No doubt and that's responsible practice. I assume most of those car thefts are from people that leave guns in the car overnight.
True story.
Female friend of mine discovered her troublesome 20+ year old son (with a record) had a nice Glock 17 in his possession. She gave it to another mutual friend to keep until she figured out what to do. He calls me, I offer to help.
I did a really DUMB thing.
I called the HPD and said 'I'm considering purchasing a handgun I saw on-line and was wondering if you could check the SN to make sure it's not stolen'. The nice lady said, "oh yes, we can do that. Let me have the number and we'll get back with you."
Literally minutes later I get a call from an older male who threatens me with all kinds of grief if I don't turn it in to the HPD immediately. I explain a) I don't have it, b) I've never seen it or touched it and c) I don't know where it is. He responds that he knows my name, residence, place of employment. Starts asking a lot of questions about how I know about it. I decline to answer and hang up.
I start getting phone calls from him.
So I call my mutual friend on a land line, explain the deal. He says hey, no problem. I'll tell the mom to drop it off at the local HPD. I tell him no, I caused this, let me meet her there and I'll do it. I get in my car (middle of the work day) and drive 30 miles to my house. About halfway there my cell rings and Officer Buttwipe calls me to ask me where I was going and told me exactly where I was. I'm thinking holy crap, what have I gotten involved with?
So the mom, mutual friend and I meet at the local PD. Mom and I go in, Glock in a paper bag. We tell the desk officer why we are there, hand it to him, he say "ok, thanks" and we all leave.
Turns out that the weapon was a duty weapon stolen a couple of nights earlier from a police officer who lived in our neighborhood and left it in his unlocked cruiser. No wonder they were all over this.
Never doing anything remotely like that again.
