NEW YORK, May 16 (UPI) -- New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg has filed a 78-page lawsuit against gun dealers in five states in a bid to reduce the number of illegal weapons in the city.
The suit names gun stores in Georgia, Ohio, Pennsylvania, South Carolina and Virginia that Bloomberg alleges sold guns to customers knowing they would turn the weapons over to criminals.
At a City Hall news conference Monday, Bloomberg said the city conducted a 6-week undercover operation in which investigators working for the city used hidden cameras to videotape transactions with sales clerks at the named stores, the New York Sun reported.
The mayor said because more than 80 percent of guns recovered at city crime scenes come from other states "our efforts to stop this bloodshed have to reach across state lines."
Bloomberg criticized the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms, the agency charged with enforcing federal gun laws, saying it would be an "understatement" to say they are "asleep at the switch."
More than 300 people were killed in New York by illegal handguns last year, the report said.
