Bad news confirmed...
My original email:
Sent: Tuesday, March 24, 2009 5:08 PM
To: Canada Firearms Centre - Centre des armes à feu Canada
Subject: converting a bolt action handgun
Could you please see the appropriate department receives this.
I am a gunsmith and have been for over 40 years.
Back about 1970 when I was working as a gunsmith for Barotto Sports in
Calgary we converted 6 Remington XP-100 pistols that were registered as
pistols and chambered for the .221 Fireball cartridge. We removed the
pistol barrel and pistol stocks and then installed rifle barrels and
rifle stocks on these receivers. At that time we had them removed from
the handgun registry through the RCMP. At first we were told by someone
processing the paper work that it could not be done, but after re
reading the firearms legislation he realized that a rifle can not be
made into a handgun, but that a handgun can be made into a rifle. At
that point they were all "deregistered" and the serial numbered action
became non restricted.
I have been told that the registry in no longer allowing registered
handguns to be altered to long guns. If this is true could you please
quote the legislation that prevents this conversion. Just to be clear
this is not about making a handgun from a rifle, it is the opposite -
the making a non restricted single shot bolt action rifle from a non
prohibited handgun.
Thank you for your attention to this.
Dennis Sorensen
His reply:
Sir
Thank you for your inquiry. Your are correct in your last paragraph below, that it is not permissable to change the legal classification of a handgun from restricted to non-restricted by configuring the frame/receiver into a rifle. The supporting legality for this is in the Criminal Code of Canada, s. 84, definition of a handgun. Please not the wording "whether or not is has been redesigned or ..." .
http://laws.justice.gc.ca/en/showdoc/cs/C-46/bo-ga:l_III//en#anchorbo-ga:l_III
"handgun"
«arme de poing »
"handgun" means a firearm that is designed, altered or intended to be aimed and fired by the action of one hand, whether or not it has been redesigned or subsequently altered to be aimed and fired by the action of both hands;
To paraphrase the above in relation to your question, "once a handgun, always a handgun."
To clarify your first paragraph, it is possible to configure your rifle into a handgun by changing its' characteristics, however as soon as you do so and it becomes a handgun it will be of the restricted class, and despite any later re-configuration, it will always remain a handgun.
Should you have any further questions, please do not hesitate to contact me.
Regards,
George Fraser SSM, CD.
Canadian Firearms Program
Royal Canadian Mounted Police
My response:
Thank you very much for this information.
Is it possible to tell me when this law;
("handgun" means a firearm that is designed, altered or intended to be aimed and fired by the action of one hand, whether or not it has been redesigned or subsequently altered to be aimed and fired by the action of both hands)
came into effect?
I was wondering how we were able to deregister the handguns described below back in the 1970's. This must not have been in effect then?
Dennis
His reply:
I believe it was 1995.