The Nutty Confessor: Director Confirms Gun Trafficking Felonies In "Under The Gun"

It takes a special kind of idiocy to confess to conspiring in multiple felonies on video, but that’s precisely what Under the Gun director Stephanie Soechtig did in a February interview promoting the anti-gun film.

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Incredibly, Soechtig confirmed again today in written responses to questions by Sean Davis of The Federalist that her producer did indeed commit federal firearms felonies, even as she attempted to claim otherwise.

In response to a series of detailed questions about the incident posed by The Federalist, Soechtig simultaneously confirmed that she and her team skirted federal gun laws and declared that they did absolutely nothing wrong:

“While it may seem hard to believe that one could buy these types of guns this easily, all purchases in the film were made completely legally. Arizona law allows out-of-state residents to buy long guns (i.e. rifles, shotguns, military style assault rifles) from a private seller without a background check. It also allows Arizona residents to buy handguns from a private seller without a background check.

“We demonstrated both versions of this dangerous loophole in the film on a hidden camera, in full compliance with both state and federal laws. The rifles – including a Smith and Wesson M&P 15, the gun used in the Aurora massacre – were purchased by an out of state resident. The handgun was purchased by an Arizona resident.

“These guns were then turned over to law enforcement and destroyed. They never left the state of Arizona.”

When combined with her statements during her interview with The Lip TV, Soechtig’s latest statement provides clear evidence that she and her team did not follow all applicable gun laws.

In the videotaped interview, Soechtig stated that all of the weapons, including the rifles, were purchased without the buyer having to undergo a federal background check.

“We sent a producer out and he was from Colorado. He went to Arizona, and he was able to buy a Bushmaster and then three other pistols without a background check in a matter of four hours,” Soechtig declared. “And that’s perfectly legal.”

And in her statement provided to The Federalist, Soechtig admitted that multiple rifles were purchased by a non-Arizona resident.

Federal and state gun law experts contacted by The Federalist vehemently disagreed with Soechtig’s declaration that out-of-state residents can legally purchase guns from private Arizona residents without processing the sales through a licensed federal gun dealer.

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Soechtig is under the belief that her producer—believed to be Denver, CO attorney Joshua A. Kunau—didn’t break any laws because the guns purchased never left Arizona. What she clearly doesn’t grasp is that while her producer might not have violated Arizona or Colorado state laws, he assuredly violated federal firearms laws, and therefore committed numerous felonies.

18 U.S.C. § 922 : US Code – Section 922: Unlawful acts makes it clear that with very limited exceptions (none of which apply to the transfer Soechtig describes), interstate sales are felonies. If Colorado resident Kunau did in fact purchase and take possession of firearms in Arizona—which he is apparently filmed doing on camera—then he violated federal law.

That he later took those firearms to law enforcement to be destroyed is as irrelevant as robbing a bank and then dropping off the cash at a police station; the crime has already occurred.

Incredibly, Soechtig has now twice confessed to committing federal gun crimes, and curiously has not provided evidence that her documentary team did, in fact, turn these illegally acquired firearms to Arizona law enforcement for destruction.

Sadly, we know from Soechtig’s fraudulent film that blatant deception is very much in her character.

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It is now incumbent upon the ATF to launch a criminal investigation into these confessed crimes, determine if federal firearms transfer laws were violated, and whether these firearms were properly disposed of by Under the Gun producers.

Katie Couric and Stephanie Soechtig conspired on a fraudulent film with other supporters of gun control in an attempt to make gun owners look bad and gun laws in the United States look insufficient. Instead, they’ve proven that they had to resort to blatant fraud in order to make gun owners look uninformed—an action that will likely see them in civil and perhaps criminal court for defamation—and have now twice confessed to federal gun crimes.

Barack Obama and Democrat frontrunner Hillary Clinton have cried incessantly that they need more gun control laws. Unless the Justice Department has the integrity to investigate crimes their political allies have now confessed to on two separate occasions, they deserve nothing but mockery and derision.

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