Federal agents on Wednesday morning hauled more than 120 firearms, including “machine guns,” out of the Ahwatukee Foothills home of a man suspected of shooting at a campaign office for the Democratic Party three times and posting bags of white powder labeled as poison near political signs.
Jeffrey Michael Kelly, 60, was arrested on Tuesday night near his Ahwatukee Foothills home by Tempe police who, according to court documents, used surveillance footage to find the suspect.
I do wish they’d stop citing weapons caches when making arrests. Just as many shootings are done by people with access to a single firearm as are done by people with over a hundred weapons.
If there were crated assault rifles, that would be worth making a deal about… but people are allowed to collect weapons in the US, and that doesn’t suddenly change anything when a suspect is arrested.
It can sometimes speak to the suspect’s state of mind. A large number of historical firearms neatly displayed in a secured room is different from 2 dozen loaded AR-15s strewn about in every room of the house “in case BLM comes knocking.”
When you get to hundreds of guns it is quite often a situation of compulsive hoarding. Not necessarily criminal, but often careless (as leaving unsecured firearms around is careless), and indicative of mental health issues.
Neighbors describe this specimen as a “January-6-type-guy” and avoided him.
Speaking as someone with his own gun collection, weapon collecting will always be considered eccentric at best. You’re going to have to live with that stigma.
While I generally agree with the sentiment… The type of person to shoot up a political campaign office is a threat to their community and shouldn’t have access to firearms.
What are the odds that he had “hundreds of firearms” properly secured? I highly doubt all of these weapons were properly secured with locks, in a safe, etc. and not at risk of an unauthorized individual gaining access to them easily.
It gets the views up. Same with ‘including “machine guns”’ even tho there is no real evidence of that, just:
“overheard mention” Top notch journalism.
To be fair, if the police aren’t providing additional info directly yet, what other reporting do you expect?
Not that what the police say is necessarily the truth about a situation either, anything they claim should be taken with at least a pinch of salt nowadays if not a whole salt lick.
Something verifiable would be nice.
Do you have a source for your data on the percentage of people who commit gun crimes based on number of guns owned?
The overwhelming majority of gun crimes are committed in relation to the drug trade, and otherwise ordinary crime. This isn’t a demographic that’s collecting guns; they’re using what they have access to. Meanwhile, I know tons of people that have multiple AR-15s, all configured differently, for different purposes. One for a basic two gun competition, one for home defense, one for a night match (usually with a suppressor; they’re great for minimizing smoke), and so on.
I’m personally likely in the top 1% or so of gun owners, because I have >10 firearms, plus a progressive reloading press. There are three that I use regularly, and some that I never use because they’re antiques.