to the flight or passengers. three large u.s. cities have filed a lawsuit against the department of defense. the suit filed by new york city, philadelphia, and san francisco alleges the pentagon failed to report many convictions in the military justice system to the fbi and its national gun background check database. the problem was exposed in november after devon kelly shot and killed 26 people at a texas church. kelly should not have been allowed to buy a gun, because he was convicted of an assault and court-martialed while serving in the air force. but that conviction was never reported to the fbi. nbc pentagon correspondent, hans nichols, joins us now from our washington newsroom. hans, good to see you. what's the pentagon saying about the lawsuit? >> well, officially today, they are forwarding questions to the department of justice to have them take care of the legal matter. unofficially, most people you talk to in the pentagon recognize that they have a reporting problem. that's across all services. they know that they haven't done a better job. this most recent ig report, this came out earlier this month,