World’s largest firearms supplier sells 3.5 years worth of AR-15 clips in 72 hours 
 
 By David Edwards 
 
 Friday, December 21, 2012 12:35 EDT 
 
 The world’s largest supplier of firearms on Thursday said that it had experienced “unprecedented” demand for AR-15 ammunition magazines after a similar weapon was used to slaughter 20 6- and 7-year-old children at a school in Connecticut. 
 
 In a statement on the AR15.com forum, Brownells spokesperson Jason Corpus apologized to customers for delays in fulfilling their orders of assault weapon clips. 
 
 “I wanted to take a minute to shed some insight on the magazine situation if i can,” Corpus wrote. “First of all I wanted to offer an apology for the situation that Pacs and anyone else encountered with magazines being ‘In-Stock’ and Backordered moments later… the demand for magazines actually exceeded the ability for the system to keep up with the volume that was being ordered.” 
 
 Corpus explained that the company’s enterprise resource planning (ERP) computer system had been flooded with orders after the tragedy in Connecticut. 
 
 “To shed some more light on the magazine situation at present, it really has been unprecedented in the last 5 days,” he continued. “[W]e sold the ‘average demand’ equivalent of about 3 1/2 years worth of PMAGS, and and an even greater amount of our Brownells magazines. We’re working like crazy to get these orders to you as quickly as possible.” 
 
 Corpus later corrected his statement to clarify that the 3.5 years worth of magazines had actually been sold in 72 hours — or three days — instead of five days. 
 
 “On the Brownells 30 and 20 round magazines, we’re still flowing those into the system daily, and are producing those at 100% capacity as well,” he said. “We ordered more material yesterday that will allow us to up production again in the coming weeks.” 
 
 A search of Brownells’ online store showed on Friday that the top 10 most popular AR-15 clips — including the Surefire high-capacity 100 round magazine — were out of stock. 
 
 [Photo: Shuttertock.com] 
 
 (h/t: Guns.com) ||||| HARTFORD, Conn. (Reuters) - A lawyer for families who lost loved ones in the 2012 Sandy Hook school shooting told Connecticut’s highest court on Tuesday that Remington Outdoor Co [FREDM.UL] should be held responsible because its military-themed marketing was designed to appeal to young men like killer Adam Lanza. 
 
 “They knew they were hitting their mark and Lanza was responding to their marketing,” said lawyer Joshua Koskoff 
 
 Lanza, 20, used a Remington AR-15 Bushmaster rifle, a semi-automatic civilian version of the U.S. military’s M-16, to kill 20 school children between the ages of 6 and 7, as well as six adult staff members, at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, Connecticut, on Dec. 14, 2012. He then killed himself. 
 
 Following the conclusion Tuesday’s arguments, the Connecticut Supreme Court will now decide whether the families of nine of the victims and one survivor can proceed with a trial seeking to hold Remington, along with a gun wholesaler and local retailer, responsible for the carnage based on its marketing. 
 
 A representative for the court declined to say when it would rule. 
 
 The families are advancing a somewhat novel legal argument in hopes of overcoming a federal law enacted by U.S. Congress in 2005 to shield gun manufacturers from liability for how their products are used. 
 
 Remington’s lawyer, James Vogts, told the Connecticut court that the families’ claims, first filed in 2014, are barred by the 2005 law. 
 
 FILE PHOTO: Street artist Mark Panzarino, 41, prepares a memorial as he writes the names of the Sandy Hook Elementary School victims during the six-month anniversary of the massacre, at Union Square in New York, June 14, 2013. REUTERS/Eduardo Munoz/File Photo 
 
 “What happened in the school that morning was horrific,” Vogts said. “But no matter how much we wished those children and teachers were still alive, the law needs to be applied.” 
 
 A lower court judge agreed with the gun maker and dismissed the families’ lawsuit in 2016. But the Connecticut Supreme Court agreed to hear the case a week after the families filed their first appeal. 
 
 The packed courtroom in Hartford, Connecticut, included many of the victims’ family members. Ian Hockley, who lost his 6-year-old son, Dylan, in the shooting, told reporters after the proceeding that families were “running out of patience” over the gun maker’s ability to escape liability. 
 
 “But we have not lost one ounce of confidence in the validity of our case,” he said. 
 
 The families claim Remington and the other defendants “extolled the militaristic and assaultive qualities” of the AR-15, advertising the rifle as “mission-adaptable” and “the ultimate combat weapons system” in a deliberate pitch to a demographic of young men fascinated by the military. 
 
 The families said Lanza was part of that demographic and cited media reports saying he previously expressed a desire to join the army. The rifle was bought by Lanza’s mother, whom he also killed, as a gift for him or for the two of them to share, the lawsuit claims. 
 
 The families’ argument is based on the legal doctrine of negligent entrustment, in which a product is carelessly sold or given to a person at high risk of using it in a harmful way. Negligent entrustment is specifically excepted from the 2005 gun maker shield laws. 
 
 FILE PHOTO: Mourners hold signs during a solidarity vigil in memory of victims of Las Vegas' Route 91 Harvest music festival mass killing, in Newtown, Connecticut U.S., the site of the 2012 Sandy Hook school shooting, October 4, 2017. REUTERS/Michelle McLoughlin/File Photo 
 
 The argument has historically been used where someone lends a car to a high-risk driver who goes on to cause an accident. It has met with some success in lawsuits against gun shop owners, but legal experts said it has never been used before to target a manufacturer. 
 
 David Studdert, a Stanford law professor, said on Monday he thought negligent entrustment was a tough argument for the families to make because it has traditionally involved someone having direct knowledge that another person poses a risk. 
 
 If the Sandy Hook families are successful, Timothy Lytton, a law professor at Georgia State University, said on Monday he would expect the U.S. Supreme Court to take up the case.
– More apparent fallout from the Connecticut shooting: Sales of AR-15 magazines are so through the roof that the world's biggest firearm supplier apologized this week for delays, Raw Story reports. "It really has been unprecedented in the last 5 days," wrote a spokesman from Brownells on the AR15.com forum. In fact, 3.5 years' worth of magazines have sold over 72 hours for the AR-15, which is similar to the weapon used to murder 20 elementary school children in Newtown, Connecticut. "We’re working like crazy to get these orders to you as quickly as possible," the spokesman added. (Meanwhile Dick's Sporting Goods has stopped selling some semiautomatic rifles, which are selling fast at Walmart.)