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A federal agent was arrested Tuesday for taking pictures in the women’s restroom of a UW-Madison residence hall, the university’s police department said. Justin T. Fahy, of Monona, allegedly went into a bathroom at Witte Residence Hall, 615 W. Johnson St., on Friday afternoon, put his cell phone under an occupied stall and took pictures, police said. The 27-year-old Fahy, who identified himself as a special agent for the federal Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF), told police it was a misunderstanding and that he mistakenly entered the wrong restroom, said UW police spokesman Marc Lovicott. Ashlee Sherrill,...

Combine a hitman, a suspicious federal agent, a world-famous graphic novelist and a daredevil journalist and you get a Molotov cocktail of mishaps in Phoenix native and former truck driver Jeffrey Yochim’s pulp thriller. Collateral Crimes (West Wave Publishing, $14.99) chronicles the adventures of novelist and murder witness Jonathan Starker, who hitches a ride to a comic book convention and finds himself on the run from an ATF agent and a ruthless hitman. The story, a slow burner at the start but fast-paced enough to keep readers flipping pages – think murder, truck hijackings and pesky witnesses – grows more...

The war on drugs has been going on since 1971, and we have a winner: marijuana. Back then, possession of pot carried heavy penalties in many states -- even life imprisonment. Today, 29 states sanction medical use of cannabis, and eight allow recreational use. Legal weed has become about as controversial as Powerball. One sign of the shift came in Wednesday's debate among the Democrats running for governor of Illinois. The state didn't get its first medical marijuana dispensary until 2015, and it decriminalized possession of small amounts of pot only last year. But most of the candidates endorsed legalization...

Federal agents caught the last suspect in Terry’s murder this week. Earlier this week, federal agents from both the United States and Mexico apprehended another suspect in the murder of U.S. Border Patrol Agent Brian Terry. Jesus Rosario Favela Astorga was arrested in Mexico Monday and charged with first-degree murder, the Department of Justice announced Tuesday. Astorga is believed to be the final suspect linked to the death of Terry. However, the past administration played a major role in facilitating his tragic demise. Without the dangerous “Fast and Furious” gun-running scheme initiated by Barack Obama’s Justice Department, Agent Terry may...

In a letter dated October 12, the ATF Association informed lawmakers that the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives (ATF) approved bump stocks because they do not turn a semiautomatic rifle into “a machine gun.” The letter contains explanations of basic points for lawmakers–like the fact that a semiautomatic only shoots one round each time the trigger is pulled and bump stocks to not change this basic action. And it also seeks to defend the integrity of the ATF by explaining that the body of laws governing machine guns has been in place since 1934 and that body of...

Mexican law enforcement officers last weekend arrested the man believed to be the final fugitive from the “rip crew” that engaged in a 2010 gunfight between Border Patrol agents that resulted in the death of agent Brian Terry. Jesus Rosario Favela Astorga was charged Monday with first-degree murder in the killing of Terry. "The arrest of Favela Astorga resulted from the unwavering commitment of the United States and our law enforcement partners in Mexico to bring to justice those responsible for the murder of Agent Brian Terry, who made the ultimate sacrifice while serving his country," Alana Robinson, the acting...

A Slide Fire bump stock in action. (Photo: Slide Fire/Facebook) The association representing current and former ATF employees has pushed back against critics blaming the agency for approving bump stocks. The ATF Association said the agency “does not have the legal authority to regulate” bump stocks, which allow semi-auto rifles to mimic full-auto fire. “The bump slide, and several other similar after-market accessories that increase the rate at which a shooter can pull the trigger, are engineered to avoid regulation under Federal law,” said Michael Bouchard, ATFA president, in an open letter last week. “The notion that ATF chose not...

The Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives (ATF) clarified its role in determining bump fire stocks' classification and legality on Friday but wouldn't say whether it planned to revisit the issue."ATF does not approve items that are submitted for classification," Mary Markos, an ATF public affairs specialist, told the Washington Free Beacon. "ATF provides guidance to the industry and evaluates and classifies items submitted as either being a firearm, an NFA [National Firearms Act] firearm, or not subject to the jurisdiction of ATF."Markos said the classification process at the ATF is initiated when a company voluntarily requests guidance from...

As the Democrats and media left rage about the NRA and Republicans over Las Vegas, these are the REAL facts: 1. The bump stock was outlawed under President Bush in 2005. 2. The Obama Administration reversed this decision legalizing bump stocks in 2010. 3. There was NO lobbying effort by the NRA, Republicans or conservatives for legalizing bump stocks. This was team Obama's decision.

This photo, taken from a video posted on the Slide Fire website, shows the after-market bump stock device, which uses the gun's recoil to cause rapid discharge of bullets. (CNSNews.com) - On June 7, 2010 -- about a year and a half into the Barack Obama administration -- the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives issued an opinion letter, giving the go-ahead to an after-market accessory that allows the user to “bump fire” a semi-automatic rifle. A company called Slide Fire had earlier sent its patented replacement shoulder stock to ATF’s Firearms Technology Branch, asking for an evaluation of...

