Thankfully, Second Amendment rights in the United States have actually expanded enormously in the last decade. We are now closer to the kind of self-defense freedom that the Founding Founders intended than we have been in many years.
Though there are still rules and those rules include what to do when you throw away a firearm. A garbage man was doing his job in mid-January when he came across a garbage can that wasn’t full of random trash.
It was full of shotguns that had been thrown out.
Why Would Somebody Do That?
Improperly disposing of firearms is illegal.
Now, one firearm shop owner is accused of quite a serious crime after allegedly dumping these 236 shotguns into a garbage can near his store.
The shop owner in question is named as 54-year-old Raymond Mussatto of Oklahoma City. His shop is located in Midwest City, which is a district of central OK City.
According to Mussatto, he trashed the 236 weapons because they were allegedly defective. However, police say he also gave a couple of them as souvenirs to shop customers and he knowingly committed a crime.
Near the end of 2022, Mussatto contacted the ATF to ask about the legal way to dispose of shotguns that didn’t work.
Specifically, he said a shipment of NK1 12-gauge shotgun models from the company Radikal Arms was not working and he wanted to throw them away.
First one there wins them all.
— James Winters (@JimCostanza7) February 5, 2023
Feds Execute Search Warrant
The AFT executed a warrant of Mussatto’s business and home properties in late January.
At the time he contacted them, the ATF says they told Mussatto that to throw them away legally, the guns had to be cut into a minimum of three pieces.
The firearms found in the garbage can had some that were partially cut, but also included working models. According to witnesses in the area, functional weapons had been found thrown away in the dumpster before.
One man said a store worker who was cutting weapons by the garbage can gave him several as souvenirs, along with mags.
According to the warrant, the ATF believes Mussatto may have lied on the paperwork about properly destroying defective firearms and also may have given away the other shotguns without following the law.
Mussatto has made no comment and the federal investigation continues.
Midwest City gun shop owner under investigation after allegedly disposing 236 guns in dumpster outside business https://t.co/BgEIZ6soyD
— The Daily Reformer News (@DailyReformerUS) February 6, 2023
The Bottom Line
Even though Second Amendment rights have been on the upward trend, that does not mean citizens can just treat their rights casually.
Cases like this which show a cavalier attitude toward firearm disposal and gifting laws are exactly what gives credence to the left’s anti-Second Amendment rhetoric.
If you are exercising Second Amendment rights and buying or selling firearms, you need to do so responsibly, legally, and through all proper channels.
