IT'S OPEN SEASON FOR GUNS GUN MAKERS GET AROUND BANS.

Byline: Gregory J. Wilcox Daily News Staff Writer

The 7.62 mm slugs from the bank robbers' AK-47 automatic rifles riddled cars, trucks, concrete and police body armor.

Destruction and fear descended upon the neighborhood at 2,160 feet per second, as the two men seemed unconcerned about dying, surrendering or who they hurt.

When the police fired back, their 9 mm semiautomatic pistol bullets did little more than irritate the robbers, as lead rounds bounced off several layers of body armor rather than inflict any serious pain.

The officers managed to kill the robbers, but only after Larry Eugene Phillips Jr. appeared to commit suicide and Emil Matasareanu was swarmed by specially armed police.

In the days after the deadly shootout at the Bank of America branch in North Hollywood one chilling fact emerged: Anyone with patience and cash can legally buy much of what the robbers had used - from their black ninja-like clothing to their high-powered ammunition, high-capacity magazines and body armor.

And in some cases, the guns.

AK-47 magazines that hold 100 rounds are advertised for $50 in a variety of shooting and survival magazines.

Police have found in Matasareanu's hideouts literature for altering identification, urban combat tactics and building homemade weapons. Those can be found in bookstores or on the Internet. Also on line are links to firearms training courses.

And the guns that the duo used can be bought, despite state and federal laws passed in 1989 and 1994 to curb the sales of assault-style weapons.

Manufacturers are able to circumvent the state law, passed in 1989, by making cosmetic and mechanical changes to the weapons and giving them a different name. The federal law, passed in 1994, in part permits manufacturers and shops to sell out their existing supplies.

And for some, the laws don't matter anyway.

``There is a market,'' said John D'Angelo, spokesman for the federal Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms in Los Angeles. ``And it seems like the criminals that want this stuff can find the people who are willing to sell it or introduce them to the people willing to sell it.''

That includes automatic weapons that have been illegal since the 1930s but are still available via an underground arms network.

Just last Thursday, federal agents raided an El Monte arms importer and confiscated about 2,100 illegal, fully automatic rifles. It was unrelated to the North Hollywood shootout but serves to underscore the ready supply.

Last month, authorities arrested a suspect in Northern California who had 15 assault rifles and conversion kits to turn each one into a machine gun, said Mike Van Winkle, a spokesman for the state Department of Justice.

Gun dealers, too, say they have seen little change in the types of weapons available, despite the state and federal laws.

``All the manufacturers changed their guns a little bit so they could still sell them in California,'' said Bill Handley, co-owner of Northridge Pistol & Rifle Range Inc.

An example hangs on one wall of his shop. It is a black, sleek-looking Springfield Armory SAR-8 obtained before the federal ban went into effect, thus it can still be sold. The .308-caliber rifle has a flash suppressor, illegal now on semiautomatic rifles, a $2,700 price tag, nearly half of which is attributed to the rifle's high-priced scope.

``They make a version of the SAR-8 today that's legal,'' Handley said of Springfield Armory. ``And all the parts are interchangeable on the weapons.''

Handley opened the facility five years ago and says its the state's largest indoor shooting range and the only one for rifles. It's got 36 shooting lanes.

His company also sells body armor, which can cost as much as $800, a complete line of weapons and accessories and offers a variety of shooting classes.

Exactly what assault weapons are illegal is not clear. While state and federal laws are specific about what guns and accessories are banned, manufacturers routinely introduce new models that are outside the law yet fire the same type of ammunition and perform in a similar way.

The laws have only been successful in taking specific guns off the market, like the Uzi, AR-15, MAC 10 and all series of the Avtomat Kalashnikov - or the AK-47.

But it is plausible that Phillips and Matasareanu might have owned their weapons legally. That's because people who already owned guns banned by the state before June 1, 1989, could register them after the law took effect.

Lots of owners took advantage.

From Jan. 1, 1990, through the end of last year, 37,821 Californians had registered a total of 62,299 assault weapons, according to the Justice Department, but registrations have slowed to a trickle.

So today, rifles and pistols that look and operate a lot like those on both the state and federal list of banned weapons still are legally available in gun shops.

``It wouldn't surprise me,'' said state Attorney General Daniel E. Lungren. ``We're still trying to enforce the law, but there is no doubt it's been difficult to do that.''

Sen. Dianne Feinstein, D-Calif., who pushed assault-weapons legislation through Congress, acknowledges that there are problems. Her bill banned the sale and manufacture of 19 weapons and also limited magazine capacity to 10 rounds.

But her legislation did not fully address the issue of high-capacity magazines made in foreign countries.

``I'd prohibit possession in an instant. I see no need for these weapons in a peacetime society,'' she said. ``I think we have a right not to get shot, and I think it's as strong a right as the one that says you can have one (an assault weapon).''

A case involving Colt Manufacturing Co. Inc. of Hartford, Conn., illustrates just how hard it is for California to enforce its law.

After the law took effect, Colt brought out a new version of the AR-15 with mechanical and cosmetic modifications that is being marketed today.

The state considered it a ``copycat'' model and tried to stop sales. But the case has been tied up in court for nearly five years and has failed to keep the gun out of shops, Lungren said.

``We picked one of the easiest copycats we thought we had, and it's just been one legal snaggle after another,'' he said.

Not surprisingly, Colt's spokesman Mike Reissig said that the company simply is following the law.

``It complies with the regulation involving rifles,'' he said, noting that one of the first changes under the law was to alter the firing mechanism so that the gun couldn't be converted to automatic.

While obtaining the weapons legally simply is a matter of coming up with the cash and passing a background check, learning how to use them in a professional manner might be a little more difficult.

Authorities still are probing Phillips' and Matasareanu's backgrounds, so it is not known yet whether they had any formal weapons training or a militia background.

Ken Good, a former Navy SEAL and co-owner of Combative Concepts Inc. in Coronado, teaches combat shooting techniques to law enforcement and security agencies. After viewing videotapes of the event, he concluded that the two robbers had few, if any, technical weapons skills.

``I'll tell you what they had was commitment and no regard for their personal safety or anybody else's. And that creates a dangerous situation,'' Good said. ``Tactically, they could have done a lot of things, and it's a good thing that they didn't.''

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PHOTO (color) Eric Symonds, a manager of B&B Gun Sales in North Hollywood, holds an assault-style rifle for sale.

Myung J. Chun/Daily News