BillC
Member
I received a visit from two officers of the Maryland State Police this morning. They rang the doorbell at 6:10 am, apparently to catch me before I could go to work (which they did).
The backstory: back in March, I purchased a heavy-barrel Colt AR-15 A3 from a Virginia dealer at the Chantilly gun show. Since it was a Colt and has a heavy barrel (not M4 or other profile), both the dealer and I agreed it was exempt from the Maryland regulated firearms and so I purchased it over-the-counter (after the normal NICS check).
Their story: the ATF audited this dealer sometime afterwards, and wrote down all purchases made by MD residents and reported them to the State Police. Since the dealer recorded it as "Colt AR-15", the police had to investigate since it could have been an improper purchase of a regulated firearm.
At their request, I retrieved the gun in question from the safe. They verified the serial number and then said I had to register the gun because it was a regulated firearm. And, apparently, the only way to register a gun in MD is to fill out all the MD regulated firearm purchase paperwork, since they insisted I had to fill it out. I tried to argue that it is a Colt and it has a heavy barrel (to which they agreed on both points), but they said it was still regulated. They pulled out a copy of the regulated long gun list and pointed to the AR-15 line, where it says AR-15s and all copies & clones "except for Colt Sporter HBAR". Since my gun is marked "Colt AR-15 A3" and not "Colt Sporter HBAR", they said it was regulated. They were polite and respectful, but very insistent that I had to fill out the paperwork. Even though I really didn't want to, I decided it was probably better to comply than fight the MSP, and filled out the paperwork. They said at some point in the future they would mail me a "not disapproved" notice, so I can take possession of the gun I already own.
Two points to this story:
1) The MD State Police are being very aggressive about tracking down any out-of-state purchases of potentially-regulated firearms.
2) The MD State Police are sticking to the exact wording of the regulated firearms list and consider any AR-15s not marked "Colt Sporter HBAR" to be regulated. This also means that it may not be possible to purchase any AR-15s after 1 Oct that aren't specifically marked "Colt Sporter HBAR", at least if the MSP has any say in the matter.
The backstory: back in March, I purchased a heavy-barrel Colt AR-15 A3 from a Virginia dealer at the Chantilly gun show. Since it was a Colt and has a heavy barrel (not M4 or other profile), both the dealer and I agreed it was exempt from the Maryland regulated firearms and so I purchased it over-the-counter (after the normal NICS check).
Their story: the ATF audited this dealer sometime afterwards, and wrote down all purchases made by MD residents and reported them to the State Police. Since the dealer recorded it as "Colt AR-15", the police had to investigate since it could have been an improper purchase of a regulated firearm.
At their request, I retrieved the gun in question from the safe. They verified the serial number and then said I had to register the gun because it was a regulated firearm. And, apparently, the only way to register a gun in MD is to fill out all the MD regulated firearm purchase paperwork, since they insisted I had to fill it out. I tried to argue that it is a Colt and it has a heavy barrel (to which they agreed on both points), but they said it was still regulated. They pulled out a copy of the regulated long gun list and pointed to the AR-15 line, where it says AR-15s and all copies & clones "except for Colt Sporter HBAR". Since my gun is marked "Colt AR-15 A3" and not "Colt Sporter HBAR", they said it was regulated. They were polite and respectful, but very insistent that I had to fill out the paperwork. Even though I really didn't want to, I decided it was probably better to comply than fight the MSP, and filled out the paperwork. They said at some point in the future they would mail me a "not disapproved" notice, so I can take possession of the gun I already own.
Two points to this story:
1) The MD State Police are being very aggressive about tracking down any out-of-state purchases of potentially-regulated firearms.
2) The MD State Police are sticking to the exact wording of the regulated firearms list and consider any AR-15s not marked "Colt Sporter HBAR" to be regulated. This also means that it may not be possible to purchase any AR-15s after 1 Oct that aren't specifically marked "Colt Sporter HBAR", at least if the MSP has any say in the matter.