Need A Gun? Your Berkeley Area Neighbor Could Easily Sell You A Semi-Automatic

Donald Trump says we need guns to fight the “bad guys” who terrorized Paris on Friday.

In New Jersey, you may be able buy a one - semi-automatic or otherwise - just by walking next door.

In the wake of the terrorism attacks that killed or injured scores of people in Paris on Friday, nj.com produced a story Monday that shows how guns are readily available throughout New Jersey - and, in some cases, being sold right from a person’s kitchen table.

Take Joe Veni, whose neighbors in Brick started noticing how many people were visiting his house three years ago. “My one neighbor says, ‘What are you selling that everybody wants?’” Veni told nj.com from his kitchen table, which doubles as his sales counter. “I said, ‘An AR-15.’”

Semi-automatic rifles are legal in New Jersey, and since Congress attempted to tighten restrictions after the Sandy Hook Elementary School massacre in Connecticut in 2012, the report says, the number of home-based firearms dealers has grown.

NJ.com put together a map showing where the home-based gun businesses are located. Click here to get there.

As the map shows, they’re available in the suburban and urban towns across the Jersey Shore, North Jersey, Central Jersey and South Jersey. NJ.com says there are 368 federal fireman’s licensed (FFL) gun businesses in New Jersey, and at least 140 operate from homes. Five years ago, there were about 100 home-based shops.

And getting one may be easier than you think.

Ammoland.com says it went to the ATF website and downloaded all the U.S.A. FFL holders’ information, which includes their physical addresses. The website then found a database that’s the same as that used by the U.S. postal service to determine if an address is residential or commercial.

This is what Ammoland found out:

“We were shocked to find that 64% of the FFL holders are home based. California was at 49%, New Jersey at 51% and even Massachusetts at 42%….”

Sellers and buyers say they’re in a free market exercising their Second Amendment rights, worried that the federal government has grown more hostile to guns, according to the reports. Gun control advocates, however, say it’s a concern in New Jersey’s densely populated neighborhoods where residents are often unaware of guns shops almost hidden inside common suburban homes near churches, schools and stores.

For example: Atlantic Tactical, located in a strip mall on Worlds Fair Drive in Somerset, has three men in identical store-branded polos who sell handguns in glass display cases. But if you don’t like what they have there, you can go just seven miles down the road through Somerset County, where you’ll be greeted by the president and vice president of the company, according to the nj.com report.

And not everybody is doing it legally. In July, a N.J. man was sentenced to 120 months in prison for selling 33 firearms to a confidential informant, according to the U.S. Attorney’s Office.

Bernardo Guzman, 26, of Jersey City previously pleaded guilty before U.S. District Judge Madeline Cox Arleo to an information charging him with one count of possessing firearms while being a previously convicted felon.

According to court documents and statements, Guzman admitted that on Nov. 14, 2013, he met with an individual in the parking lot of a grocery store in Fort Lee to illegally sell three handguns.

Guzman also admitted that from June 2013 through February 2014, he sold approximately 33 firearms and hundreds of rounds of ammunition to a confidential informant.

The firearms sold by Guzman consisted of semiautomatic weapons, sawed-off shotguns, assault-style rifles and firearms with high-capacity magazines. Some of the firearms had obliterated serial numbers. All of the weapons and ammunition are now in the custody of law enforcement.

In addition to the prison term, a federal judge sentenced Guzman to serve three years of supervised release.