ATF Seize Huge Larry Vickers Gun Collection

Industry News Max Slowik This Week

According to recently published documents from the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives, or ATF, the agency recently confiscated literally truckloads of firearms from the collection of gun industry legend and cornerstone Larry Vickers (.pdf).

Many of the guns are irreplaceable historical firearms that Vickers personally documented for his collector’s guides. While many of the guns appear to be NFA-regulated, the list includes many that may not be which raises questions about what’s going on.

Multiple sources are saying that this is the result of Vickers letting his Special Occupational Tax payment lapse, which would explain why the ATF confiscated the NFA-regulated guns.

However, among the many, many machineguns, there are a few rifles and receivers, which may or may not be NFA-regulated, which raises additional questions. So far, Vickers has not given a statement about the seizures.

ATF Seize Huge Larry Vickers Gun Collection
The list of firearms goes on for pages in the disclosure. (Photo: ATF)

Vickers has been quietly fighting cancer and recently transferred and sold a portion of his gun collection. Many of the guns the ATF confiscated are valued at $1,000, which doesn’t reflect their true value.

Some of the guns on the list are essentially priceless museum pieces, historically relevant and impossible to replace. The raid happened in Huntersville, North Carolina, with the notification posted last week.

SEE ALSO: SIG Sauer Announces the SIG-Edition Vickers Guide

A U.S. Army veteran and experienced Delta Force member, Vickers later turned teacher and historian, training shooters of all experience levels and documenting famous and infamous arms alike. Vickers fought in Operation Desert Storm, participating in Operation Acid Gambit, earning a Bronze Star with V for Valor.

He would go on to work with Heckler & Koch to help with the development of the HK416 and HK45. His series of reference books are collectively called the “Vickers Guide.”

It’s not clear if Vickers is challenging these seizures or if he’s resigned to let them go. Vickers has yet to make a statement on the issue. We’ll keep you posted as more news develops.

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  • John Sands October 27, 2023, 2:56 pm

    n to argue with the ATF he is a felon now. As soon qs it started he needed to sell everything. With all his contacts a day or 2 would have cleared the shelves. He knew which guns were compromised so ATF gets those. Any machine gun parts are a liability to your Gun Collection. Sell them to a class 3 dealer to protect your collection from confiscation. My old buddy Bill called it sanitizing his collection. Same for NFA items not registered. 1 solvent trap declared a silencer and kiss your collection good bye. I love the second amendment but stay away from any part of a machine gun.Remember the key card seller? A simple flimsy diagram for an Ar15 meant jail. Potentially to hundreds of people who bought one created probable cause for the ATF. Yikes

  • GShimmy January 28, 2023, 11:41 am

    Contraband machine guns that he smuggled into the country is the real story, dont buy his lies of lapsing sot.

  • Jim November 12, 2021, 6:05 am

    How is it possible for this to happen, with the number of people out there that are friends, enthusiasts, or want to just help, that the payment he owed would not have been covered. We all trust the ATF right, so I’m sure that they are treating these collectibles as such, and locking them in a secure location. More importantly is the fact that the ATF is a corrupt organization, that cannot be trusted.

  • John Laratta October 26, 2021, 5:36 pm

    The police in Darien, IL., in situations where most grade school graduates understand that the government (local, state, national) in its sworn duty will, in most cases size your weapons immediately no matter what the circumstance. That is pretty much a given.
    All the police have to do is makeup, does not matter the truth, a Firearms Restraining Order that after my firearms were taken from my safe that you have to pay an attorney thousands of dollars to prove that you are not a clear and present danger to society. However, because the Darien, IL. police force can fabricate this in Illinois, you have to pay thousands of dollars more for attorneys and psychiatrists to again prove that you are not a clear and present danger for firearms.
    This is after a Darien police officer was caught trying to embellish his sworn testimony in court trying to convict an innocent man, me.
    Remember, that when you protest or make the wrong comment; you are a target!!

  • jimpeel October 24, 2021, 2:52 pm

    Vickers failed to tithe to the government. He failed go pay the mordida.

