Via @Tactical_review
With more than 1200 guns stolen from cars this year, as opposed to less than 600 just a few years ago, Rallings doesn’t think he has much of a choice but to ask.
Memphis Police Director Asks Legislators To Make Guns In Cars Illegal
And this is why I want to make 2019 the year we secure our guns in our cars. If the numbers the Director gives are correct, Memphis has a very big problem with cars being broken into for an average of 3 guns a day being stolen. Not all cars have guns in them, heck I figure they are a minority so we probably have a crime being pretty much ignored by the cops. It is Memphis anyway and it is a crime-infested locale going back decades.
But, the issue at the end is one of personal responsibility. We simply cannot become a supplier of firearms for criminals just because we were too lazy or too cheap to invest in a simple metal box with a lock to secure our gun inside a car. We are also providing Gun Control with political ammunition to come after us and curtail our rights.
A good point, but another way to look at the same information is if the gun is under the control of a trained concealed carrier there is very little chance it will be stolen. The places that prohibit legal carry give us few choices but either leave a gun in the car or at home, neither place is a good option when the need for defense arises.
Agreed. But since there will be occasions when the gun must remain in the car, we need to figure out how to keep them secure in them.
Call it a technical issue rather than a political one.
You are right, however I can easily defeat the simple lock box most of us use with a screw driver. I have been unable to find a better alternative and I have looked. Mine is well hidden which is the only alternative I have discovered. Further it is very difficult to be discrete when either putting the weapon in or removing it for redeployment. I hope that this will engender discussion and we can find answers. I have gone as far as consulting a body shop. They were able to secure the box via a lockable frame. This is better in terms of security but being discrete still sucks. Any equipment ideas?
I think that no matter what you can do, if they steal the car, they eventually get the gun. No time limit. Can’t open the box with a screwdriver? Get one of those $200 metal cutting bandsaws from Horrible Freight. After the first gun, it has paid for itself. Bandsaw blade won’t cut it? That’s a really unusual gun box. OK, get a chop saw. If you have to, use an oxyacetylene torch.
Once they have the car, anything can be taken apart.
So keep it in your holster or don’t go. But don’t pass more unenforceable, poorly conceived, useless laws that the criminals won’t ever follow anyway. Any other ideas?
Next year we want us to be the starting point to do a Secure Your Gun In Your Car initiative.
Everybody’s input will be welcome.
Desinbers and metal workers will be needed… who knows? Maybe we start our own line of products 😀
The Jacksonville, FL metro area has an ongoing problem with people leaving guns unsecured in cars, often unlocked cars, which are then stolen. The same thing has happened to police issued guns.
Why do people leave guns in cars? This is theist I can come up with off the top of my head based on what I and my friends have done or experienced
Unaccomodating spouses or home environments or legal reason why a firearm cannot be stored in a home with certain individuals.
Unaccomodating laws and/or gun free zones thus making use of the securest storage method available.
Disarming to stay legal while intoxicated.
Loading the car the night before for an early morning range trip.
For no specific or articulable reason, laziness, or stupidity.
I’m sure there are more reasons. I’d say the solution is not to simply make it illegal but understand why people do it and perhaps (not going to hold me breath) fix the laws that make or encourage people to do it.
Id bet that would account for 50% or more cases.
My inclination is to assume bad motives, partly because of the sweeping nature of what he’s asking for and partly because he is a politician.
It would be easy to make a proposal that actually addresses the real issue: requiring the use of a secure container when a weapon is stored in an unattended car.
I already addressed that in my comment, now tell us where to find a secure container.
“Secure container” is like “safe” — it isn’t an absolute. Secure storage containers (if real) are rated as to their ability to resist attack. A high quality safe might be rated at 30 minutes, which means that a UL expert (or a couple of them?) armed with such tools as abrasive power saws and big drills need 1/2 hour to get into the container. That probably means the average burglar will need multiple hours, and may well give up before that point. After all, by definition criminals are people who don’t like or are incapable of real work.
Another way of looking at it: if it comes with a California gun storage container approval, it should be acceptable. Not that this necessarily means it’s seriously secure, but because it means that it has gotten past some of the most gun-hostile politicians in the world.
anyone else insulted by the Police Director wearing 5 fricken stars on his collar to feel good about himself?
If only someone had predicted this exact outcome…..oh wait
By law, all automobiles must now include fixed points of attachment for baby seats. Something similar should be feasible for that attachment of a locked container for a firearm, although, as others point out, any method to secure a firearm can be defeated, with enough time, ingenuity and money.
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