Originally Posted By: NdIndyI would assume (and I'm assuming since I don't have a dog in the fight) if the tax stamp is registered to a trust, you need something showing you are the trust. Otherwise there's nothing that says the person in possession of it is legally in possession of it. If it's stamped to you as an individual your ID takes care of that by itself.
that was my take on things too. since its trust owned, you have to be able to prove you're not only a member of the trust, but additionally a "responsible person" allowed to be in posession of the item owned by the trust.
Originally Posted By: crittr gittrIf your trust is set up under your personal name, which it should be, your name is already on the tax stamp so you do not need to carry a copy of the trust with you. This is what my attorney told me.
first off - a trust name, even a NFA trust name - can be anything. Your name, your dogs name, a random string of numbers and letters. the name on the trust is no different that a item number on a series of products. its just a title. there is no legal guideline as to what your trust can or even should be named.
however even if your name is the name of the trust, that doesnt necessarily put you in a position of being a "responsible person" who's allowed to posses trust items, or even being a member of the trust.
now i am not a lawyer, but IMHO, i would suggest at the very least, if you're in posession of trust owned NFA items, you carry with you a copy of your Schedule A and Schedule B ( or whatever your trust calls your list of trust members, and the list of trust property) as well as the stamp for the item you have in posession and your personal ID.
those documents are what tie you personally to the trust and therefore verify your legality of posession.
just as an example
You're in posession of a silencer register to "John Smith's NFA trust".
Your name is John Smith
however just because your name is john smith, does not 100% guarantee that you're the John smith the trust was named after. or that there is even a John Smith as a valid member of the trust.
Your Schedule A list of trust members will have the additional pieces of information to confirm that in fact you are the John Smith the trust designates as a responsible person in the trust because it will have other data points, for example: a least part of your SSN, your DOB, your home address, etc
Lets say that you are
John Smith
123 anywhere Ln
Cowtown, TX
DOB: 12.12.1971 SSN: xxx-xx-1234
but the trust's Schedule A List of trust members may say that the only john smith in the trust is
John Smith
123 Apple Ln
Crabtree, TX
DOB: 1.12.1979 SSN: xxx-xxx-2345
so you can see why not having at least some basic trust paperwork with you may well cause issues, and that a LEO may not take just the stamp and your ID as valid posession documents.
YMMV, but with anything dealing with the NFA its probably best to err on the side of caution. So carrying a few extra pieces of paper instead of just your stamp is probably not a bad idea. Personally i have a copy of the entire trust i keep in my vehicles. that way i'm never without it.