Warner Robins hopes gun collection cuts crime. Why Macon isn’t doing it

Bibb County Sheriff David Davis says he won’t support a gun buyback or collection program in Macon, criticizing the concept shortly after Bibb County Commissioner Stanley Stewart recommended the idea to reduce violence.

But in neighboring Warner Robins, the Warner Robins Police Department will hold a gun collection event Saturday, which Chief Wayne Fisher said is meant to cut crime, with no questions asked.

The Macon and Warner Robins law enforcement agencies have conflicting views on whether a buyback or collection program is helpful to reduce crime.

“We will never do that here in Bibb County,” Davis told The Telegraph on a Nov. 6 phone call.

Stewart previously told The Telegraph he would propose the idea for Davis to host a gun return program after three people were shot to death on Oct. 18 in east Macon, an area Stewart represents. Gun evidence was used to connect a suspect to the triple homicide, according to records from the sheriff’s office.

Stewart’s idea would require deputies to not ask questions nor report any identifying details about the people who turn in the weapons. This anonymity is a common practice in other gun buyback initiatives, according to The Trace, which investigates gun violence across the United States.

But not getting background on the donor or the gun is unrealistic, and against legal expectations of law enforcement, according to Davis. Someone involved in a crime could use the opportunity to dispose of evidence, he said.

“If someone brings a firearm into us, we are absolutely duty bound to find out all we can find out about a firearm,” Davis said. “You may be taking in a gun that was involved in a murder.”

When the sheriff’s office comes across a gun, “we’re going to check it, trace it, shoot it to make sure that this doesn’t have any connections to any type of crime,” Davis said.

While the sheriff’s office won’t host a gun collection, a third-party unrelated to law enforcement could, Davis suggested.

A local electronics company did this in the past, and gave away free radios or stereos as an incentive in exchange for turning in guns, then the business gave the guns to the sheriff’s office, Davis said.

But not many guns were turned in, and most of them were inoperable, which defeats the purpose of a gun collection, Davis explained.

“It can call attention to the fact that communities are trying to do something to get guns off the street … but in a practical standpoint, they really don’t yield any guns that may be used in crimes,” he said.

Most gun buyback programs aren’t proven to reduce violence, according to several researchers, but it has worked in some cases. Agencies in California “claimed record numbers of gun recoveries in the wake of the Newtown tragedy,” which referred to the 2012 mass shooting at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, Connecticut, the American Journal of Preventative Medicine said.

Davis said he doesn’t expect people to turn in functional guns for free without an incentive worth more than the cost of the weapon.

Warner Robins makes the case for gun collections

Warner Robins officers will offer nothing in exchange for turning in a gun at their event Saturday, according to Fisher. Nor will officers ask any questions or photograph the people who bring them in.

Fisher said it’s better to take a firearm out of someone’s wrongful possession and run the risk of missing out on possible verbal evidence, than to leave the gun with someone who shouldn’t have it and risk potential further crime.

“It is true that if a firearm is turned in and by process we do not ask question that there is potential that it could hinder the original case,” Fisher said in an email to The Telegraph Friday. “However, if by not providing an opportunity for the transaction to take place, that firearm will remain in circulation, (with) the crime in question still being negatively impacted.”

During a news conference Thursday at the police department, Fisher encouraged parents, guardians and heads of households to bring unwanted or found guns in an effort to reduce crime amongst youth in Houston County. He did not allow the press to ask questions during the conference.

“If we were to require full disclosure by the adult who would be turning in the firearm they would just not engage with the program out of fear of prosecution of themselves, or the minor they are trying to protect,” Fisher said in an email to The Telegraph Friday.

Officers won’t report anything about the people who surrender the guns, unless they willingly provide such information, but the guns will be investigated as possible evidence afterward, according to Fisher.

“It will be preserved in such manner to prevent corruption of potential evidentiary value,” he said in the email. “There are technical practices that the firearm will undergo to determine if it is reported as stolen, or involved in other crimes.”

Anyone can anonymously surrender a gun from 10 a.m. to 3 p.m. Saturday at WRPD at 100 Watson Blvd.