The governor signed a bill into law on Monday that allows gun owners to use gun silencers.
Gun enthusiasts say silencers aren't just for the 'bad guys'
By Ursula Reutin
97.3 KIRO FM Reporter
A bill that would make it legal to use gun silencers in Washington has quietly become law, but critics worry they'll get into the wrong hands.
The way Hollywood portrays them, silencers are either used by the bad guys or by leading men, like James Bond, to get the bad guys. But Wade Goughran says in reality, the noise suppressors he sells at his shop in Bellevue are used by gun hobbyists.
"Most people that buy them are really into guns. They've been collecting and owning guns for years. I would suspect that you know people that own suppressors, they're just not talking about it," Goughran said.
In Washington state it has been legal to buy them, but not legal to use them. That, Goughran said, has been very frustrating for gun owners.
"It would be like can you buy booze but you can't drink it. How well would that go over? You can buy cigarettes, but you can't smoke them. There was a glitch there and it unwittingly made a lot of people into people that were breaking the law," he said.
Goughran also said it doesn't make sense that cops can use silencers when they're not legal.
"A lot of our SWAT teams in this state have suppressors. There's a lot of tactical advantages for law enforcement or the military to have suppressors. If they had shot somebody with a weapon with a suppressor on it, would that have opened the state of Washington up to a huge liability?"
So why would you want one if you're not in law enforcement? For one thing, Goughran said, you can preserve your hearing.
"Gunfire is roughly in the neighborhood of about 160 to 170 decibels. A very good suppressor will take about 30 to 40 decibels off of that and it brings it back down to what they call hearing safe," Goughran said.
Chad Curtis, who manages the store, took me into the firing range to get a taste of how painful it can be on your eardrums even with ear plugs.
A suppressor would not eliminate all the noise, but would make it more like the sound of a nail gun. That, Curtis said, would also make it more tolerable for neighbors who live close to gun ranges.
But critics say that passing this legislation would send the wrong message: that silencers tend to be used by professional criminals and this would just make it that much easier.
Gaughran disagrees. He said anyone interested in buying one would have to pay a $200 fee and undergo an extensive federal background check.
"The suppressors are serialized just like a gun, so they're very well tracked. There's relatively a very small number. I wouldn't even say a tenth of 1 percent as opposed to firearms in general. So they're very easy to track," Gaughran explained.
He also said it's harder to buy a silencer than a gun, with background checks taking at least four months to clear. A gun background check may only take a couple of weeks.
Ursula Reutin, 97.3 KIRO FM Reporter
