Giving back to your community

The police department in Clarksburg, West Virginia is giving back to their community in a way that I can really get behind.

CLARKSBURG — The Clarksburg Police did a little spring cleaning Tuesday. The department spent the day clearing out its evidence locker in an effort to save the department some money.

The gist of it is that the PD went through their evidence locker and took about 70 guns which had been confiscated and traded them to a local gun shop in exchange for 10 new shotguns for the department.

Any guns that had the serial numbers removed were not traded, and those are slated to be destroyed.  The guns that were traded couldn’t be returned to the original owners for whatever reason, but instead of destroying them, it seems the PD had a little bit of common sense and decided to put them to good use.  I like that, because instead of destroying these guns, they can end up in the hands of a law-abiding gun owners, at at the same time help equip the police department even better.

Perhaps instead of gun buybacks, more departments should try taking confiscated firearms and using them to help fund their departments.  It’s not a bad idea, and I wouldn’t mind seeing a lot of those guns made available to the law-abiding public for sale.

10 Comments

  1. The odds that you’ll EVER see a Massachusetts PD doing that? Slim and none… and slim just moved to New Hampshire along with all the other people fleeing this fascistic hellhole. You see, there’s a STATE LAW that says that they CAN’T… so sentence the gun to death for being a gun. Yeesh.

    I gotta move to a free state. Soon.

  2. Finally, a PD with some common sense.

    I heard from a LEO friend that IMPD will sell firearms from the evidence room as long as the trial has cleared and all that jazz.

  3. What if one of these guns ends up used in a crime and some intrepid investigator somehow tracks it back to trade in? Ooh-wee. The manure will hit the fan if that happens.

    Anyway, I think this is a good idea too.

  4. Good for them! I’m shocked that more departments don’t do this, especially considering how difficult it is to wrangle money for new equipment sometimes. I’ve heard horror stories of departments where the officers never get their shotguns out of the trunk, because they’re in such bad shape they don’t trust them. Nevermind that what they really need is a rifle.

  5. I’ve always wanted to see firearms training programs for law-abiding inner-city residents using surplus LEO firearms, where at the end of training you could purchase one at a discount. A good way to get some more urban marksmen to lower the recidivism rates…? Who knows, “gun welfare” might just empower someone.

  6. That’s an awesome idea… love to see the local city dept. do it, esp. if the guns were in good condition!

  7. When I got my Cougar last Saturday, the store owner was talking to another customer about several pistols he had, saying they were sold to him by a PD on the coast, along with about 100 guns from their evidence locker.

  8. No wonder Omaha PD is so hot to confiscate unregistered guns out of hand, with no recourse…. such thuggery is legal AND Profitable!

  9. Auction them off, the same way cars, boats, bikes, etc., that are confiscated are auctioned off. Money to the PD without the need for raising taxes.

    dc

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