SilencerCo's Maxim 50 suppressed muzzleloader caused a hoot on the internet. A gun with a silencer that doesn’t require ANY paperwork? One that can be MAILED to a buyer’s house, WITHOUT A BACKGROUND CHECK? Yup, pretty much. CNN reports that the Maxim 50 has the ATF’s blessing . . Silencers are subject to federal gun control laws that are more restrictive than for most guns. They are treated like machine guns, requiring a more intensive background check that takes months to process, with a $200 tax. But muzzleloaders are not subject to federal gun control laws because they use antiquated...

Firefighters were able to extinguish the fire rapidly, said Montgomery County Fire Battalion Chief Dan Ogren. (Courtesy Montgomery County Fire and Rescue Service) WASHINGTON — Investigators are still working to find what caused a house fire that killed a man in Bethesda earlier this month. But the investigation is far from routine after investigators found tunnels, chemicals and wiring in the basement. “The conditions in the basement became more and more unusual as the investigation went on,” Montgomery County Fire Chief Dan Ogren said Tuesday in describing the site of the house fire on Danbury Road. Firefighters responded at around...

The park ranger spotted him kneeling in the bushes by the 112-year-old Confederate statue, explosives in hand. Was he trying to harm the statue? she asked. Yes, he said. He didn't like the guy. The late-night confrontation at the statue of Confederate Lt. Dick Dowling — detailed in court records by a federal agent — led to the arrest of 25-year-old Andrew Schneck, setting off a two-day operation by law enforcement that forced the evacuation of the tony Rice University neighborhood where Schneck lives with his parents. Bomb squad experts detonated a cache of high-powered explosives found on the property...

Gun ads have changed with the times. Political correctness is certainly not the name of the game in these classic pieces of gun marketing. It was just plain old fashion advertising back in the day. Hammer the hammer? Lawyers wouldn’t come within a football field of this one. Of course, hammering on a vintage revolver probably is a bad idea anyway…Oh no, that guy is teaching his son how to hunt, you say? Where are their iphones, video games and couch? Well, buddy, this is how a father is supposed to raise his son to be a man, not a...

Man who sold gun used to shoot 2 cops released on $4,500 bond: sources Chicago 07/06/2017 Sam Charles @samjcharles | email A man who sources say sold an assault rifle to gang members — which was then used to shoot two Chicago Police officers last May — was released from federal custody on a $4,500 bond on Wednesday. Charles Williams was arrested and charged in federal court last week with possession of a firearm by a felon. On Wednesday, Magistrate Judge Young B. Kim ordered him released on $4,500, court records show. A law enforcement source told the Chicago Sun-Times...

CHICAGO (WLS) -- An FBI agent had his car stolen early Monday on the West Side, a source told ABC7. The theft happened at a gas station near Morgan Street and Jackson Boulevard at about 1 a.m., Chicago police said. Police said a 32-year-old man left his car running at the gas station when a male suspect entered the car and took off. Police have not confirmed that the stolen white Chevy Equinox belonged to an FBI agent. The vehicle was last seen heading east on Van Buren Street. There were several guns in the FBI agent's vehicle when it...

No Need for Federal “Chicago Crime Gun Strike Force” if Police Allowed to Do Their Jobs Written by Bob Adelmann In an early-morning tweet, President Donald Trump decried the violence in Chicago and announced that he was sending in “federal help.” But the rationale for this “help” would not exist if Chicago police were not hamstrung by the war on cops and the “Ferguson Effect.” President Donald Trump’s early morning Tweet on Friday decried the continuing violence in Chicago and announced that he was sending in “federal help.” Tweeted the president: “Crime and killings in Chicago have reached such epidemic...

While the Big Three Networks (ABC, CBS, and NBC) spent Wednesday focusing on a Senate hearing they were hoping would implicate President Trump in obstruction of justice, they ignored a House Oversight Committee report that showed President Obama’s administration did just that. “An absolutely blistering report tonight out saying the Obama administration in general and former Attorney General Eric Holder in particular repeatedly lied to the family of a slain Border Patrol officer about the weapons used in his death, and stonewalled efforts to get at the truth,” announced Fox News’ Bret Baier on Special Report. {..snip..}

The House Oversight Committee released a scathing report Wednesday that accuses former Attorney General Eric Holder and his Department of Justice of covering up Operation Fast and Furious and misleading Congress’ investigation into the botched gun-running operation. The nearly 300-page report states that the Justice Department under Holder actively tried to hide the facts from the loved ones of slain Border Patrol Brian Terry – seeing his family as more of a “nuisance” than one deserving straight answers — and at times being openly hostile to them. {..snip..}

Six years late, we have new insight into the government’s secretive Fast and Furious operation in which federal agents purposely let thousands of assault rifles and other weapons be trafficked from the U.S. to Mexican drug cartels, where they were used in many murders and other crimes.