My encounter with cops

bigdaddyjunior · August 25, 2007 05:43

Some drug addicted formerly successful contractors broke into my shop and cars and stole 10 rifles, some tools and a few other items. Within 15 minutes of my call a deputy was here to take the report. I expected to be hassled for not locking my cars or having better security on my shop. I figured it being next to my house was secure enough for this area.Last real crime we had was in the 60's. He was very sympathetic and understood my concern that my guns might end up in some drug dealer's hands if not found pretty quickly. I had serial numbers,dates of transfer, cost and pictures of each gun taken. He took my info then we talked about reloading for the 45/70 and had some coffee. Two hours after he left a detective showed up with a copy of the report. I told him that one gun in particular would be very hard to sell or hide for long since it was one of only 1000 ever made and one of maybe 100 in the US. He also was sympathetic and knew how sick it makes you feel to have your guns out there in the wrong hands. He told me a number of guns have been stolen in this end of the county and they even arrested some guys with them, but since the owners didn't have serial numbers and they were common guns the charges didn't stick in court. An attorney would just ask how many hundreds of thousands of this gun were made and how can you be sure this is that particular one etc. My having the numbers,pictures and even bills of sale, he said would make all the difference this time. He said,"Don't worry, I will get your guns back, but we'll have to act fast before they get moved out of the area." He pulled an all-nighter and within 24 hrs called and told me he had two of my guns and a suspect willing to talk in order to lessen the 12 plus felonies he was facing. A few hours later he called and said he had four more of my guns and would be dropping them off to my house later. I asked if they didn't need to keep them for evidence til the trial and he said with the serial numbers and pictures they didn't need to keep them. The next evening he came by with the last four guns and told me that having the serial numbers and catching the first guy led them to getting search warrants on a bunch of drug houses where they had been trading the guns for dope. When the detective dropped off the last of my guns and I signed for them I asked why I didn't have to go downtown to get them. He said that seeing me get my guns back was one of the good parts of his job and he didn't want to miss it. He wouldn't even take a 10% finder's fee, which in this case would have paid his mortgage for a few months. I am writing a letter to his boss and one to the paper commending him for doing an excellent job.
When my guns first got stolen it was a bad thing, but as it turned out I got them back in a few days and it resulted in a large number of successful raids all over the county putting a lot of bad guys away. All because I keep a computer file of serial numbers, pictures, description, price etc. Something to think about.

My encounter with cops

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