  • Keith H Patton October 21, 2021, 8:44 am

    How could someone collect a lot of guns? My uncle collected over 70 and he worked for the damn postal service. If someone wrote about guns and pretty much made a career out of guns, its easy to see how he collected a lot of them.

    As to the ATF, we all know their history of overreach. Nothing new there. Pity though. Like any corporation you choose to name who says “people are our greatest resource” and then treat their employees like used toilet paper when it suits them, the US government is no different. We are just a herd of taxpayers that need to be controlled and managed. The drovers are the likes of the ATF and FBI and their minions have less regard for us than true cowboys did for cattle. Give someone a little bit of power and they get corrupted pretty quick. There is no “protect and serve” in the mottos of the FBI or ATF.

    They are there to enforce, just like the DEA who isn’t shy about stating their job is enforcement. What and how the Feds enforce things is no longer governed by law, but by the politics of the party in power on a given day. Ruby Ridge, Waco and others didn’t occur under Republicans…so that is the take away here. The Dems are always way more repressive when it comes to gun rights and freedoms. Always.

  • MichaelT October 19, 2021, 9:35 pm

    Truckloads of firearms. How could he even collect that many, which I assumed he started doing once retired/ discharged.

  • alex October 17, 2021, 9:23 pm

    the next time one of the commie politicians say they don’t want to take your guns,point the finger to larry vickers,a decorated military vet to be treated like this is criminal,why are we letting this go so easy??

  • Don October 16, 2021, 10:28 pm

    Vickers should have planned better. Certainly the illness screwed with his plans. But the guns won’t be a cash reserve for his family now that the ATF has taken them. Too bad for his family. Selling them can be a very time consuming affair. I hope he gets it resolved in his favor.

  • Bruce Lorenc October 16, 2021, 2:35 pm

    God Bless Mr. Vickers. As a USN vet, it is our duty as veterans to honor our oath of enlistment or commissioning. Our Constitution has been under piecemeal assault for a century. Now we are victims of
    tactics used by Stalin, the ‘Salami’ technique. Take a little slice here and there and pretty soon you have the whole salami. Our current Administration is the result. My late father, USN LT who fought in the Pacific WWII
    theater would always admonish us boys that ‘ All politicians are crooks!’ Sadly, Dad was right.

  • HC October 16, 2021, 2:15 am

    The ATF should have been gone after they gave timothy mcveigh the bomb that blew up the oklahoma fed building . But they are still here taking more and more of our god givin rights away and nobody can do anything about it. If our gov actually followed the constitution . Non of this shit would happen. If they can take mr vickers guns away. They can make up some bullshit and take yours away too.

  • Jon October 15, 2021, 6:07 pm

    He should have immediately utilzed those weapons on those commie bastards. God help the day they show up at my place.

  • Scotty Gunn October 15, 2021, 6:06 pm

    Guess ATF needs money. I met Larry via a late friend years back. Larry never struck me as a man who would do anything sketchy. Just the opposite. He was professional, knowledgeable and a nice outgoing man.
    I hope someone starts a Go Fund Me type thing for lawyers for him. I will definitely contribute to that.

  • Markian Pelenytschka October 15, 2021, 4:07 pm

    When are they going after the TRUE crime families in the Democrat Party

  • TriggerHappy October 15, 2021, 3:59 pm

    Still waiting for Hunter Biden to be arrested.

  • Dsno October 15, 2021, 1:36 pm

    I guess people think therr should be two sets of laws: One for vets snd one for the rest of us…if he broke the law, he broke the law, regardless of who he is.

    • Elapid King October 15, 2021, 5:38 pm

      The same can be said of those who aided Jews to flee the Nazis or runaway slaves from the plantations.
      Since when did immoral and/or unconstitutional laws become valid? The founders would have tarred you straight away.

    • Lance October 15, 2021, 10:01 pm

      Broke laws, what laws? Made up horse shit! Maybe they’ll come for you next? Eh, Comrade?

