I am a FFL in TN. We run the Buyer and The firearm. If the firearm has been put in the system as stolen it will be caught right then seen it happen more than once. What probably happened was the gun was tracked down to the pawn shop by law enforcement and not serial numbers. they probably got the crook to tell them who he sold it to and then tracked it to the pawn shop without the gun ever going into the system as stolen as the owner probably did not even have the serial number. By the time the law tracked it to the pawn shop it had already been sold to you.
