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The Guns Were Said to Be Destroyed. Instead, They Were Reborn. (www.nytimes.com)

submitted 7 months ago by MicroWave@lemmy.world to c/news@lemmy.world

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Communities across the U.S. are fueling a secondary arms market by giving seized and surrendered guns to disposal services that destroy one part and resell the rest.

When Flint, Mich., announced in September that 68 assault weapons collected in a gun buyback would be incinerated, the city cited its policy of never reselling firearms.

“Gun violence continues to cause enormous grief and trauma,” said Mayor Sheldon Neeley. “I will not allow our city government to profit from our community’s pain by reselling weapons that can be turned against Flint residents.”

But Flint’s guns were not going to be melted down. Instead, they made their way to a private company that has collected millions of dollars taking firearms from police agencies, destroying a single piece of each weapon stamped with the serial number and selling the rest as nearly complete gun kits. Buyers online can easily replace what’s missing and reconstitute the weapon.

Hundreds of towns and cities have turned to a growing industry that offers to destroy guns used in crimes, surrendered in buybacks or replaced by police force upgrades. But these communities are in fact fueling a secondary arms market, where weapons slated for destruction are recycled into civilian hands, often with no background check required, according to interviews and a review of gun disposal contracts, patent records and online listings for firearms parts.

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[-] ArcaneSlime@lemmy.dbzer0.com 42 points 7 months ago

Buyers online can easily replace what’s missing and reconstitute the weapon.

I like how this article doesn't mention that since it is the serialized receiver they need to "fix" the buyer still has to pass a NICs background check at an FFL to get the receiver separately, instead implying they can just buy it online like ordering car parts. Nice subtle move to make it sound worse than it actually is, gotta push those feature bans!

[-] babboa@lemmy.world 15 points 7 months ago

Yep. Most people clutching their pearls at this story don't have any idea how difficult it is to actually build anything outside a gen 3 Glock or an ar-15. And those have "80% kits" that basically say "drill hole here" available on the market. Try finding a hi point, lorcin, or even Taurus or low end S&W pistol, or cheap shotgun(like a Stevens or Remington 870) receiver(because that's most of what comes into these guys who have businesses like this), and you'll find out it is a) cost prohibitive, b) still has to go through a nics check bc there's nobody home building much of anything (well, the hi point may be the odd one out bc there are 3d printed frames you could make). What they do end up doing is a lot of business with guys refurbishing grandpa's old deer or duck gun.

[-] mctoasterson@reddthat.com 9 points 7 months ago

And thankfully these kits are out there. Say you have inherited grandpa's old rifle and it has a clean receiver but is otherwise pretty thrashed... You can spend a few hundred bucks and get parts to repair old guns that would otherwise have no parts availability.

[-] ArcaneSlime@lemmy.dbzer0.com 2 points 7 months ago

For sure!

[-] NoMoreLurking@startrek.website 8 points 7 months ago

I guess that companies like this one

https://youtu.be/5q54yLuJlKk?feature=shared

adhere to regulations, but it is not unimaginable that there are those who could make the same part and sell it under the table. It's not even a necessity to own a CNC to cut this part out of a block of aluminium, an old-time milling machine and 20 hours worth of training are enough to get the job done.

[-] ArcaneSlime@lemmy.dbzer0.com 8 points 7 months ago

Well yes crimes can always be committed but making and selling without a manufacturers license is a serious crime punishable by iirc 10yr in prison or more. Making your own is legal but virtually impossible to stop even if they have to make a luty SMG and ECM rifle the barrel at home.

[-] ExLisper@linux.community 36 points 7 months ago

I would like to have the imagination that would let me come up with schemes like that. It would never occur to me to make money off of gun violence. American capitalist are something else...

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[-] Jaysyn@kbin.social 35 points 7 months ago

Sounds like fraud, but I'm sure they have some bullshit legaleze protecting their ass.

[-] radix@lemmy.world 53 points 7 months ago

A "gun" is legally defined. There are dozens of parts, but usually only 1-2 are deemed to be the "firearm" for legal purposes, and those get the serial number. The rest, even when necessary for proper operation of the weapon, are essentially just accessories as far as the law is concerned.

