So, in my somewhat hyper anxiety yesterday after my Senator's office forwarded a reply from ATF that the FBI/NICS has had my suppressor on "Delay" since Mar 31 when I just cleared a NICS check on a BA on 16 Mar???
Anyway, while you can appeal a Denial....you can't do shit or get really any info on a Delay (well, not without perhaps an attorney). You can get your FBI file, that really doesn't indicate wtf is the reason for the Delayed status.
I did take a bit of a desperate action yesterday and emailed the VAF (UPIN guys) as they were the only people in NICS I could find to reach out to directly. I did acknowledge that my situation doesn't seem to be in their portfolio but asked if perhaps they could direct me to the proper person that I could contact.
That was yesterday....the same day that ATF came back to my Senator's office saying I'm on Delay since Mar and that's that. Assholes.
So today (!!) the VAF office replied to me that they reached out to the supervisor of the department that handles ATF background checks (part of NICS) and was informed that:
"your transaction with the FBI has recently been completed and sent back to the ATF. The ATF should be in contact with you upon completion of your application."
Now, they didn't say what "recently been completed" means but I suspect that perhaps it was yesterday! haha The very same day that the ATF insisted that the FBI said I'm on Delay.
I THINK (not caps...I don't know, but I think) that the NICS office puts all ATF NICS requests on Delay as the Brady law says they have 3 days to complete a check on a Delay or the item can be released by the FFL. This does NOT apply to NFA Form 4 stuff. But we know that all of these orgs are totally in the weeds, have a big backlog, and I suspect that the "Delay" put on my Form 4 on 31 Mar is the date the NICS folks got the ATF request for background check and given that they were not going to be "instant" (as in the I in NICS) they routinely put all such background requests on Delay status until they can get to it. I do NOT know that....but I think it may be the case.
Anyway, next week we (Senator's office) is going to ping the ATF about this...if those assholes come back and say I'm still on FBI/NICS Delay, then we will go to war. But I suspect (again, don't know) that we may have broken the log jam and got things moving again. Aside from the background check, I don't think (that word again) there is much else to process.
Anyway, that's were we are.
Damn, this stressed me out terribly yesterday. In 1998 I ran into an issue with NICS (first gun bought under NICS req) with them having absolutely erroneous and incomplete data in my record and it took about 2 years and $$ to a lawyer to get it cleaned up. I feared I was about to be dropped into that quagmire again but thankfully not.
The NICS regs need to be amended, IMO, to include some sort of admin law court for "Delayed" where a citizen can find out WHY they have been put on Delay and defend/appeal/rebut the NICS position.
Cheers