    • Kents October 15, 2021, 10:59 pm

      there actually are two sets of laws in America. One for the privileged elite democrats, and another much harsher one for the rest of us.

      • G3Ken November 4, 2021, 10:26 pm

        Guess the sheep are alive and well. No, there shouldn’t be laws for some and not for others. However, virtually ALL laws relating to firearms are unconstitutional and certainly immoral. If government can have those weapons, citizens should be allowed to have those weapons.

        Where do law enforcement and military get the right to have those weapons? If “We the People” gave them those rights, then logic dictates we have those rights as well. You CANNOT give permission for something you don’t have the right for yourself as an individual.

  • Mike October 15, 2021, 1:23 pm

    I’m sad to read this.
    I’ve taken classes from Mr Vickers over the years and respect him a lot.
    Hopefully he can get his health issues fixed and retrieve what was stolen from him by the atf.

  • andrew October 15, 2021, 1:22 pm

    Don’t be on the list.

    Why don’t I own suppressors? Don’t be on the list.

    Why don’t I own an SBR? Don’t be on the list.

    I understand that I am already on a list, but I try to keep the instances of my name on that list to a minimum.

    Don’t be on the list

    • Dave October 15, 2021, 2:26 pm

      Exactly right. And they do pay attention. That and using your credit cards for guns and ammo. Don’t think they aren’t noticing…..

    • Banenk October 15, 2021, 3:25 pm

      Sheep feel the same way.

  • Eric Holder October 15, 2021, 12:11 pm

    I am reaching the point where I see the majority of “Law Abiding” gun owners (LMAO) really do not need to DO ANYTHING or take any actions. The weapons they are so well versed in is outrage and not acceptable and we will fight this. How is that working out for you? I must also commend North Korea for bad mouthing the United States for 50 plus years and that really was effective and I know it hurt my feelings. Everyday I would awaken and think of the nightmares I had of negative propaganda posters in that country saying the USA is bad. You know it is just strange that once they started launching missles (and certainly it is mere coincidence) that the USA decided….”lets talk with North Korea”. Lol The current status of the active civil war in the United States remains a war of propaganda in the world of media and internet. Who is winning that virtual war with the major news networks such as CNN? Chinese News Network and the others? Jen Psaki just stated that Facebook and the US Government is working together to censure EVERYONE. Lets recap. First Amendment gone, Second Amendment just about sunk. I have to go now the Cartel is thinking about not buying anymore machine guns from me and saying they have a new source called the Taliban who have extras.

    • fee October 15, 2021, 10:36 pm

      What do you think the gun laws were like in Northern Ireland? The main weapon of resistance of the IRA was bombs. The US gov does not realize that they will not get security from seizing guns. If true armed insurrection was underway in the US, the rebels will use bombs. Look what happen to Britain in Northern Ireland, the US forces in Iraq. Northern Ireland only had 500,000 Catholics against 60 million Brits, and they were able to create enough financial losses that Britain had to sue for an armistice after 20 years. In Iraq only 20 percent of the population actively IED the US forces. They kept us pretty busy till the surge. After the US pulled out, the war is still ongoing. Imagine if 30 percent of the US is engaged in an insurrection using IED and bombs against federal forces. The US cost would be huge just to maintain internal security in a vast continental nation like the US. So I say to those liberal elites who think they can get internal security by just outlawing the 2nd Amendment, they are wrong. Technology has obsoleted the gun as the main weapon of resistance in a modern society.

    • Martin Beijersbergen October 16, 2021, 11:53 am

      U R right

  • krinkov545 October 15, 2021, 10:40 am

    I pray that FDR, Homer Stiles Cummings and the rest of the congressional and senatorial bastards that voted in the affirmative to pass NFA 34 get the flames and heat of hell turn up a few thousand degrees for this act.

  • Mauser6863 October 15, 2021, 10:12 am

    First Off, I hate the NFA and the Jackbooted Murdering Thugs that enforce these unconstitutional laws, the BATFE.

