By Mark Walters
USA – -(Ammoland.com)- Another day, another gang banging band of thugs burglarizing another gun shop.
I’m infuriated about what I’m writing about today; It’s personal, and I’m going to try to do something about it. For the third time in 12 months, a close friend of mine has had his gun shop burglarized.
Back in March, the first time it was hit, a group of Atlanta gang bangers made their way to the shop in a sleepy little town about 40 miles outside the city, smashed a huge glass window and within 90 seconds made off with a handful of firearms including a few AR 15 rifles.
The following week, apparently emboldened by the success of the first hit, the same bangers struck again, this time upping the ante by getting away with over five figures worth of inventory. In an attempt to stop the robbery crew, my friend placed his inventory of gorilla-sized safe displays in front of the windows after rebuilding the damages to the storefront, making it virtually impossible to get in using the same tactics. Of course real criminal crews adapt and overcome, and this team was no different. Waiting and scouting the store over the next few months, they struck again on Wednesday, same MO, same bat time, same bat channel, around 0530. This time, though, the crew used a stolen Dodge Durango. They backed it up at full speed ramming it into the glass and brick facade, knocking a couple of the large safes backward just far enough that the scumbag boys on the ground could scurry inside like the cockroaches they are and make off with dozens of firearms in the glass cases. In and out in one minute, forty one seconds.
Here’s what a local paper had to say about the crime;
A stolen SUV was driven through the front window of a local gun shop early Wednesday and left at the scene as burglars made off with an undisclosed number of firearms, police said.The incident marks the third time this year that a gun store and shooting range located on XXXXX has been hit by gun thieves.
Detective Greg Bettis said police were dispatched to the scene just before 5:30 a.m. Wednesday and arrived to discover a stolen Dodge Durango that was backed into the store’s window.“The vehicle was still there,” Bettis said, adding that it was the third time this year the shop’s been targeted by burglars looking to make off with firearms.
Plywood replaced the store’s large glass window Wednesday afternoon, but there were tire marks on the curb and in the grass from where the SUV was backed into the store. The shrubs in front of the window were destroyed, and black skid marks were visible on the sidewalk.The Dodge Durango used in the burglary, Bettis said, was reported stolen in DeKalb County.
Investigators believe that multiple people were involved in the break-in and that the suspects loaded the weapons into another vehicle before leaving the scene.“We’re concerned with the stolen contraband, but we’re more concerned with people continuing to make horrible decisions in our community,” Bettis said, adding that his department was looking to make an arrest in the case. As of press time, it was still unclear what types of weapons were stolen or how many were taken from the shop. Bettis said the store’s owner; XXXX was taking an inventory of the shop and working to access surveillance footage.
Three AR-15-style rifles valued at about $1,800 were taken from the store March 26. Thieves broke into the store again less than two weeks later using the same “smash-and-grab” technique to make off with even more of the popular semi-automatic rifles. All three burglaries occurred early in the morning—before 6 a.m.—and no arrests have been made as of yet. XXXX called the break-ins a “scourge on our community as a whole.”
I might point out that this crime marks over 60 times that guns shops in the Atlanta metro area have been burglarized, losing hundreds of weapons during that period, now winding up on the streets.
I and some others in the local community have offered our assistance to our friend in his efforts to stop this from happening again.
While it hurts when a friend is hurting, and his business is suffering at the hands of scumbag criminals, there is more to this story. It is also evidence of the lies and misinformation put out by the humiliated and defeated enemies of our rights. How many times have we been subjected to the constant rantings of the left calling for more background checks to reduce crime,? Maybe it’s their lies about some mysterious “iron pipeline” supplying “crime guns” to the major cities of the northeast and elsewhere due to our supposed “lax” gun laws down here in Georgia, for example?
Here’s the real truth. Criminals don’t need a background check to steal a Dodge SUV, ram it into a gun shop wall, enter illegally and take thousands of dollars worth of weapons.
This story and many others like it are proof of the false narrative put out by the gun-grabbers, who for too long have been blaming the guns in our safes for the actions of criminals.
I have offered my time, along with many others in the community to provide heavily armed overnight security until new measures can be built to keep this from happening again. I would be willing to bet a group of a couple dozen well placed, highly visible and heavily armed local citizens willing to use deadly force would keep this from happening a fourth time. How much you want to bet?
Mark Walters
About Mark Walters
Mark Walters is the host of two nationally syndicated radio broadcasts, Armed American Radio and Armed American Radio’s Daily Defense with Mark Walters. He is the Second Amendment Foundations 2015 Gun Rights Defender of the Year award recipient and co-author of two books, Lessons from Armed America with Kathy Jackson (Whitefeather Press) and Lessons from UnArmed America with Rob Pincus (Whitefeather Press)