Machine guns shouldn't be illegal to buy and sell, but they are. They've been that way for a while, too, which is an even bigger problem. But, we were told for quite some time, they were also proof gun control worked. After all, most criminals didn't have machine guns.

The issue with that pronouncement is that it was a prime example of focusing on the tool, not the tool using it.

Because they focused on the guns, they never did anything about addressing the underlying demand for such weapons. Sure, most were settling for less than full-auto, but as soon as someone was able to meet that demand affordably, they'd do it.

And a 20-year-old Florida man was just sentenced for doing precisely that.

A 20-year-old Kissimmee man who sold over a dozen machine gun conversion devices to an undercover police officer has been sentenced to more than two years in federal prison.

On Tuesday, October 8, U.S. District Judge Roy B. Dalton sentenced Jamal Joseph Mala Leonardo to 30 months behind bars for possession or transfer of a machine gun and dealing in firearms without a license.

...

Mala Leonardo had pleaded guilty to the charges on May 20.  

According to court records, Mala Leonardo had multiple meetings with an undercover law enforcement officer between January and February of 2024.

During those meetings, Mala Leonardo sold a total of 17 machine gun conversion devices to the undercover officer, which can be used “to convert a firearm into a fully automatic machine gun.”

Since full-auto switches count as machine guns, he sold 17 machine guns to an undercover cop.

Brilliant.

However, let's also understand that at age 20, he couldn't lawfully buy any firearm in Florida. While the state is fairly pro-gun, it also passed a law barring gun sales to anyone under the age of 21. Mala Leonardo couldn't even buy guns lawfully, yet he was selling machine guns.

And you want to tell me gun control works?

Moreover, this illustrates the real point about why gun control doesn't work.

Full-auto weapons are a little tricky to get, sure. Over time, wear and tear has removed a lot of them from the market, driving the costs up since we can't produce more to meet the demand for lawful full-auto firearms. While the demand didn't go down, the supply didn't exist to meet it at a price your street crooks could pay.

So someone figured out how to meet the demand.

Full-auto switches weren't designed by Glock, but only work on Glocks and other firearms that use that design. That's because of the unique characteristics of how Glocks are made and how the switches are installed. But they were created by someone with no affiliation with the company, and people making and selling them now are capitalizing on Glocks simply being the most common handgun out there.

And they're not difficult to make, either, apparently.

Enter Mala Leonardo, who somehow got his hands on them, sold them, and made money doing so.

Yet he's just the one who had the misfortune of selling them to an undercover cop. Plenty of others are selling them and getting away with it.