'Pawn Stars' guest tries to sell a unique desk. Then, the expert tells her she could be in legal trouble.
Rare vintage items are highly likely to fetch a good valuation on TV shows such as "Pawn Stars," but every precious isn't necessarily legal. A woman who brought something with a shady past on the show learned this the hard way when she was taken aback after knowing the history behind the item. One woman came into the famous pawn shop, which she described by saying, "It's a desk, but it's not really a desk - it's a gun." She then went on to explain how the desk worked and said that when somebody pushes down on the inkwell on top of the desk it fires a bullet out of the trap door in front of it.
The item which is known as a novelty gun was brought to the store as the woman wanted to find out more about its history and was less worried about selling it. "I have no idea how much it's worth, I just really am curious what it was used for and how old it is, if I sell it, that's fine, if I don't I am okay with that too," she said in the episode. She revealed in the show, that she got her hands on the item in an estate sale. "I was just looking for a nice little desk to put a guestbook on," she added. Rick took a look at the item and identified that it used a 0.22 short, which is the oldest metallic cartridge made in the USA. He also understood the workings of the gun desk, concluding that it could hold only one round of ammunition.
They then called in Sean, an arms expert to find out the year in which it was manufactured. The man too was taken aback after taking a look at the time and added that while he had been collecting guns and weapons since he was 10, he had still not seen anything like this. "Anything manufactured before 1898 is okay, you can ship it, you can buy and sell, no problem," he said. "Anything after 1898 has to be registered through an FFL (Federal Firearms License) with the ATF (The Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives)," he revealed.
He also said that it was actually a concealed weapon as the gun itself was hidden. Sean tried to extract more information from the woman but she didn't seem to know anything else about the peculiar gun. Sean then decided to take a closer look at the gun and added that it looked like it was made around the 1890s to 1910s period but couldn't pinpoint the year, labeling it as a grey area and saying that it could potentially be illegal to purchase and sell.
He then advised her to bring it to a gunsmith to professionally deactivate the mechanism in the gun desk which would then clear the item for sale. "I wish I could help you out more, it's just one of those things," Rick Harrison said before thanking her for bringing the item to the pawn shop.
