For Immediate Release
January 11, 1999

Washington D.C.
FBI National Press Office

More than one million persons attempted to obtain firearms during the first 41 days of the new National Instant Criminal Background Check System (NICS), the Federal Bureau of Investigation said today.

NICS was created by Congress in the Brady Act to prevent handguns, rifles, and shotguns from being purchased by convicted felons, wanted persons, illegal aliens, and the mentally ill.

Of the checks conducted by the FBI, 11,584 transfers of firearms were denied by the Bureau because of disqualifying provisions of the Act. Most of the denials were to convicted felons.

A total of 1,030,606 background checks nation-wide were processed from November 30 to January 10 (a period that excludes Christmas Day).

There are 27 so-called "Point of Contact" states where federally-licensed firearms dealers contact state agencies that make background checks under a Brady Act option: 16 states conduct all of their own background checks; and 11 others check for handguns only, with the FBI making their long-gun checks. The FBI conducts all background checks on prospective gun purchasers for the remaining 26 states/territories.

The 16 "Point of Contact" states making all their own checks and the 11 states making only handgun checks processed 462,298 firearms applications during the first 41 days of the NICS program. Under the Brady Act, statistics on the total number of checks in those states are available to the FBI but not the number of applications approved or denied.

Of the FBI checks in the 26 states/territories, and the long-gun checks in 11 other states, about 75 percent resulted in immediate clearance to transfer a weapon. The remaining 25 percent required further analysis by the FBI, with 11,584 transfers denied under Brady Act provisions.

Since the NICS program began, the FBI has determined that 1,541 of the 11,584 applicants denied firearms were the subjects of outstanding arrest warrants in the 37 states/territories where the Bureau conducts all or some of the checks.

When a "hit" occurs in checking an applicant through the National Crime Information Center's computerized files of wanted persons, the FBI first verifies that the warrant is still in effect. If so, the FBI then notifies the state so the relevant law enforcement entity--for example, the state police or state fugitive task force--can then seek to apprehend the wanted person. If the check determines there is a valid federal warrant, the FBI then notifies either the relevant federal agency or one of its own field offices if it is a Bureau case

There are no statistics yet available on the total number of wanted persons arrested as a result of seeking to purchase firearms. However, arrests on outstanding warrants of firearms applicants include these wanted persons: a man in Oklahoma for embezzlement, a woman in Texas for tampering with government records, a man in Indiana for child neglect, a man in Texas for criminal non-support, a man in Missouri for fraud, a woman in Nebraska for fraud, a man in Indiana for larceny, and a man in Mississippi for fraud.