Brooklyn District Attorney Ken Thompson is offering $200 deals to anyone who owns a gun and wants to be rid of it. The lawmaker is also offering an assurance that if that weapon is an illegal firearm he will not ask any questions.
How’s that for a deal?
DA Thompson said that about 90 percent of the guns recovered in crimes in Brooklyn were traced back to the South.
The first Black DA to actually execute a Brooklyn Buy-Back Gun program will turn up incentives to lessening the proliferation of guns in New York City by providing a sanctuary with amnesty to help rid the city of illegal weapons.
The Lenox Road Baptist Church is the sanctuary on Dec. 5 for an all-day no questions asked buy-back gun program.
Sellers need not show identification.
No questions will be asked means just that.
This is the first time since he first took office last year and became the first-elected Black to win the coveted crime-fighting position that the safety measure has been implemented.
He adopted the initiative which his predecessor DA Joe Hynes tested and with colleagues in every borough proved to be a virtual harpoon for retrieving illegal firearms.
“Each gun taken off the street is a gun that no longer has the potential to be used to kill,” Ray Kelly, former NYPD Commissioner said.
The program, which was started in 2008, offers a maximum $200 reward for handguns or assault weapons, and $20 for most other guns.
During the initial trials, Manhattan DA Robert Morgenthau hauled caches in Harlem and other high priority communities where gun violence was predominant.
At a Harlem church where the highest amount of firearms were collected, the former Manhattan DA said the 1,108 illegal rifles, pistols and BB-guns collected would be recycled into clothes hangers.
He also explained at that time that some of the money used to purchase the weapons were recouped from drug dealers.
“I can’t think of a better way to recycle drug money than to use it to buy guns,” he said.
Although the program limits the amount of cash any one seller can obtain, reports of sellers using willing assistants to accompany them have been alleged.
“One ‘entrepreneur’ had nine guns to turn in, but there was a limit of $600 that could be given to any one person. He got the help of two friends, and the three of them each collected the maximum,” a pastor said.
Uptown in the Bronx, Cash4Guns proved a necessary companion to imitate and one that effectively exchanged money for firearms.
Gun buy-back programs were also implemented in Queens and Staten Island.
Soon afterwards Suffolk County and New Jersey followed the pattern of legally sanctioned buying and selling of weapons.
Previously proven tried and true in Williamsburg, Bushwick and Sunset Park, the all-day transaction program held inside designated churches accounts for netting 9 mm handguns, AK-47, Uzi, fully-loaded Tec-9 semi-automatic, Ruger – Mini 14 semi assault rifle, and in Staten Island an assault rifle with 30-round clip and grenade launchers.
According to DA Thompson’s office “the goal of the gun buyback program in this borough is to remove illegal, functioning guns from the streets of Brooklyn by offering a $200 cash reward for each eligible weapon surrendered.”
Guns must be operable.
One of the requirements for sale is that guns should be placed in a plastic or paper bag or a box before presenting for sale. If transporting the gun by car, the gun must be transported in the trunk of the car.
Restricted from sales are guns owned by current or past law enforcement officers.
Brooklyn gun buy-back begins at 10 a.m. and ends at 4 p.m. at 1356 Nostrand Ave.
For more information, call 718-250-3888 or visit www.brook