    My understanding is that Larry Vickers is battling cancer and is selling the majority of his collection so his family didn’t have to deal with any of this after he passes soon or in decades. Some of the collection was listed on GunBroker and was transferred and being sold by another Class 3 Dealer/SOT.

    If Larry let his SOT expire and retained post 1986 Dealer Samples Machine Guns, then the BATFE was well within their rights to take them away. Pre-1986 Dealer Samples can be retained by the licensee after they give up their license, but can only be subsequently transferred to another Class 3 Dealer.

    Ideally, if Mr. Vickers was going to let his SOT License expire, he should have transferred all his Class 3 Post Samples to another dealer, so they could have legal possession and sell them, etc. Larry has been in the gun industry for decades, so either he made a big mistake, didn’t care or perhaps he was in the process of renewing his license and the BATFE delayed the approval, just so they could take his stuff? Until Larry or his lawyers speak, we will never really know what transpired.

    I have no knowledge about Larry Vickers’ Cancer or Health conditions. From a personal standpoint, I can tell you that people in the late stages of Cancer/Illness stop caring about this life and the details of everyday living, as they are resigned to their fate and know death is coming. Its very sad to watch and you can’t blame them, as they know their time is limited. Hopefully this is not what happened in this case, as I wish Mr. Vickers a long and happy life.

    • Rattlerjake October 15, 2021, 2:27 pm

      First of all, nothing you stated about the ATF and their authority is correct. The ATF enforces ILLEGAL legislation. The NFA and all licensing requirements are a direct violation of our constiitutional rights, other than the government’s “right” to regulate a BUSINESS! If Larry Vickers truly believed in the Constitution and the 2nd amendment, he would have spent his existence fighting the NFA, the ATF, the gun licensing laws instead of paying for his rights. All you do when you pay their fees/taxes and go along with their illegal laws is to enable them and empower them. Vickers is just a “slave” of the very system he has paid to exist and so are all the other people who have a carry permit, an ATF tax stamp, or other government permission slip!

      Secondly, there is one reason that people die from cancer – 1) they do not educated themselves on treatments that will eradicate cancer and they 1) let the medical system treat them with deadly government approved treatments, or 2) they give up. It’s no different than the fools who are allowing themselves to be murdered by the current government approved treatment for covid! Cancer IS curable, it has been done and proven, but the government and multi-billion dollar cancer industry/pharmaceutical corporations cannot afford you to be cured. Their objective is to slow the cancer so that it eventually returns and you continue to be a revenue source!

      • Solo October 18, 2021, 7:29 am

        Rattlerjake, do you put tinfoil on your head too? Obviously you have no idea what you are talking about. You obviously haven’t been around death, or someone you care about to die from cancer. The mental state of someone who is not ready to die. They do become sheltered, recluses, hermits. As they get lost in their thoughts and think of their lives and was never achieved. It is sad. But what is more sad, is delusional thought process of American’s like your self. Who believe in conspiracies. My advice to you is travel the world. Learn about new cultures maybe even a new language. It will do wonders for your mind.

  • Rouge1 October 15, 2021, 9:56 am

    We can thank ol Ronnie Reagan for putting one of the final nails in the coffin of our 2a rights. Rot in hell Ronnie.

    • Rattlerjake October 15, 2021, 2:34 pm

      You are 100% correct! Ronnie Raygun, a governor of Commiefornia passed the Mulford Act – the first major state gun law that grew into all of the states creating anti-2d amendment laws.

      We can also thank him for passing the The National Childhood Vaccine Injury Act (NCVIA) of 1986 (42 U.S.C. §§ 300aa-1 to 300aa-34) which he signed into law as part of a larger health bill on November 14, 1986. NCVIA’s purpose was to eliminate the potential financial liability of vaccine manufacturers due to vaccine injury claims and lay financial liability on tax payers.

    • Scotty Gunn October 15, 2021, 6:10 pm

      From what I have read, they slipped the no more NFA for the public in at the eleventh hour, and no one knew when they signed that it had been slipped in.
      Should have scrapped the whole thing and redone it. Hindsight is always a thing, though. It did nothing for “public safety” and really was unconstitutional. However, years later, here we are.

