ACT Policing has arrested a 19-year-old Palmerston man after an incident in Fyshwick early this morning (Tuesday, October 25).
Around 3.30am, Woden Patrol members located an unlocked vehicle, with the keys in the ignition, parked in Ipswich Street, Fyshwick. Checks on the vehicle revealed that the registered owner may be in breach of his bail conditions.
About an hour later, the person of interest was seen walking along Wiluna Street, Fyshwick, toward the Shell service station and a foot pursuit began.
Police will allege that while the man was being pursued, he dropped a 9mm handgun and a bag containing a substance suspected to be methylamphetamine (ice).
The man was arrested and conveyed to the ACT Watch House. He will face the ACT Magistrates Court this morning to answer drug-related charges and a weapons charge.
[Courtesy ACT Policing]
Not the sharpest tool in the shed. Good work boys, another clown with a gun off our streets.
Ugh I wondered what all the noise was last night!
MrMagoo said :
Too bad the judiciary won’t keep him off the street.
Mysteryman said :
To true, unfortunately.
I’m going to guess it was an unregistered hand gun?
AAMC said :
It might have been registered to the person he stole it from.
p1 said :
There is a fairly big market in re-birthing deactivated handguns. In most cases these “replicas” have welded barrels, firing pins removed, drilled actions etc. The re-birthing can be a very dodgy process and make the gat just as harmful to the firer as the person at the other end.
neanderthalsis said :
Do you have more info on that?
I have a deactivated pistol, I’ve been looking over it for ages and I there is just too much deactivation to reservice it in my opinion. They’re done a very good job making it unusable.
But to be frank, anyone who does attempt to reactivate those replicas deserves some back-fire in the face.
Why would someone try and fix a deactivated gun? Surely it would be easier just to build one from scratch. I’ve used bolt action rifles a number of times, and the mechanism is very simple.
anyway, well done to the police for catching the criminal.
I wonder if they need to reconsider more seriously who they let out on bail. I think that is two people in two days that have been arrested for further criminal offenses whilst out on bail……
dpm said :
This would suggest that some old beak got it absolutely and completely wrong.
Then again, our world class human rights prison is probably full so there’s nowhere for them to be sent anyway.
dpm said :
http://www.legislation.act.gov.au/a/1992-8/current/pdf/1992-8.pdf
Unfortunately while we can say that the Magistrates should lock more people up…. It is legislation that is holding them back…. Have a read of the bail act, posted above and see what the Magistrates have to deal with.
Henry82 said :
The 9mm is a pretty high intensity load, somewhere around 30000 psi. Pressures in centrefire rifles get up around 60000 psi. That’s tens of tons per square inch developed and released over sub millisecond time spans. The materials used in firearms have to be pretty special to withstand these pressure spikes, and the manufacturing has to be spot on. If something goes awry, Bad Things Can Happen. Improvised firearms usually end in pieces, and it’s highly likely that the user will rest in pieces. Check out http://www.thegunzone.com/m1akb.html for an example, or just Google for “Handgun Kaboom” for lots of sobering pics.
As a responsible firearms owner, I hope they throw the book at this dog. He could’ve used that gun to kill any one of us in a half-arsed robbery attempt after hoovering some of that stupid powder up his nose. I’d give him a kicking if I could.
Is there ever any penalty given to magistrates if someone they’ve let out on bail re-offends whilst out? I suspect not. Pity.
farnarkler said :
They get arrested, then re-released on bail again. So you could say the penalty is a free ride in a police car?
Henry82 said :
Don’t forget some free meals while they wait until they are released at their next bail hearing!
Diggety said :
Replicas are actually prohibited in the ACT, see pg 192.
There has been much written locally and internationally about re-birthing:
NSW Parliamentary Library publication, Firearms Restrictions: Recent Developments
Gunpolicy.org, a UK site.
The National Coalition for gun control
The SSAA Shooter magazine did an article on it a while back and the Australian Institute of Criminology site has a number of papers and references to the practice.
Henry82 said :
Why would anyone want a deactivated gun?
Deref said :
Collectors, re-enactors, militaria enthusiasts, museums…
neanderthalsis said :
In a lot of parts of the world deactivated guns are much less restricted then “live” guns. This is much less the cast in most of Aust.