WHAT HAPPENED?

Sessions Orders Review of Background Check System After Texas Massacre

The shooter’s domestic violence conviction was not entered into the background check system.

Attorney General Jeff Sessions on Wednesday ordered top officials at the FBI and ATF to conduct a review of the federal background check system in the wake of the mass murder at a church in Sutherland Springs, Texas. In a memo, Sessions said the National Instant Criminal Background Check System (NICS) “is critically important to protecting the American public from firearms-related violence.” Devin Patrick Kelley murdered 26 people at the Texas church earlier this month. Kelley was previously convicted for domestic violence but the Air Force, where Kelley served from 2010 to 2014, apparently did not report the conviction into the NICS database, which could have prevented Kelley from buying firearms.