  • K October 15, 2021, 9:43 am

    Based on the following links, did Mr. Vickers have his Rights abused or did he surrender his Rights in exchange for a government granted privilege to operate a regulated business?

    https://www.atf.gov/firearms/qa/when-must-firearms-special-occupational-taxes-be-paid-and-how-much-are-taxes

    https://www.atf.gov/rules-and-regulations

    https://www.atf.gov/firearms/docs/form/special-tax-registration-and-return-national-firearms-act-atf-form-56307

    Further study: (A lot further)

    https://law.justia.com/constitution/us/amendment-14/05-procedural-due-process-civil.html

    Shortcut to the above linked material quoted from around 20% in:

    A more fundamental shift in the concept of property occurred with recognition of society’s growing economic reliance on government benefits, employment, and contracts,801 and with the decline of the “right-privilege” principle.

    This principle, discussed previously in the First Amendment context,802 was pithily summarized by Justice Holmes in dismissing a suit by a policeman protesting being fired from his job: ***“The petitioner may have a constitutional right to talk politics, but he has no constitutional right to be a policeman.”*** (I add nor an FFL dealer.)

    803 Under this theory, a finding that a litigant had no “vested property interest” in government employment,804 or that some form of public assistance was “only” a privilege,805 meant that no procedural due process was required before depriving a person of that interest.806 The reasoning was that, if a government was under no obligation to provide something, it could choose to provide it subject to whatever conditions or procedures it found appropriate.

    ————

    But don’t stop with just that shortcut above just because I did.

  • John Powell October 15, 2021, 9:06 am

    Just another rogue government organization like CARB in Commufornia. While this one is federal doesn’t make it any better.
    They need to be defunded.

  • Gerard M Jaume October 15, 2021, 8:22 am

    WE MUST FIGHT THIS WITH UNAIVERING RESOLVE!! This illegitimate Administration must be removed Immediatly and replace with America First Constitution Protecting leaders who can right this sinking ship!! God Bless America!! FJB!!

    • Ardvark October 15, 2021, 9:49 am

      Not going to happen without something severe happening, either the election is over turned, HA, or worse on a nationwide level! These people have every intent if completely controlling our lives!

    • Dano October 15, 2021, 1:32 pm

      So you support authoritarianism and our Democratic process? You know protection against things like elections are also in the Constitution, but I guess you only support some Constitutional rights…

      • Rattlerjake October 15, 2021, 2:45 pm

        When an election win is proven to be based on corrupt/illegal activity, then the Constitution allows us, the people, to do what congress won’t, and REMOVE that corrupt government, by force if necessary, and replace it. Maybe YOU should read the Constitution!

  • Todd October 15, 2021, 8:06 am

    A high-profile individual who isn’t a dem/lib conformist that had to be silenced. Thanks atf- you certainly made the world a safer place. NOT.

  • Rob October 15, 2021, 7:42 am

    The BATFE is an unconstitutional agency. The NFA is an unconstitutional act.

    Absent the abolition and repeal of these repugnancies to the U.S. Constitution, it is high time the united states of America started exercising the power reserved to them under Amendment X by nullifying illegal acts of the United States Corporation which are null and void under the U.S. Constitution.

    “Shall not be infringed” means that the inherent right to “keep and bear arms” cannot be taxed, not that it can be taxed.

    The ATF just violated Mr. Vickers’ inherent, constitutionally-protected right to keep and bears arms.

    Read that again, and let it sink in. The ATF trampled on Mr. Vickers’ right to even keep HIS private property in the form of constitutionally-protected arms.

    If there is a better example of “the power to tax is the power to destroy” than this one, I cannot think of it.

