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Lapeer MI auctioning off M-16
The Lapeer Sheriff's Dept. is going to make some much-needed cash by selling an M-16. Now, it being full auto, it has to be transferred only after the buyer submits fingerprints for an FBI check, pays a $200 fee, and gets the approval of his local police chief or sheriff. You'd think even antigunners would have no complaint there. But...
""The fact that a law enforcement agency is selling a dangerous weapon is appalling," said Shikha Hamilton, president of the Michigan chapter of the Million Mom March, a gun control group."
[Hat tip to The Bitch Girls.
[Update: just to explain the comments for those not into licensed full auto: (1) $1700 would be impossibly low as a price for a fully-transferrable M-16. $17,000 might be a bit closer. (2) But there are some classes of guns that got various benefits (no tax, or made after the 1986 ban) that only a police agency can possess. For those, $1700 might be possible, since the only buyer would be another police agency that feels it's short an M-16, a rather limited market. So the Million Moms lady is getting lathered up over nothing -- they're just going to sell it to another PD, if that's the case).
Comments
"Undersheriff Robert Rapson said the gun might fetch as much as $1,700 by the time bidding closes May 1."
Class III M-16s are going this cheap?
Ms. Hamilton needs to look up the stats on crimes done with Legal Class III weapons. I bet she'll be suprised!
Posted by: WeerdBeard at February 27, 2007 02:31 PM
I bet it is a post 86 gun and this is a big hoopla over nothing.
Posted by: Beerslurpy at February 27, 2007 02:54 PM
I bet it is a post 86 gun and this is a big hoopla over nothing.
No wait, I think it's a pre-86 sample, that would make sense.
Posted by: Beerslurpy at February 27, 2007 02:55 PM
There are pre-86 dealer sample M-16s? How did that work?
Posted by: Letalis at February 27, 2007 03:54 PM
The Detroit Free Press article that the Fox News piece was based off of quotes Rapson as saying that it'd likely go for as much as $17,000, not $1,700. Which is in-line with current transferable full-auto M-16 prices.
Posted by: jesse at February 27, 2007 07:40 PM
Yeah, dealer samples from before 86 that were imported under the 68 rules that otherwise bar importation of MGs are only transferrable between SOTs but the guns can be retained if the license is relinquished.
Posted by: Beerslurpy at February 27, 2007 08:54 PM
I forget the other ways guns get made into pre samples, I have forgotten a lot of the NFA rules at the moment.
Posted by: Beerslurpy at February 27, 2007 08:55 PM
I understand abou pre-86 dealer sample HK's and such other imported weapons. But an M-16A1?
At any rate, the Sheriff says this one is on a Form 4.
Posted by: Letalis at February 28, 2007 11:07 AM
Yea ... pre-86 samples are almost as spendy as fully transferables.
If he is selling for $1700, he is clueless. A used post may '86 M-16 is simply not worth that much ... and pre may-86 rifle is worth ten times that.
Posted by: Kristopher at February 28, 2007 11:20 AM
Heck, in nearly every case, a used post-86 machine gun is worth more when broken down into a parts kit and the receiver destroyed.
Posted by: Letalis at February 28, 2007 01:51 PM
If the police department owns the weapon, there is no transfer fee. The seller of a Class III weapon is required to pay the tax and police departments are exempt. Therefore, there is no transfer fee, just the background check.
Posted by: norm at March 2, 2007 11:29 AM