Where Criminals Get Their Guns

Dear Fellow Survivalist;

As should be expected, the Democrat primary race is filled with promises to pass harsher gun laws, perform gun “buybacks” and outright confiscate guns. These Democrat candidates are pandering to the most leftist part of their base, mostly because that is the most vocal part. By and large, those people don’t own guns, would never own a gun, and are downright terrified of them.

This doesn’t mean that those candidates will succeed in passing the laws or enacting the policies they are promising to. For leftists to succeed in passing their gun control agenda, they would need control of both houses of Congress, as well as the presidency. The last time they had that, during former president Obama’s first term, they didn’t bother to pass a single gun control law.

Of course, as any of us who are interested in guns knows, there are no gun laws which will do a thing to reduce the amount of gun-related crime. Nor will eliminating guns reduce violent crime, if that were even a possibility. Criminals would either still get their hands on guns or switch to other weapons.

The reason why laws can’t eliminate gun-related crime is that criminals don’t obey the law. That’s so simple, that it seems incredulous that anyone would even think of questioning it. Yet we repeatedly see leftist politicians and pundits making ridiculous claims about how criminals will lay down their guns, as soon as all the rest of us do. Tell that one to the wolf that’s got a sheep in its mouth.

A fairly recent study by the FBI shows us where criminals get their guns from. By and large, they are already breaking laws to get those guns, so what makes anyone think that additional laws would make any difference? The statistics are rather revealing:

• 43% of criminals buy their guns on the black market (which means they are probably stolen)
• 6% get them through committing the crime of theft
• 11% of the time, someone else bought the gun specifically for them, including straw purchases
• 15% got their guns from a family member, either through buying, trading or borrowing
• 12% of the time, the gun was brought to the scene of the crime by someone else. This includes guns found at the scene of the crime, where they were used against their lawful owner.
• Only 10% actually buy them from retail sources, including 0.8% that are bought at gun shows

These statistics make it rather clear why new gun control laws won’t make a bit of difference. All they will do is to punish law-abiding gun owners, disarming them and making the job of the criminal easier. Those criminals will continue to get the firearms they need, just like the drug cartels in Mexico manage to get their hands on guns illegally, even though it is almost impossible for law-abiding citizens to buy guns in that country.

There are some types of gun-related violence that can probably be thwarted by all those gun-control laws that the left is pushing. Accidental shootings won’t happen when people don’t have access to guns, nor will suicide by gun, a figure which is much larger than other gun-related crime. But when we talk about crimes committed by actual criminals, it won’t make a difference.

The FBI study has helped those of us who support the Second Amendment, by showing the truth about all those gun laws. But there’s something important in those statistics that I want to bring up. That is, if we assume the guns on the black market got there because they are stolen, then something like 61% of the guns used in crimes are stolen (including those found at the scene of the crime).

This is something we should all strive to do something about. If criminals get their hands on our guns, we are helping them to commit crimes; maybe not knowingly, but helping them nevertheless. That’s something I have no desire to do.

Two important points I’d like to bring up here. The first is that the first place burglars check when breaking into a home is the master bedroom. That’s because the vast majority of valuables in the average home are kept in that room, including guns. Keeping your guns anywhere but your bedroom and bedroom closet is a good way of keeping criminals from finding them. The absolute worst places to keep a gun, from a theft point of view, is in the master closet or the nightstand.

The second issue I’d like to bring up is the importance of secure storage. I have loaded firearms in my home; but they are secured where I can get to them and others won’t. I also don’t have children in my home. If I did, the only loaded gun would be in my holster, where I can keep it under my control.

This doesn’t mean that you have to buy a gun safe. You can hide them in unlikely places. There are also other ways of keeping guns from being used, like removing the firing pin. Simply field-stripping them will keep children and many adults from being able to fire them, even if they can find the ammo. Likewise, a gun lock is effective, although it doesn’t keep criminals from stealing that gun.

Part of the responsibility of owning firearms is caring for those firearms. In other words, making sure that we keep control of them and keep them out of the hands of people who can and will use them incorrectly. Whether that is an angry family member or a hardened criminal doesn’t matter; the responsibility is the same. So make sure you know where your guns are and that others can’t make use of them.

Stay safe; it’s for your family’s protection; just like keeping your powder dry and your survival gear close at hand.

Dr. Rich