I heard this on NPR this morning, and am flabbergasted.
Arizona recently had a gun buyback ptogram, as has been done countless times in other states and cities. They gave people $20 grocery cards (donated by a grocery chain, and also funded by donations) in exchange for guns. They want to destroy the guns thus brought in.
The local NRA is planning on suing, claiming that any abandoned property must, by law, be sold to the highest bidder at public auction. When it’s pointed out that these were “buy back” guns, bought by the police, they say that the guns were ABANDONED to the police.
Couldn’t find an artixcle on it this morning, but here’s one from last month, when they were saying the same thing about the same program:
What the Hell?
This seems a completely different issue from people having a right to owning and using firearms. It’s even completely separate from arguing about whether people can have particular types of weapons, like “assault weapons”. Nobody’s rights are being questioned here, except the police’s right to destrroy weapons they have legally obtained through bargaining. Clearly, the police would like to get these, not only off the street, but remove the possibility that they will somehow find their way back onto the street (like being stolen from a warehouse or lockup).
Is the NRA’s position that it’s a BAD thing to destroy guns at all? When did they get that crazy?
Neither do I.
It’s turned into a “bidding war”, with NRA members offering potential gun “buybackers” more than $20 for the guns they’re bringing in.
I’m not seeing where the NRA even has standing to sue, and it’s not like this is the first gun buyback ever. And it’s not even like the police went door-to-door; people had to go to the buyback site. Besides, I understand that most guns involved in these buybacks aren’t the high-value guns, they’re cheap little Saturday night specials, so I can’t imagine why the NRA would want those.
So basically, it sounds like the NRA is being pissy and grabbing attention again. Someone please call the wahhh-mbulance.
Are the police buying back the guns with their own money?
If it’s tax payers money I can see where the NRA, and taxpayers, might have something to say about it. It seems wasteful to me to use taxpayer money to buy goods and destroy them.
In some stories the Ucson police make precisely this point – that many things seized are destroyed on a regular basis.
But, of course, these guns aren’t even “seized” – they’re purchased, a distinction that the NRA not only ignore in their arguments, but actually is vowing to get lefilation to change.
I have to ask again – What is the vPoint of this attitude? What is the NRA actually trying to accomplish? Establish that guns are sacrosanct, and like Matter/Energy cannot be destroyed, but simply turned over to a new owner?
“12-945. Sale of property
A. If after thirty days notice has been given the owner or person entitled to the property has not taken it away, the property may be sold. The proceeds shall be paid to the general fund of the jurisdiction from which the unclaimed property was received.
B. Notwithstanding subsection A of this section, if the property is a firearm, the court shall order the firearm to be sold to any business that is authorized to receive and dispose of the firearm under federal and state law and that shall sell the firearm to the public according to federal and state law, unless the firearm is otherwise prohibited from being sold under federal and state law. A law enforcement agency may trade a firearm that it has retained to a federal firearms licensed business for ammunition, weapons, equipment or other materials to be exclusively used for law enforcement purposes.”
I read that and it still seems that it hinges on a novel definition of “abandoned”. The owners are not abandoning the weapons: they are selling them for coupons as provided by a third party. You could just as easily claim that the state would be forced to sell any firearms that it purchased for use by its police officers.
Police property I think is taxpayer property. I’m sure they have regulations to keep them from wasting taxpayer property. Revenue raised from the selling of these guns would slightly lessen the tax burden.
First they need to show that buyback guns should be considered abandoned property and since the law clearly states that abaondoned property can be reclaimed by the owner, then either the police is the owner as the posters above have pointed out, or the people who “abandoned” their guns for cash should be given 30 days notice to reclaim them.
Only it’s NOT “unclaimed property”, so the law shouldn’t apply. It’s voluntarily surrendered in exchange for a “gift card”.
I wonder if the real point of this is not simply to be a Pain In The Ass, but to discredit the very idea of a buyback program. The NRA has long been saying that they are pointless, since it doesn’t affect the majority of weapons, but, if this article is an indication, they’re afraid that buybacks may turn into compulsory programs, amounting to confiscation:
Why is the NRA taking the stance? Simple. The fucking NRA is nothing but the Church of the Holy Gun. And it’s blasphemous to destroy that which they worship. The NRA doesn’t give two wet shits about gun-owners; it’s the guns that they hold above all else.
I would. If such a statute existed, someone would have brought it up in arguing the case by now. So far, they seem to be pinning their argument on their unique interpretation of “abandoned”
I don’t know why this is in the Pit. The NRA is just fulfilling its mandate of protecting the rights of Firearm-Americans. Destruction of buyback guns is a violation of the guns’ right to due process of law.
This is why we have elections. If you think your municipal government is making unwise use of its funding, you elect a different one. This is not why we have courts.
Do you know what “abandoned property” is? It’s not stuff that is exchanged for consideration.
I am not exactly a fan of the NRA, but this is way, way goofier than any legal argument they’ve tried before. It has about as much weight as PETA’s argument that the 13th Amendment protects killer whales from “slavery”.
And that’s not a completely crazy claim – the idea would, I suppose, be that $20 is such a low price for a firearm that it is, effectively, abandoning. But it’s almost completely crazy.
Correct.
I suspect they think it’s a bad thing to use public funds to destroy valuable property that is not contraband.
This is not a Second Amendment argument – it’s a public policy argument.
I agree. Even if the guns were bought for a penny, they aren’t being abandoned; they’re being sold.
Of course, the NRA has every right to offer TWO pennies – or, in this case, whatever premium they’re offering above the gift cards the police are offering. Right?