    • Kane October 15, 2021, 9:51 am

      Yes

      Repeal NFA

    • Dano October 15, 2021, 1:33 pm

      wrong…

    • Rattlerjake October 15, 2021, 2:55 pm

      Problem is not just the ATF! Vickers and millions of other Americans enable the ATF to exist by voluntarily filling out the forms and paying the fees/taxes, instead of standing up against it; WHY? Because it is easier and cheaper to comply, and then bitch about it later to make people believe you actually support the 2nd amendment. his is no different than all of the US citizens who comply with the individual income tax! 1) The supreme court ruled decades ago that income tax on an individual’s wages and earnings is UNCONSTITUTIONAL! 2) There is NO LAW mandating filing or paying income tax, it is entirely VOLUNTARY! Yet 99.9% o the American fools comply because 1) it is easier and cheaper to comply, 2) the are intimidated by the lies of government, 3) the are too lazy to educate themselves on the FACTS!!!! https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=98a5tBBDjlY&t=21s, Russo/Cohen IRS interview

    • Michael monahan October 15, 2021, 6:12 pm

      Very true

  • Bob October 15, 2021, 6:42 am

    Sounds like pure BS to me. A machine gun – working – that is valued at $!,000???? Hell, gimme a minute, I’m rounding up all the cash I can!

    • Kent San October 15, 2021, 8:46 am

      Not unusual. The ATF agents aren’t firearms appraisers. The “$1,000” consistently listed for the firearms seized is simply to note value. Surprised you didn’t pick up on that.

      • Snowdog October 15, 2021, 9:35 am

        “Surprised you didn’t pick up on that.”

        Surely you don’t think anyone is that stupid. Of course he picked up on that; it was the premise of his post.

        I, for one, am surprised YOU didn’t pick up on that. Perhaps your massive ego obscured your vision. Do try to do better next time (and be less of a jerk). We’re all on the same side here.

      • Rouge1 October 15, 2021, 9:51 am

        The ATF agents aren’t defenders of the second amendment or freedom either. So what are they?

        • Dave October 15, 2021, 2:30 pm

          Gestapo.

  • Abner Yokum October 15, 2021, 6:24 am

    Another ‘asset forfeiture’ after ‘guilty until proven innocent’ bureaucratic decision?

    • Chris McLaughlin October 15, 2021, 11:35 am

      Way past time for someone to start forfeiture on the assets of Jeff sessions.

  • Douglas Ott October 15, 2021, 6:21 am

    Goons

    • Rouge1 October 15, 2021, 9:52 am

      They know what they are and you cant shame them.

  • Jim Hovater October 15, 2021, 6:17 am

    ‘Unintended Consequences’ immediately comes to mind. America needs ‘Henry Bowman’ now more than ever.

  • Jrp October 15, 2021, 6:05 am

    This raid should never of existed in the first place. NFA needs to be repealed period. Just another mechanism for control. Was he a felon? Nope. They are being released by the thousands with sheets longer than most our bodies. Just give them another chance they say. Correctional facilities they call them. Good thing the atf is looking out for our safety.

  • Jim Parker October 15, 2021, 5:45 am

    The feds are ever-vigilant. Securing America’s borders from foreign actors? Nope. Keeping deadly drugs out of the country? Nope. Preventing central American street thugs and gang members from overrunning the nation’s cities? Nope.

    • perlcay October 15, 2021, 11:26 am

      Ah, but confiscating private property from cancer patients? They are all over that.

    • Dano October 15, 2021, 1:34 pm

      Protecting us against right wing seditionists? Nope…

      • Fatboy October 17, 2021, 7:54 pm

        Draino – Nope – you have capitol police shooting unarmed non threatening people for that.

  • Yep yep October 15, 2021, 4:37 am

    It’s always about the 💰!!!!!

  • JB October 14, 2021, 9:17 pm

    WHEN your a Veteran, Warrior, and one of Americas best this is what the Communist Biden regimes KGB does to Larry.

    Think long and hard. This could have been you.

  • Gun Giveaways October 14, 2021, 3:40 pm

    Absolute craziness. Abolish the ATF. Give Vickers back his gun collection. Just more proof we don’t need the ATF around at all with all the crap they pull.

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