Tallahassee, FL –-(Ammoland.com)- Earlier this month AmmoLand brought its reader a story of an alleged illegal gun list compiled by the Charlotte County Sheriff's Department using the FINDER system in Florida.
Pawnbrokers are required to enter information on firearms transactions into the FINDER system. The system transmits the serial number of the firearm along with the make and model to the local sheriffs' department to make sure that the person pawning the gun, did not steal it. A bug in the system also transmitted the names and addresses of the transfers to local law enforcement. The Charlotte County Sheriff’s Department used the information to create a list of gun owners.
In Florida, it is a felony for law enforcement agencies to keep a list of gun owners under Florida Statute 790.335. The Charlotte County State's Attorney's Office determined that the Charlotte County Sheriff's Department did not violate any laws in compiling the list. After the results of the investigation, Florida Carry asked the Attorney General's Office of the state to carry out an independent investigation.
AmmoLand has discovered with the help of reporter Andrew Sheets that abuse of the FINDER system appears to extend past Charlotte County into surrounding jurisdictions. It isn’t clear how far the abuses extend across the state.