ByRepresentatives Valdez, Orwall, Slatter, Kloba, Peterson, Kilduff, Ryu, Fitzgibbon, Jinkins, Cody, Doglio, Pollet, Stanford, Frame, Leavitt, Walen, and Bergquist; by request of Attorney General

AN ACT Relating to undetectable firearms; amending RCW 9.41.010, 9.41.190, 9.41.220, and 9.41.225; creating a new section; prescribing penalties; providing an effective date; and declaring an emergency.

(1) "Antique firearm" means a firearm or replica of a firearm not designed or redesigned for using rim fire or conventional center fire ignition with fixed ammunition and manufactured in or before 1898, including any matchlock, flintlock, percussion cap, or similar type of ignition system and also any firearm using fixed ammunition manufactured in or before 1898, for which ammunition is no longer manufactured in the United States and is not readily available in the ordinary channels of commercial trade.

(2) "Barrel length" means the distance from the bolt face of a closed action down the length of the axis of the bore to the crown of the muzzle, or in the case of a barrel with attachments to the end of any legal device permanently attached to the end of the muzzle.

(3) "Bump-fire stock" means a butt stock designed to be attached to a semiautomatic firearm with the effect of increasing the rate of fire achievable with the semiautomatic firearm to that of a fully automatic firearm by using the energy from the recoil of the firearm to generate reciprocating action that facilitates repeated activation of the trigger.

(a) Any of the following felonies, as now existing or hereafter amended: Any felony defined under any law as a class A felony or an attempt to commit a class A felony, criminal solicitation of or criminal conspiracy to commit a class A felony, manslaughter in the first degree, manslaughter in the second degree, indecent liberties if committed by forcible compulsion, kidnapping in the second degree, arson in the second degree, assault in the second degree, assault of a child in the second degree, extortion in the first degree, burglary in the second degree, residential burglary, and robbery in the second degree;

(b) Any conviction for a felony offense in effect at any time prior to June 6, 1996, which is comparable to a felony classified as a crime of violence in (a) of this subsection; and

(6) "Dealer" means a person engaged in the business of selling firearms at wholesale or retail who has, or is required to have, a federal firearms license under 18 U.S.C. Sec. 923(a). A person who does not have, and is not required to have, a federal firearms license under 18 U.S.C. Sec. 923(a), is not a dealer if that person makes only occasional sales, exchanges, or purchases of firearms for the enhancement of a personal collection or for a hobby, or sells all or part of his or her personal collection of firearms.

(8) "Felony" means any felony offense under the laws of this state or any federal or out-of-state offense comparable to a felony offense under the laws of this state.

(9) "Felony firearm offender" means a person who has previously been convicted or found not guilty by reason of insanity in this state of any felony firearm offense. A person is not a felony firearm offender under this chapter if any and all qualifying offenses have been the subject of an expungement, pardon, annulment, certificate, or rehabilitation, or other equivalent procedure based on a finding of the rehabilitation of the person convicted or a pardon, annulment, or other equivalent procedure based on a finding of innocence.

(11) "Firearm" means a weapon or device from which a projectile or projectiles may be fired by an explosive such as gunpowder. "Firearm" does not include a flare gun or other pyrotechnic visual distress signaling device, or a powder-actuated tool or other device designed solely to be used for construction purposes.

(13) "Law enforcement officer" includes a general authority Washington peace officer as defined in RCW 10.93.020, or a specially commissioned Washington peace officer as defined in RCW 10.93.020. "Law enforcement officer" also includes a limited authority Washington peace officer as defined in RCW 10.93.020 if such officer is duly authorized by his or her employer to carry a concealed pistol.

(18) "Machine gun" means any firearm known as a machine gun, mechanical rifle, submachine gun, or any other mechanism or instrument not requiring that the trigger be pressed for each shot and having a reservoir clip, disc, drum, belt, or other separable mechanical device for storing, carrying, or supplying ammunition which can be loaded into the firearm, mechanism, or instrument, and fired therefrom at the rate of five or more shots per second.

(20) "Person" means any individual, corporation, company, association, firm, partnership, club, organization, society, joint stock company, or other legal entity.

(22) "Rifle" means a weapon designed or redesigned, made or remade, and intended to be fired from the shoulder and designed or redesigned, made or remade, and intended to use the energy of the explosive in a fixed metallic cartridge to fire only a single projectile through a rifled bore for each single pull of the trigger.

(24) "Serious offense" means any of the following felonies or a felony attempt to commit any of the following felonies, as now existing or hereafter amended:

(b) Any felony violation of the uniform controlled substances act, chapter 69.50 RCW, that is classified as a class B felony or that has a maximum term of imprisonment of at least ten years;

(k) Vehicular assault, when caused by the operation or driving of a vehicle by a person while under the influence of intoxicating liquor or any drug or by the operation or driving of a vehicle in a reckless manner;

(l) Vehicular homicide, when proximately caused by the driving of any vehicle by any person while under the influence of intoxicating liquor or any drug as defined by RCW 46.61.502, or by the operation of any vehicle in a reckless manner;

(o) Any felony offense in effect at any time prior to June 6, 1996, that is comparable to a serious offense, or any federal or out-of-state conviction for an offense that under the laws of this state would be a felony classified as a serious offense; or

(25) "Short-barreled rifle" means a rifle having one or more barrels less than sixteen inches in length and any weapon made from a rifle by any means of modification if such modified weapon has an overall length of less than twenty-six inches.

