Gun buybacks are a misnomer in that the cities or police departments never owned the guns in the first place. They are also stupid because it’s mostly people trading in junk guns that don’t work and would have never been used in a crime. One genius in New York printed out a bunch of lower receivers on a 3-D printer and milked a gun buyback for $21,000.
WKTV reports that a man who would only identify himself as “Kem” recently saw that the City of Utica, NY was having a gun buyback and offering up to $250 for “assault weapons” with extra cash for anything without a serial number.
Kem had received a $200 3-D printer for Christmas and thought he could make some things that were technically guns and cash in.
“I 3D-printed a bunch of lower receivers and frames for different kinds of firearms,” Kem said.
He loaded up his plastic pieces that met the legal definition of firearms and headed to the Utica gun buyback. He walked up with his bag full of goodies and presented them to a man working the program.
“And he sees the tote and says, ‘how many firearms do you have?’ And I said, ‘110,’” Kem said.
Obviously the gun buyback didn’t want to give Kem money for the 3-D printed lower receivers so he went back and forth with the Attorney General’s staff in an hours long negotiation. Since what he brought met the standard of what a gun is, Utica had to honor their gun buyback program and Kem scored.
“And it ended with the guy and a lady from the budget office finally coming around with the 42 gift cards and counting them in front of me. $21,000 in $500 gift cards,” said Kem.
The news contacted the New York State Attorney General’s office, which bankrolls these local gun buybacks, and told them what Kem had done. They wouldn’t comment specifically about it but claimed that the Utica gun buyback was a “big success” that helps “keep NY families safe.”
“I’m sure handing over $21,000 in gift cards to some punk kid after getting a bunch of plastic junk was a rousing success. Gun buybacks are a fantastic way of showing, number one, that your policies don’t work, and, number 2, you’re creating perverse demand. You’re causing people to show up to these events, and, they don’t actually reduce crime whatsoever,” Kem said.
The only thing that would make this funnier is if the gift cards were something Kem could use to buy real firearms and ammo.
After having a few days to stew on it, the AG’s office gave another statement to the news.
“It’s shameful that this individual exploited a program that has successfully taken thousands of guns off the streets to protect our communities from gun violence. We have partnered with local police throughout the state to recover more than 3,500 guns, and one individual’s greedy behavior won’t tarnish our work to promote public safety. We have adjusted our policies to ensure that no one can exploit this program again for personal gain,” said a spokesperson.
Isn’t the whole point of a gun buyback that people personally gain? If they are going to change the rules and no longer compensate people for trading in unwanted firearms, these stupid buybacks are going to be even less successful.
