Man sells off 3D-printed gun plans after ruling

Company owner finds loophole after US court bars him from posting blueprints online

The owner of a Texas company that makes untraceable 3D-printed guns says he has begun selling the blueprints through his website to anyone who wants to make one, after a federal court order barred him from posting the plans online.

Cody Wilson said at a news conference on Tuesday that he started selling the plans that morning and had already received nearly 400 orders.

He said he would sell the plans for as little as a penny to anyone in the United States who wanted them.

“Anyone who wants to get these files is going to get them,” Wilson said, noting that he could only sell to US customers. “They can name their own price.”

He said blueprints purchased through his company’s website could be downloaded on a thumb drive and shipped to buyers by standard mail, sent by e-mail or sent by some other secure download transfer. Some of his first sales included purchases made with cryptocurrency.

Nineteen states and the District of Columbia had sought an injunction to stop a settlement the State Department reached with Wilson’s Austin-based company, Defense Distributed, after the agency removed the 3D gun-making plans from a list of weapons or technical data that are not allowed to be exported.

The states argued that online access to the undetectable plastic guns would pose a security risk and could be acquired by felons or terrorists.

On Monday, US District Judge Robert Lasnik in Seattle blocked Defense Distributed from posting the blueprints online, saying: “It is the untraceable and undetectable nature of these small firearms that poses a unique danger.”

But Wilson said the ruling still allowed him to sell the blueprints even if he could not post them online for free, widespread distribution.

“Regulation under the (law) means the files cannot be uploaded to the Internet, but they can be e-mailed, mailed, securely transmitted, or otherwise published within the United States,” the ruling said on its final page.

“I’m following yesterday’s orders that direct me to sell the files. The judge was very gracious to put that in black lettering,” said Wilson.

Washington Attorney General Bob Ferguson, whose office oversaw the federal lawsuit, said he believed the judge’s ruling made Wilson’s latest actions illegal.

Wilson said he anticipated that states may try to sue to stop him from selling the plans, but that he was raising money for his legal defence. — AP