Sunday, January 15, 2012

Something to watch out for at the range or show

POSTSCRIPT: I can't verify the veracity of the following, but yesterday I received a mass emailing from a good friend explaining how street gangs are 'tagging' cars in parking lots at gun stores, shooting ranges and gun shows. Then when the automobile, after tagging, is driven to another part of the area and left empty it is broken into and the weapons and gear stolen.

Supposedly, a number of expensive shotguns were stolen from vehicles this past summer at an event held near San Antonio, Texas and law enforcement feels this was the technique that identified the vehicles in each case. It also appears the same technique was used recently in Denver, Colorado.

A small adhesive dot is place on the bumper or the license plate to 'mark' the vehicle, when empty, as a target for thieves specializing in weapons theft.

So be aware and watch for anything 'strange' being put on your vehicle whenever you leave a 'Fun-Show' or shooting range...
Thanks to Farmer Frank for the warning. Hadn't heard of this before, but it doesn't surprise me.

4 comments:

KurtP said...

It wasn't in the San Antonio news...

Phelps said...

Screams urban legend.

Storyteller said...

Years ago, busted up a burglary ring that would buy 2-3 boxes of .22, sign the ammo log, an d look for others buys that included multi calibers. Recovere3d a load of stolen weapons and sent several young men to long stretches of "rehabilatation".

Sigivald said...

I'm with Phelps.

Especially since the vast, vast majority of street gangs are:

1) Basically incompetent - certainly not James Bond villains on the small scale.

2) Of small range, and thus unlikely to find the "tagged" cars in their area of the city - especially since they also tend to be in the poor and crime-ridden parts of town, where people aren't buying a load of expensive guns and leaving them in the car - because random car break-ins lose your guns just as easily as a targeted one.

3) Already have both illicit income and sources for illicit firearms; sure, robbery is free, but the effort and payback potential don't seem plausible (#1, #2 above).