Wednesday, September 2, 2015

Hawaii police to destroy $575,000 in surplus guns to keep them ‘off the streets’

Guns dot com

After buying new sidearms for its officers, the Honolulu Police Department is moving to destroy its surplus pistols, some new, over the protests of gun rights groups.

HPD recently entered into a deal to purchase 2,000 new Glock 17s for $818,000 to phase out their existing inventory of Smith and Wesson and Sig Sauer pistols.

Valued at over a half million dollars if resold, the surplus guns will instead be destroyed at the decision of city officials.

“Mayor Caldwell and the Honolulu Police Department agreed that they would not allow the guns to be sold to the general public and end up on the streets of Honolulu,” says the department in a statement. “The same goes for selling individual gun parts that could have been used to assemble a gun.”

The 2,300 surplus guns in question are mostly S&W Model 5906 9mm semi-autos, including some 200 unissued guns still new in their boxes, as reported by Hawaii News Now. The guns, acquired in the 1990s, could have been sold for $250 each or as parts for a lower amount.

16 comments:

  1. For once an appropriate label. Yes, destroying guns to "keep them off the streets" is pretty foolish giving that they are a legally made product.

    Glock, S&W, Sig Sauer, et al.: "Go ahead. We'll make more."

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    1. I guess in Hawaii, the get it that guns do more harm than good.

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    2. If Hawaii thought guns did more harm than good then shouldn't they be criminally liable for going ahead and arming their police officers? They would be making the decision to put the people at higher risk by increasing the number of guns out in public by having their officers armed with guns.

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    3. But... They'll make more. You're supposed to ban them first, then destroy them. Otherwise the gun manufacturers will "laugh all the way to the bank".

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    4. No, Jim. If civilian gun owners had to be trained as well as the police, it'd be a different story.

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    5. MikeB: "No, Jim. If civilian gun owners had to be trained as well as the police, it'd be a different story."

      Oh, so if you're a "gun nut" who practices all the time, then guns do more good than harm.

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    6. Mike, am I to understand that your position is if we can shoot as well as these NYPD cops, then guns do more good than harm?

      http://m.nydailynews.com/new-york/nyc-crime/cops-wound-brooklyn-shooting-suspect-wild-gun-battle-article-1.2348489

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    7. I've never denied that if all gun owners were like you guys claim to be, we'd have fewer problems. It might even

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    8. I've never denied that if all gun owners were like you guys claim to be, we'd have fewer problems. It might even flip the harm/good ratio around.

      About your trick question about those particular cops, I'll say this - some people are so dangerous and irresponsible that no amount of training will help. This goes for cops as well as civilians.

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    9. So all six of those NYPD officers are "so dangerous and irresponsible that no amount of training will help."? What are the odds? Is this just a New York thing?

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  2. The article has a good point. Gun manufacturers make their profit only on the initial sale. So the city government will now be removing 2,300 firearms which will be at least partially be replaced by new firearms. Increased demand means increased production.
    Of course, any owner of property is free to dispose of that property as they see fit, but in this case, I wonder how the voters will feel about losing that money.

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    1. They probably agree that lives are worth more than money.

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    2. What? No smart ass, dishonest come back?

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  3. And one wonders why Hawaii taxes are so high.

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  4. Gun manufacturers laughing all the way to the bank

    Why? Do you mean because silly, feel-good measures like this mean that the manufacturers have less competition from the used gun market?

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  5. One can guess that there is far greater security involved in entering Hawaii when compared to crossing a state line in the continental forty-eight. Unless one is a large ocean-going shark, the only two ways to travel to Hawaii are by ship or airplane.

    So if the Police Department destroys 2,300 guns, they really are preventing that number of weapons from ever becoming available on the black market.

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