Handguns are restricted to those over the age of 21 by law. Only those old enough to drink are old enough to buy a pistol.

The problem is that it doesn’t stop those under the age of 21 from getting them. It seems black market dealers aren’t particularly careful about obeying federal gun control laws.

I know, I’m as shocked as you are.

A prime example of this can be seen in a recent incident in Minnesota, which isn’t a particularly pro-gun state to begin with.

Saturday night, the Ramsey County Sheriff’s Office says deputies busted a party at an Airbnb rental home. They said a teenager who was wanted for credit card thefts in Shoreview, was throwing his 17th birthday party at the rental.

“He was on the radar from past auto thefts and carjackings,” Undersheriff Mike Martin said.

He said deputies ordered everyone outside. An estimated 50 people were at the party with ages ranging from 15 to 21. Once inside, Martin said they found 11 guns, 7 of which had fully automatic switches. He said the teenagers went to great lengths to hide the guns before taking off.

“They hid guns in cereal boxes, in board games, in fast food wrappers, in the walls, the unfished walls,” he said.

Now, there were 21-year-olds present, who theoretically could have bought handguns lawfully. We don’t know how many, though, nor do we have any reason to believe that any of them were the owners of lawfully purchased firearms.

The fact that seven of the guns had full-auto switches suggests that they weren’t legal.

So far as I can tell from this news report, only the 17-year-old host was arrested–and that likely had more to do with allegedly using stolen credit cards to pay for the house–while everyone else walked. Then again, it’s difficult to tie a gun found in a place with a particular person who happened to be in that place with 50 other people.

Even then, based on what Cam wrote earlier today, there’s not a great deal of hope that there would be any real punishment here.

And yes, this is a gun control fail. Up and down the board, it’s a fail.

Full-auto switches on most of the handguns alone would have made this a fail since those are NFA items and thus illegal according to federal law. The age of most of the guests also means the likely owners were breaking federal gun laws as well.

On every level, gun control didn’t do what it was supposed to do here.

There’s nothing shocking about that, mind you. We’ve seen it way too often to be surprised that the laws we’re told will keep guns out of the “wrong” hands and do no such thing. Meanwhile, how many 18-year-olds could and would be good, responsible handgun owners but aren’t allowed to because of these same laws?

Plenty.

Here’s the kicker, though. The cops weren’t even looking for illegal guns. They showed up looking for a credit card thief. How many more guns are in teenage hands despite the law?