywhere.

"If you push it as far as selling one gun to a relative as a dealer, how would that be enforced?" organizer Ben Hewett asked. "It would be impossible."

Dealers at the show said they understand what the loophole references.

"The individual walking into the gun show with a gun over his shoulder and selling it to an individual," said Larry Deason, a Baton Rouge gun dealer who has been a part of the Classic Arms show for decades. "That's not going to stop that either because you can do that outside. You can do it in the newspaper."

The gun show's organizers said the real solution to gun violence is filling in incomplete background check databases.

"The states won't release information on felons and on dangerous mentally ill people," Hewett said. "It's all protected under HIPAA laws, and it's very difficult to get help for the mentally ill."

Deason thinks prosecutors need to enforce current gun laws better.

He has a federal firearms license and extra security in the form of alarm-triggering cords fastening his guns to his display. "Makes it harder for them to steal something," he told KSLA News 12.

"I had one stolen. They won't prosecute unless there's 20 to 25 guns stolen. Then they will do it. They're just not doing what they're supposed to."

Dealers and show organizers agree the violence needs to stop. That won't happen with the president's executive order but rather with more enforcement, they said.

"I know you'll have a lot less crime, a lot less killing," Deason said.