Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel: ATF out of control

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Journal-Sentinel: ATF uses rogue tactics in storefront stings across nation​

Aaron Key wasn't sure he wanted a tattoo on his neck. Especially one of a giant squid smoking a joint.

But the guys running Squid's Smoke Shop in Portland, Ore., convinced him: It would be a perfect way to promote their store.

They would even pay him and a friend $150 apiece if they agreed to turn their bodies into walking billboards.

Key, who is mentally disabled, was swayed.

He and his friend, Marquis Glover, liked Squid's. It was their hangout. The 19-year-olds spent many afternoons there playing Xbox and chatting with the owner, "Squid," and the store clerks.

So they took the money and got the ink etched on their necks, tentacles creeping down to their collarbones.

It would be months before the young men learned the whole thing was a setup. The guys running Squid's were actually undercover ATF agents conducting a sting to get guns away from criminals and drugs off the street.

The abuses include the Wichita ATF office using a man the agents described as "slow-headed" to spread the word about a questionable buy-back program, running buy-backs near schools and churches (federal and state laws prohibit possession of a firearm within 300 to 1,000 feet of a school, and many churches have schools contained therein) while letting adolescents into the gun-buyback location to drink, smoke pot and play video games, as well as paying far too much for hand guns and semi-automatic weapons for no apparently valid reason other than to take the gun out of circulation.

And that's on top of the Fast & Furious gun trafficking scandal.