[-] Machinist3359@kbin.social 11 points 7 months ago

Sounds like a useful loophole for gun reform and getting around the 2nd amendment.

[-] Bgugi@lemmy.world 10 points 7 months ago

It's a practical line that has to be drawn. Otherwise your going to have to go for a background check for every pin screw and spring you want to buy.

[-] QuinceDaPence@kbin.social 6 points 7 months ago

Some countries use the barrel as the S/N part instead of the receiver but I'd rather a wear item not be the s/n item. Plus, with AR15 you can buy one receiver and then gets finished uppers in 5.56mm, 9mm, .50 Beowulf, .300 Blackout etc.

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[-] BigDiction@lemmy.world 4 points 7 months ago

That’s kind of what California has in place for semi auto rifles. If the gun has certain ‘assault features’ like a collapsible stock, pistol grip, muzzle device, etc - the firearm needs to be taken apart to remove the magazine.

If the firearm has no assault features, then you can have a standard removable magazine (capped at 10 rounds). As a result you’ll see some pretty odd looking CA compliant rifles sold in state that are featureless.

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[-] FartsWithAnAccent@lemmy.world 34 points 7 months ago* (last edited 7 months ago)

Gun buyback programs are almost always a joke of one kind or another.

[-] douz0a0bouz@midwest.social 27 points 7 months ago

It’s wild how you get: gun buyback programs = bad. Rather than: corrupt corporations need watchdogs.

[-] shalafi@lemmy.world 11 points 7 months ago* (last edited 7 months ago)

Gun buy backs are a total joke. All you end up buying is a bunch of busted ass guns that nobody wanted. Wish they would have one around here. I could unload a few that I hate, are useless or nonfunctional. Get paid son!

Saw a hilarious picture of an Australian buy back. Those ancient rifles, shotguns and rusted out revolvers were laughable. If you used a photo tool to gather the most common color from that pile, it would be the dark orange guns turn when they rust. Bet not 1 in 10 was functional.

And the idiots in the article were patting themselves on the back for doing such a fine job taking these guns out of circulation! They were so very proud.

[-] Catoblepas@lemmy.blahaj.zone 2 points 7 months ago

How many mass shootings has Australia had in the past decade, again?

[-] Milk_Sheikh@lemm.ee 6 points 7 months ago

Mandatory confiscation and eliminating new sales =! US gun buybacks where the stores are still open

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[-] tinkeringidiot@lemmy.world 2 points 7 months ago

Why would you “sell back” actual guns when you can build a functioning 12 gauge shotgun from $20 of parts from the hardware store? Slap a few of those together and turn them in for a solid contribution toward your next gun.

[-] FartsWithAnAccent@lemmy.world 4 points 7 months ago* (last edited 7 months ago)

You think intentionally fraudulent programs with no meaningful oversight or meaningful accountability are OK? That's what seems wild to me but ok.

There's no way this is the first time this has happened either.

[-] FlyingSquid@lemmy.world 19 points 7 months ago

Maybe, then, you should be calling for more oversight and accountability of such programs rather than dismissing them as a joke.

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[-] Treczoks@lemmy.world 15 points 7 months ago

Only in the US, again. Other places just crush that stuff and melt it.

[-] FartsWithAnAccent@lemmy.world 4 points 7 months ago

Pretty much, yeah.

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[-] originalfrozenbanana@lemm.ee 10 points 7 months ago

Why is that?

[-] FartsWithAnAccent@lemmy.world 18 points 7 months ago* (last edited 7 months ago)

There's no real oversight, no accountability, little to no regulation, and the prices they offer are almost always well below the fair market value of the firearm (never mind the black market value) so most people end up keeping, selling, or pawning the gun instead. Functional firearms are kept in circulation as a result (the opposite of the supposedly intended goal).

There are also cases of people just making $20 pipe guns to rip off even the well intentioned programs, some programs try to mitigate this, some don't, but there are no set rules beyond whatever the program decides.

I guarantee you, the program mentioned in the article is not the first to pull that reselling shit too.

