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Buying a gun for someone who is not allowed to have one is a crime often referred to as a “straw purchase.”
Philadelphia gun stores will now have to post signs warning customers of that fact under a new ordinance signed into law by Mayor Cherelle Parker on Monday afternoon.
Parker called it a matter of reinforcing common sense.
“Any time that a purchaser misrepresents who the weapon is being purchased for or who it’s going to be transferred to, they will be breaking the law,” she said.
Philadelphia Police Commissioner Kevin Bethel said many people accused of making a straw purchase claim they were unaware that it was illegal to buy a weapon for someone prohibited from having one.
“One thing we have to think about is that young person, particularly, in many cases, women are sitting and locked up in a cell block and say, ‘Well, I wish somebody had just told me I couldn’t do that, because I didn’t know,’” Bethel said.
“Eight of out 10 straw purchases are made by women, often young women, who are walking into the store procuring these weapons for someone who knows they can’t have it,” said Adam Geer, the city’s public safety director.