MCCOMB, Miss. (WLBT) – The McComb Police Department is working to make the city safer by getting dangerous guns out of the wrong hands.
They tell WLBT 3 On Your Side they’re taking firearms strong enough to fire through cars, tough wood, and sometimes even steel away from everyday citizens almost every day.
One concern for officers is how easy it is to get access to these weapons. They are bought at swap meets, on the street, or a lot of times, they are stolen.
There are no safety precautions during these types of transactions, and that is how weapons can fall into the wrong hands.
“Every person that I interact with, I automatically assume that they had some type of weapon on them, from young teenagers to adults. It is getting a little bit out of hand,” said Lieutenant Kayla Moore.
The type of ammunition McComb police officers and other law enforcement use is meant to avoid over-penetrating.
“What they’re designed to do is, when they impact something, they flatten out, so they can no longer keep traveling through targets and potentially hitting someone on the other side,” said Corporal Tyler Harvey.
However, the cheapest and most common option in stores does not always have that safety measure.
“We find every means available to stop the round going through things, so it doesn’t reach somebody that it’s not supposed to reach. You know, civilians don’t follow those set of rules. They buy whatever. The cheapest is going to go through your vehicles; it’s going to go through that door,” said Moore.
According to Harvey, this type of ammunition is not designed to be used outside of its intended targets, such as gun ranges.
“They’re meant to be shot at a range… at a target where there should be no one behind to burn, and it’s going to have something to stop the round. Now, when they’re used in the public, they’re not going to slow down. If it didn’t go through a target and it goes into the person, it can hit any type of vital organ, eventually leading to death,” Harvey said.
If you are in possession of any type of firearm, the McComb Police Department encourages you to use them safely.
Want more WLBT news in your inbox? Click here to subscribe to our newsletter.
See a spelling or grammar error in our story? Please click here to report it and include the headline of the story in your email.
Copyright 2024 WLBT. All rights reserved.