These programs need to be regulated and there needs to be meaningful oversight or they will always be a joke. As it stands they are, at best, public relations campaigns and, at worst, fraudulent and potentially very dangerous.

[-] originalfrozenbanana@lemm.ee 2 points 7 months ago

That’s unfortunate. I wish we had competent government.

[-] FartsWithAnAccent@lemmy.world 5 points 7 months ago

Groups like the NRA put a lot of money into lobbying politicians to protect the gun industry. They don't even really care about the 2nd amendment, they care about protecting the bottom line of companies like Colt and S&W.

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[-] kerrigan778@lemmy.world 34 points 7 months ago

Most of a gun isn't the part that is legally considered a gun. The lower receiver, which is the part that makes it shoot and has the serial number on it is legally the gun. The rest are just gun accessories essentially and anybody can buy and sell them. You can't just turn any amount of them into one functional gun, you need the lower receiver. You cannot buy a lower receiver without going through a background check and the fact that you can buy everything but the lower receiver without a background check doesn't change the fact that you don't have a gun without getting a hold of the lower receiver which does require a background check to get.

This article is rage bait for people who don't know about guns.

[-] vivadanang@lemm.ee 19 points 7 months ago* (last edited 7 months ago)

You cannot buy a lower receiver without going through a background check

yeah but you can easily buy an 80% arms lower, finish that yourself, and no bg check involved.

Or you could just get a lower from private sales which aren't required to bg check.

Saying it's impossimole wivvout de lowah is just bullshit and you know it. But cute attempt to be cranky. Like you're attempting to rage bait for people who don't know enough about the arms trade.

[-] kerrigan778@lemmy.world 9 points 7 months ago* (last edited 7 months ago)

Yes, there is no (federal) law against making a gun yourself or from a kit that has basically always been a thing. You can also 3d print most of all of a gun. And this also does nothing to change the lack of UBC law. Those are unrelated issues. (And for the record, I support most UBC laws).

The ability to buy or build a gun without a background check via private party is unchanged by the ability to cheaply buy gun accessories from destroyed guns.

[-] vivadanang@lemm.ee 2 points 7 months ago* (last edited 7 months ago)

The ability to buy or build a gun without a background check via private party is unchanged by the ability to cheaply buy gun accessories from destroyed guns.

yeah pretty fucked up that we'll let people buy most of a gun without a check, then the rest without another check. good to find ground we can agree on.

440 million firearms in the USA. Never seems like enough to some folks. And you know what, I'd be chill with it, if they could fucking secure their weapons.

But they won't. Sometime this week, someone, somewhere is gonna get murdered with a firearm some dickhole couldn't bother to secure, who left it in their car, who didn't even know it was already stolen because they're too fucking dumb to do the minimum.

[-] kerrigan778@lemmy.world 8 points 7 months ago

No disagreement there, my guns are locked the fuck up and UBCs and gun storage laws are no brainers.

[-] vivadanang@lemm.ee 5 points 7 months ago

TY. I wish more gun loving people had the same attitude.

[-] VintageTech@sh.itjust.works 29 points 7 months ago

I attended an auction in UT where I came across guns like this and the part that was destroyed on most of them was the serial number. Yay 'Merica and upcycling?

[-] FluorideMind@lemmy.world 15 points 7 months ago

Seems sensationalized, they destroy the part considered the firearm (lower receiver) and sell the rest for parts. I don't see any issues with that.

[-] TheJims@lemmy.world 9 points 7 months ago

Those guns have more constitutional rights than the school children that are indiscriminately murdered with them.

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[-] Blamemeta@lemm.ee 2 points 7 months ago

Hell yeah!

Also, nytimes paywalls their articles. can we get a non-paywalled version?

[-] girlfreddy@lemmy.world 6 points 7 months ago

Non-paywall link.

[-] crsu@lemmy.world 3 points 7 months ago

NYTimes cares so much about democracy they hide all of their information to paying customers while letting FOXNews offer an alternate reality for free without any of the finger wagging and scolding

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this post was submitted on 10 Dec 2023

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