Well, maybe sorta. The following is the text of an announcement I received via email from The Second Amendment Foundation:
SAF has negotiated an agreement with New Orleans regarding the firearms seized from lawful firearm owners during and after Hurricane Katrina. The issue is pending before the federal court in the case NRA & SAF v. Mayor Ray Nagin.
On March 15, 2006, lawyers for both sides informed the court that positive settlement negotiations were occurring. New Orleans has now confirmed that it holds a number of firearms and that owners of firearms which may have been confiscated may contact the Property and Evidence division of the New Orleans Police Department in any of the following ways:
- Telephone number 504-658-5503
- Mailing address:
New Orleans Police Department
Property and Evidence
400 North Jefferson Davis Parkway
New Orleans, LA 70119 - Go in person to the same address. This is where the firearms are located.
Please be patient inasmuch as records are incomplete and the police are currently understaffed. Records are most accessible if you can supply your gun’s serial number. Claims can be made based on proof of ownership or, lacking such documents, an affidavit that the item belongs to you.
For those who go through the above process, whether successful or unsuccessful, SAF would be interested in hearing your comments on what occurred. Please contact SAF at (425) 454-7012 or send an e-mail to: AdminForWeb@saf.org
The part I find most interesting is what you get by reading between the lines. Since using the serial number is the fastest way to find a given gun, the implication seems to be that the New Orleans cops just grabbed whatever guns they saw with out any sort of record keeping.
Draw your own conclusions on what that means.
I suspect this isn’t over. Anyone care to place a bet on how many people are refused the return of their guns because they can’t prove that they actually owned the gun in question?
