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The gun store that sold Nancy Lanza the gun that her son used to kill her ended up losing its license to sell firearms six days after the shooting. Not because of the massacre conducted by Adam Lanza at Sandy Hook Elementary — because of violations stretching back way before Nancy Lanza ever entered the shop.
Len Beshoff of WFSB.com reports on the decision by the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, and Firearms:
The ATF says losing the license is pretty rare and last year, it revoked only about 1 percent of them.
The document states the agency inspected and found violations at Riverview in 2007, 2009, and 2011.
During the one in 2011, "the licensee committed over 500 violations," ATF documents stated.
The ATF's letter to the store, Riverview Gun Sales in East Windsor, Connecticut, is dated December 20, 2012 — less than a week after Adam Lanza killed 26 teachers and children in Newtown. It outlines the violations: failures to maintain records properly, failing to submit records of sales to the ATF, failures to conduct proper background checks. It illegally sold firearms to customers out-of-state. In May 2010, the store let someone leave the store with a weapon before it conducted a background check. In January of that year, an employee sold ammunition to Wilfred Hellandbrand despite knowing that Hellandbrand was a felon, a violation of the law.