Furthermore, the 'ban' on importation or manufacture of full-auto weapons are, in fact, not a complete ban. There are exceptions, some of them notable. For example, a FN P-90 is on my wishlist, but falls under the aforementioned importation ban. Except for policemen. But once it's been imported for a cop, and said cop has owned it for a period of time (2 years, IIRC) then a standard Class III transfer & ATF tax stamp is all that is required for that cop to sell that firearm to any other citizen with the correct permit to buy one.
I do not believe that such a process is actually legal. I'm gonna need a link on that. First off, I do not believe policeman can "own" fully automatic weapons. They are treated as any other citizen under these laws. They may be issued one by a department but they do not own it and can not sell it. Second, it is my understanding that
no fully automatic manufactured after 1986 can enter the legal market as per
FOPA. I'd be interested if you could provide links to show otherwise.
Sorry for being unclear. I got into this thread because I was interested in how effective the "ban" on automatic rifles really is. From what you are saying you think they are poor tools anyway.
They are at least as effective as a semi-auto and they have that flexibility to go full auto in the unlikely even you actually needed to. Otherwise they are bad tools for most purposes other than fighting a battle. The ban is so effective gun control advocates have had to resort to a lot of false scare mongering about semi-autos to try and make them out to be "Machine Guns" or give them scarier names like "Assault Weapons". (and I say that as someone in favor of gun control) If fully automatics were actually out there on the streets, believe me you would be hearing about it.