Tuscaloosa City Council rejects bid to revoke Guns and Ammo business license after contested hearing

The Tuscaloosa City Council on Aug. 7, 2025, voted 4–2 to deny a motion to revoke the business license and the privilege to renew the license of Guns and Ammo LLC, a firearms retailer owned by Joshua Wakefield, following a three-hour public hearing and testimony from police investigators and the store owner.

The council hearing, conducted under Tuscaloosa City Code sec. 7-33, was prompted by a police investigation that led to a search warrant at Guns and Ammo and 26 municipal citations tied to record-keeping and secondhand-dealer rules. City attorneys told the council the shop had repeatedly failed to follow the city’s secondhand-dealer requirements and had bought firearms from a convicted felon; the business and its attorney said the problems were clerical and that Wakefield cooperated with investigators.

City Attorney (identified in materials provided to the council) urged revocation as a public-safety measure, saying the city could prove that on multiple occasions the shop bought guns that were later identified as stolen and that staff continued transactions after being warned. “We’re asking you to revoke Mister Wakefield’s business license, not just because he’s a bad bookkeeper, but because the whole way he operates his business jeopardizes public safety, and he couldn’t care less,” the city attorney said during opening remarks.

Tuscaloosa Police Department Investigator Jeffrey Kervin, assigned to the FBI Safe Streets task force, testified about the city’s secondhand-dealer rules and about specific incidents the department investigated. “When you buy…