City will buy back guns Aug. 15 with no questions
Despite some doubts, effort called effective
Leonard R. Lane’s nephew was gunned down four years ago.
Kirk Thompson’s 15-year-old son was killed as a friend played with a gun inside a home.
Pastor Alberto Lanzot has presided over three funerals in the past two months for people who died of bullet wounds.
“And none of them were over 20 years old,” Lanzot lamented.
Lanzot, Lane and Thompson were among two dozen people who gathered outside a church on the Lower West Side on Wednesday to voice support for the city’s third gun buyback program.
Mayor Byron W. Brown announced that this year’s “no questions asked” buyback will occur Aug. 15.
People are urged to turn in weapons from 9 a. m. to 5 p. m. at seven drop-off sites.
They will receive prepaid bank cash cards that range from $10 to $100, depending on the type of gun. Police officers stationed at each location will accept the weapons.
The first two buybacks resulted in 1,601 guns being surrendered, according to audits performed by City Comptroller Andrew A. SanFilippo.
While some have questionned the effectiveness of gun buybacks in curbing crime, Brown said he believes it’s one valuable tool in what he described as a multifaceted anticrime effort.
Police Commissioner H. Mc- Carthy Gipson said he believes previous buybacks played a role in reducing homicides and other violent crimes.
He alluded to critics’ arguments that criminals won’t be surrendering their weapons. But Gipson said guns inside homes can be stolen and used to commit crimes.
“[Taking] 1,600 guns off the streets are 1,600 weapons less that are capable of taking the life of someone else,” said Gipson.
The drop-off sites will be as follows:
• Church of the Good Shepherd, 96 Jewett Parkway.
• Prince of Peace Christian Church, 190 Albany St.
• Primera Iglesia Metodista Unida (Primera United Methodist Church), 62 Virginia St.
•St. Thomas Aquinas Church, 450 Abbott Road.
• True Bethel Baptist Church, 907 East Ferry St.
•St. John Baptist Church, 184 Goodell St.
•St. Mark’s Episcopal Church, Parish Hall, 256 Riverside Ave.
People who turn in assault weapons, including Uzis and AK-47s will received $100 cash cards. Handguns will be worth $75, while rifles and shotguns will command $50. Nonworking guns, antique guns, pellet guns and BB guns can be traded in for $10 gift cards.
Buffalo is using asset forfeiture funds obtained during narcotics seizures and other criminal investigations to finance the program.
The executive director of Back to Basics Outreach Ministries divulged a sobering statistic at the news conference outside Primera United Methodist Church on Virginia Street. Of the 120 young people in the program, the Rev. James Giles said 105 told him they knew someone who had a gun. About 40 of the young people said they had around-the-clock access to a gun.
“Pull these weapons that are taking lives off the streets,” Giles said.
To help promote the gun buyback, Lamar Outdoor Advertising will provide billboards to the city, while the Niagara Frontier Transportation Authority will place posters in some of its bus shelters.
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