Peter Brennan, his spouse Jacqueline Shaw and their eight-year-old son Archie Brennan will always remember the day the ATF raided their Texas gun-parts store, which is situated in northeast Texas close to the Oklahoma border.
“We pulled as much as our gun store in an previous GMC truck and all these automobiles surrounded us,” Peter Brennan instructed the Second Modification Basis. “They’d seven automobiles and a load of tactical guys leaping out. We didn’t notice what was taking place. We hadn’t executed something mistaken?”
They brokers tried separating the household.
“They stored making an attempt to yank my son away from his mother,” Brennan mentioned. “These brokers – some carrying man-buns – have been making an attempt to behave as laborious as nails. Lots of people have been watching. They handcuffed me and put me in one among their automobiles.”
“You understand why we’re right here – not by chance,” one of many brokers instructed Brennan.
“That’s debatable,” Brennan replied, as they tore his store aside. “Such as you guys don’t make errors. Nothing within the store is unlawful in Texas. I need to get a lawyer.”
The ATF brokers seized a whole lot of property: CNC instruments, buffer tubes, AR elements and aluminum blanks that have been simply blocks of metallic. ATF brokers pulled the laborious drive out of Brennan’s CNC machine, which he had just lately bought for $170,000.
“I sunk every little thing we owned to purchase that,” Brennan mentioned. “I used to be in a darkish gap.”
Brokers then took the couple and their son to their house to execute yet one more search warrant.
“They took our passports, which we nonetheless don’t have again, together with telephones and computer systems – all of our cash. They instructed us to ring them in a pair days on a Thursday. All I had in my pockets was 40 {dollars},” Brennan mentioned.
The ATF threatened the couple in the event that they ever determined to get new passports and return to Australia.
“They mentioned if we went to our embassy they’d arrest us. That’s unconstitutional. They shut down my YouTube channel. We had no meals they usually took all our cash,” Brennan mentioned. “We have been purported to go to England every week after the raid.”
The raid happened practically two years in the past. To date, the couple has not been charged with any crime, however Brennan’s household can not depart the USA as a result of they don’t have any passports.
“We now have youngsters in Australia we haven’t seen for 2 years,” he mentioned. “It looks as if a foul film. Australia and America are allies. I really like this place and fought laborious to be right here. I’d fortunately commerce my Australian citizenship for American. If you wish to reside in a communist nation go to Australia.”
The ATF brokers’ use of power was unconscionable, Brennan mentioned.
“They pointed their weapons at a seven-year-old boy,” he mentioned. “What was he gonna do to them?”
“He now has tics on account of all that,” Archie’s mother Jacqueline Shaw mentioned. “They wouldn’t let him come to me or my husband.”
Texas Silencers
After he opened his gun-parts store, a lot of Brennan’s clients started asking him about silencers, that are often known as suppressors.
“We’d get requested about them on a regular basis,” he mentioned. “They mentioned you may promote suppressors in Texas in the event that they’re made in Texas and keep in Texas. They confirmed us the regulation.”
One among Brennan’s associates labored for the native sheriff’s workplace. He instructed Brennan he had watched Texas Gov. Greg Abbott signal the state regulation, often known as Texas Home Invoice 957, in September 2021.
The state regulation could be very clear: “A firearm suppressor that’s manufactured and stays on this state shouldn’t be topic to federal regulation or federal regulation, together with registration, underneath the authority of the USA Congress to manage interstate commerce.”
The state regulation requires that silencer elements – the “fundamental materials” to make one – should not topic to federal regulation. Additionally, any suppressors made within the Lone Star State will need to have “Made in Texas” clearly stamped on them.
Brennan started manufacturing silencers, in accordance with the state regulation. He estimates that 80-percent of his patrons have been regulation enforcement.
“We started promoting them to state troopers, Reno (Texas) Police and different native police forces,” his spouse mentioned.
“We had Texas State Troopers coming to our home asking about them,” Brennan mentioned.
The couple even had indicators placed on the home windows of their store, telling potential clients of the silencers that have been made inside, topic to Texas regulation. Even the ATF paid them no nevermind.
“An ATF agent came visiting, and he by no means talked about something about suppressors,” Brennan mentioned. “The one factor he cared about have been AR braces. All of the suppressor elements have been made regionally. Not as soon as did the agent say something about them. This was about three months earlier than they raided us.”
The agent was current throughout the raid. He instructed Brennan that he wished he would have requested about suppressors.
“I instructed him I by no means offered any weapons. The one weapons I ever had have been mine. I by no means had an FFL. I didn’t need one. I by no means needed to promote firearms. I nonetheless don’t need an FFL,” he mentioned.
The agent tried to interview Brennan’s spouse.
“I instructed the agent interviewing me that he was right here six weeks earlier than the raid, and he by no means instructed us to cease making them, the suppressors,” she mentioned. “The interview stopped, and he turned the digital camera off.”
ATF’s Nonresponse
Calls to the ATF in Texas weren’t returned. Nonetheless, their authorized opinion about Texas HB957 is well-known. The company issued an “Open Letter to all Texas Federal Firearm Licensees” shortly after Texas handed their state regulation in 2021.
“HB957 claims to exempt silencers (often known as suppressors) which might be manufactured in Texas, and which stay in Texas, from Federal firearms legal guidelines and laws, together with the federal registration necessities. Nonetheless, as a result of HB957 straight conflicts with federal firearms legal guidelines and laws, federal regulation supersedes HB957. In abstract, all provisions of the Gun Management Act (GCA) and the Nationwide Firearms Act (NFA), together with their corresponding laws, proceed to use to FFLs and different individuals in Texas,” the letter states.
In different phrases, the ATF takes zero discover of state’s rights. Selfmade silencers, in accordance with the ATF, stay a violation of federal regulation.
Authorized Limbo
Brennan and his spouse spoke with their lawyer about two weeks in the past.
“He instructed us it’s been 15 months since he final talked to the ATF and mentioned, ‘What would you like me to do?’” Brennan mentioned. “I bought led down this path by a bunch of cops – you understand what I imply – and an ATF man who turned up six weeks earlier than the ATF raided us, who solely cared concerning the braces. He didn’t care concerning the cans.”
To this point, the one correspondence the couple has acquired from the ATF was a forfeiture letter. Brennan has returned to YouTube and has greater than 3,000 subscribers. He and his household are slowly making an attempt to get well financially. His gun-parts store is making AK merchandise and ear safety for police, rangers and wildlife officers.
Stated Brennan: “The ATF might have despatched us a cease-and-desist letter. As a substitute, they simply raided us. We discovered the opposite day they weren’t purported to take our passports, however they did. They by no means filed costs towards us, as a result of in the event that they do, it’ll permit the politicians to make use of it. We’ve misplaced every little thing. Now, if we get kicked out of right here, we’ve bought nowhere to go.”
This story is courtesy of the Second Modification Basis’s Investigative Journalism Mission. Click on right here to make a tax-deductible donation to help pro-gun tales like this.