(26) "Short-barreled shotgun" means a shotgun having one or more barrels less than eighteen inches in length and any weapon made from a shotgun by any means of modification if such modified weapon has an overall length of less than twenty-six inches.

(27) "Shotgun" means a weapon with one or more barrels, designed or redesigned, made or remade, and intended to be fired from the shoulder and designed or redesigned, made or remade, and intended to use the energy of the explosive in a fixed shotgun shell to fire through a smooth bore either a number of ball shot or a single projectile for each single pull of the trigger.

(28) "Transfer" means the intended delivery of a firearm to another person without consideration of payment or promise of payment including, but not limited to, gifts and loans. "Transfer" does not include the delivery of a firearm owned or leased by an entity licensed or qualified to do business in the state of Washington to, or return of such a firearm by, any of that entity's employees or agents, defined to include volunteers participating in an honor guard, for lawful purposes in the ordinary course of business.

(31) "Major component" means, with respect to a firearm, the slide or cylinder or the frame or receiver of the firearm, and in the case of a firearm that is not a pistol, includes the barrel of the firearm.

(33) "Undetectable firearm" means any firearm that does not contain sufficient metal to be reliably detectable by commonly used walk-through metal detectors or magnetometers, or any firearm that, if the firearm or any major component were subjected to inspection by the types of X-ray machines commonly used at airports, would not generate an image that accurately depicts the shape of the firearm or component. A firearm is per se undetectable if any major component is made of polymer plastic or other nonmetal material and the firearm does not contain at least 3.7 ounces of steel or steel alloy.

(34) "Untraceable firearm" means any firearm manufactured after July 1, 2019, for which the sale or distribution chain from a federally licensed dealer to the point of its first retail sale cannot be traced by law enforcement by means of a serial number registered with a federally licensed manufacturer imprinted on its major component.

NEW SECTION. Sec. 2. (1) No person may knowingly or recklessly allow, facilitate, aid, or abet the manufacture or assembly of an undetectable firearm or untraceable firearm: (a) Is ineligible under RCW 9.41.040 to possess a firearm; or (b) has signed a valid voluntary waiver of firearm rights that has not been revoked under RCW 9.41.350. For purposes of this provision, the failure to conduct a background check as provided in RCW 9.41.113 shall be prima facie evidence of recklessness.

(2) Any person violating this section is guilty of a gross misdemeanor punishable under chapter 9A.20 RCW. If a person previously has been found guilty under this section, then the person is guilty of a class C felony punishable under chapter 9A.20 RCW for each subsequent knowing violation of this section. A person is guilty of a separate offense for each and every firearm to which this section applies.

(a) Manufacture, own, buy, sell, loan, furnish, transport, or have in possession or under control, any machine gun, bump-fire stock, undetectable firearm, untraceable firearm, short-barreled shotgun, or short-barreled rifle;

(b) Manufacture, own, buy, sell, loan, furnish, transport, or have in possession or under control, any part designed and intended solely and exclusively for use in a machine gun, bump-fire stock, undetectable firearm, untraceable firearm, short-barreled shotgun, or short-barreled rifle, or in converting a weapon into a machine gun, short-barreled shotgun, or short-barreled rifle; or

(2) It is not unlawful for a person to manufacture, own, buy, sell, loan, furnish, transport, assemble, or repair, or have in possession or under control, a short-barreled rifle, or any part designed or intended solely and exclusively for use in a short-barreled rifle or in converting a weapon into a short-barreled rifle, if the person is in compliance with applicable federal law.

(a) Any peace officer in the discharge of official duty or traveling to or from official duty, or to any officer or member of the armed forces of the United States or the state of Washington in the discharge of official duty or traveling to or from official duty; or

(b) A person, including an employee of such person if the employee has undergone fingerprinting and a background check, who or which is exempt from or licensed under federal law, and engaged in the production, manufacture, repair, or testing of machine guns, bump-fire stocks, short-barreled shotguns, or short-barreled rifles:

(4) It shall be an affirmative defense to a prosecution brought under this section that the machine gun or short-barreled shotgun was acquired prior to July 1, 1994, and is possessed in compliance with federal law.

All machine guns, bump-fire stocks, undetectable firearms, untraceable firearms, short-barreled shotguns, or short-barreled rifles, or any part designed and intended solely and exclusively for use in a machine gun, short-barreled shotgun, or short-barreled rifle, or in converting a weapon into a machine gun, short-barreled shotgun, or short-barreled rifle, illegally held or illegally possessed are hereby declared to be contraband, and it shall be the duty of all peace officers, and/or any officer or member of the armed forces of the United States or the state of Washington, to seize said machine gun, bump-fire stock, undetectable firearm, untraceable firearm, short-barreled shotgun, or short-barreled rifle, or parts thereof, wherever and whenever found.

(1) It is unlawful for a person, in the commission or furtherance of a felony other than a violation of RCW 9.41.190, to discharge a machine gun or to menace or threaten with a machine gun, another person.

(2) It is unlawful for a person, in the commission or furtherance of a felony other than a violation of RCW 9.41.190, to discharge a firearm containing a bump-fire stock or to menace or threaten another person with a firearm containing a bump-fire stock.

(3) It is unlawful for a person, in the commission or furtherance of a felony other than a violation of RCW 9.41.190, to discharge a firearm or to menace or threaten another person with a firearm if that firearm is an undetectable firearm or an untraceable firearm.

NEW SECTION. Sec. 6. Sections 3 through 5 of this act are necessary for the immediate preservation of the public peace, health, or safety, or support of the state government and its existing public institutions, and take effect July 1, 2019.