“We must get rid of it”: Americans lay down their arms
In Texas, Americans have decided to give their guns and pistols to the police in an attempt to stem gun violence.
Published
A policeman recovers weapons brought back by Americans, in Houston.
AFP
Inside Marilyn Bragg’s car in Texas: her late husband’s five guns. “I don’t want that at home, I don’t even know how to shoot,” says the retiree before entrusting them to the authorities. In this American state, scarred by shootings, initiatives are multiplying to offer residents a chance to get rid of their pistols, rifles, and semi-automatic weapons, in complete safety.
“I have grandchildren, I don’t want them to have access to that,” insists Marilyn Bragg from the metropolis of Houston, where a long line of cars winds its way, to an arms dump site in fire. At the end of the queue, drivers are asked to leave their weapons in their trunk or on the back seat, for inspection.
Specialized police then approach and check that the weapons are unloaded and registered. They often find more than a dozen weapons in the vehicle. “I think it’s a great program,” says Stuart Wolf, 11 guns in the back of his truck. “There is really no other safe way than this to part with it,” says the sixty-something.
“We already have enough weapons”
A total of 793 weapons will be handed over to law enforcement during the day on Saturday. In exchange, participants are given vouchers: 50 dollars for a gun that no longer works, 100 for a rifle, and 200 for a semi-automatic rifle, the weapon used in so many shootings in the United States.
“We already have enough weapons, and there are some that we deposit that we do not need,” confides Kenneth Blackmon, alongside his wife, Loretta. “So why keep them? We have to get rid of it, ”pleads the 69-year-old man, handing over seven weapons. Especially since thefts of firearms are recurrent, and dangerous, he insists.
Texas in sight
“Gun thefts have increased by 16% over the last ten years,” agrees Rodney Ellis, a county official who surrounds Houston. In Texas, shootings are a daily occurrence. “Since 2009, more people have died in deadly shootings in Texas than in any other US state,” Rodney Ellis said.
According to figures from the federal police, the FBI, in 2020, the state’s violent crime rate – 446.5 cases per 100,000 population – was significantly higher than the national average, which is 398.5. One example, among many others: a few days ago, a person was killed and three others injured by bullets during an altercation in a shopping center in El Paso, a city bordering Mexico.
The Uvalde massacre
The tragedy happened just steps from where a young white supremacist killed 23 people in a supermarket popular with the Hispanic community in 2019. Texas will be forever marked by the horrific killings in Uvalde, when an American , just of age, had caused a bloodbath in a primary school, killing 19 children and two teachers.
This immense state of 30 million inhabitants is also one of those where it is the easiest to obtain a weapon. The carrying of weapons is authorized there without restriction, in the name of the second amendment of the American Constitution.
But for Rodney Ellis, the county official, the framers of the Constitution – written in the 18th century – could never have imagined the modernity of today’s guns. “So until we manage to change the mentality and we arrive at a reasonable framework for firearms in this country, this type of initiative is the kind of thing that we have to do.”
(AFP)
