Imagine this prospect: You discover the gun used in a violent crime in your neighborhood was purchased at a local gun show.

Here are several of the questions likely to trouble you: Who sold that gun? Why didn’t anyone bother to run a background check or require a waiting period? Why in the world was that weapon handed over to a criminal?

That’s the nightmare scenario the Washington Legislature should have the courage to prevent. Bills have been introduced in both the House and the Senate this session to require sellers at gun shows to follow the exact crime prevention steps as dealers in gun stores.

Gun store dealers are required to run online background checks on buyers before they sell a rifle or a shotgun. They must observe a five-day waiting period before selling a pistol.

Those common-sense crime prevention tactics won’t stop a law-abiding citizen from hunting an elk or a mallard.

They can be effective, however, in preventing a murderer, sexual predator, kidnapper, terrorist or a person with a violent mental illness from laying his or her hands on a gun. These are the people whose intent isn’t on bringing a roast goose to your holiday dinner table, but horror to your street.

Opponents of this legislation argue that it’s a step toward confiscating guns from legitimate owners. Don’t believe them.

This law wouldn’t hamper the Inland Northwest’s hunting season in the least, nor keep a responsible collector from acquiring an antique firearm.

They’ll tell you that criminals can find other ways to lay their hands on a gun. That much is true: Criminals often steal guns from people’s homes, buy them on the street or trade drugs for them.

But here’s what opponents won’t tell you:

International terrorists were convicted in 2001 of buying guns at U.S. gun shows to supply Hezbollah and al-Qaida.

American gun shows also have been linked to prominent homegrown terrorists. Some of the guns used by the Columbine shooters were purchased for them at a gun show by a friend.

Criminals involved in the Oklahoma City bombings stole guns from collectors, and one of them admitted he sold many of them at gun shows. Branch Davidian leader David Koresh and his followers bought their huge stash of weapons at Texas gun shows.

The majority of gun show dealers no doubt make responsible choices. But all it takes is one shady dealer with a trunkload of pistols to impact a community’s safety significantly.

The Seattle police chief recommends passing this legislation because aggravated assaults with a firearm have gone up in his city 48 percent since 2004. And, nationally, violent gun crime increased 49.4 percent from 2004 to 2005. This country, despite all its concern about terrorism, has simply begun to ignore many of its efforts to tighten gun restrictions and trace crime guns.

Will closing the gun show loophole keep all guns out of the hands of criminals?

No.

Is it a logical step that could help prevent crime on your block?

Absolutely.