In an affidavit filed in a San Diego court on Monday, Robert A. Ricker, a former gun industry executive, said "that gun manufacturers had long known that some of their dealers corruptly sold guns to criminals but pressured one another into remaining silent for fear of legal liability," according to a story by Fox Butterfield in yesterday's New York Times.

If this is the case, it means that gunmakers know about -- and choose to do nothing about -- stores like Bull's Eye Shooter Supply in Tacoma, Washington, which once owned the rifle used in the D.C.-area sniper shootings last fall and whose owner has given conflicting stories about its disappearance from his shop. As I mentioned in December, Bull's Eye has been cited several times for violations of the gun laws but has received no more than a wrist-slap; it appears that either the rifle was stolen from Bull's Eye (in which case Bull's Eye failed to report the theft, in violation of the law) or Bull's Eye sold it to one of the sniper suspects, John Muhammad (who shouldn't have been able to buy it because he had an order of protection filed against him) or Lee Malvo (who shouldn't have been able to buy it because he's a minor and an illegal alien).

Here's the last paragraph of yesterday's story:

Mr. Ricker said in the affidavit that the idea that all dealers operate legally because they have a license is a "fiction." He added that "the firearms industry has long known that A.T.F. is hampered" by its shortage of personnel and loopholes in the gun laws. For example, he said, the bureau can inspect a dealer only once a year as a result of a law supported by the rifle association.

Butterfield knows about the emasculation of the ATF -- he wrote a devastating story about it in the Times in 1999. If you didn’t read it the last time I linked it, read it now, and get angry.