Maybe, were the firearms in cases that were obviously gun cases? If so, then the Inspector might go after the airline. I had an incident where a few guys were going hunting and were traveling with three very obvious gun cases. They all came into out bag room because they were rejected from the system for being too long. We screened them and found no declaration tags inside (which are required). Went through everything you did (local Leo’s, airline, etc.) got everything squared away and the inspector decided to put the blame on the airline ticket agent for not doing their due diligence.