Brilliance, thy name is a Seattle PD officer

[Phyphor]

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/43567848/ns/local_news-seattle_wa/

SEATTLE — The Seattle Police Department is apologizing for an assault rifle left unattended on the back of a patrol car Monday night, and has launched an investigation into the matter.

First published by The Stranger, Nick Gonzales snapped a picture last night of the menacing-looking rifle on the trunk of a Seattle Police car. It was around 9 p.m. and the car was parked outside the Roosevelt Hotel, near Pine and 7th Avenue, with no police officers in sight, said Gonzales.

In addition, after an officer got back into the patrol car, it was driven away with the rifle still on the trunk. A woman also saw the rifle and followed the car to try to get the officer's attention.

Gonzales said he flagged down two more SPD officers on bicycles to tell them what he saw. As he described, they were "shocked as hell."

Two more witnesses alerted police to the situation.

In response, the director of the SPD Office of Professional Accountability said in a statement, "It is unacceptable that a rifle was left unattended on a patrol car and people should expect more from their police department."

The commander of the West Precinct has begun the investigation, said the SPD.

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Once again, I just don't have the words.

[41magsnub]

ugh..  similar story out here from last year.  Malmstrom AFB by Great Falls, MT is primarily a Minuteman ICBM base.  They have a lot of security troops doing roving patrols in armored cars to all the missile silos spread out all over that part of the state.  At Eddie's Corner (a truck stop) a guy found an M16 in the parking lot.  No AF personnel around at all.  The guy who found it was familiar with NFA laws and was suitably freaked out.  He put it back on the ground and called the cops who then took possession of it.  I'm sure some airman had some pretty serious consequences...

[Monkeyleg]

Standard procedure for politicians and bureaucrats is to punish guns, not people, so the rifle in question will be banned from SPD squad cars for the next year.

[MillCreek]

Oooh, that is not going to look good on the annual review.

[Declaration Day]

I understand that it's a pretty big F-up. 

But people make mistakes. 

Fortunately, the matter was resolved without anyone getting hurt, or the rifle going "missing".

[Balog]

Those assault rifles are evil and terroristic. Undoubtedly it was trying to escape into the wild to shoot up a school. Glad the brave police forces were able to recapture it before it made it's escape.

[lee n. field]

What is it?  I can't see it well enough for any identifying details to register.

[Boomhauer]

ugh..  similar story out here from last year.  Malmstrom AFB by Great Falls, MT is primarily a Minuteman ICBM base.  They have a lot of security troops doing roving patrols in armored cars to all the missile silos spread out all over that part of the state.  At Eddie's Corner (a truck stop) a guy found an M16 in the parking lot.  No AF personnel around at all.  The guy who found it was familiar with NFA laws and was suitably freaked out.  He put it back on the ground and called the cops who then took possession of it.  I'm sure some airman had some pretty serious consequences...

Entire military bases and units have gone on lockdown for lesser items missing. The airman's unit and possibly the entire base itself was feeling some pain b/c of that bit of stupidity.

[seeker_two]

Those assault rifles are evil and terroristic. Undoubtedly it was trying to escape into the wild to shoot up a school. Glad the brave police forces were able to recapture it before it made it's escape.

Kinda reminds me of the question, "If hollowpoint bullets are "evil, cop-killer boolitz", then why do so many LEO's carry them in their service weapons?"...... 

[birdman]

Entire military bases and units have gone on lockdown for lesser items missing. The airman's unit and possibly the entire base itself was feeling some pain b/c of that bit of stupidity.

You mean like losing a pylon full of cruise missiles?  No wait, found them, they flew to louisiana.

[41magsnub]

Entire military bases and units have gone on lockdown for lesser items missing. The airman's unit and possibly the entire base itself was feeling some pain b/c of that bit of stupidity.

I'm sure they did...  I was in a group in the Army that almost got flown back to Ft. Irwin from Ft. Riley immediately after getting home from a deployment because one idiot (not me, not even my company) grabbed the wrong rifle.  Cooler heads prevailed after this guy's rifle and the one still at Ft. Irwin were identified and arrangements were made.  It still sucked a lot, we got to hang out in the base gym for 8+ hours with constant weapon inspections looking for the missing S/N.  It really helped that communications were flaky and the guy somehow managed to get a rifle from an entirely different battalion.  Private Skippy got an Article 15 and narrowly missed a beat down.

[vaskidmark]

I fail to see what you and the SPD are getting your panties twisted in a knot about.  It's not like there were guns in the street threatening the tires and alignment of passing automobiles, like the newspapers are always warning us about.

From all accounts this was a trained weapon.  Probably the officer took it out, laid it on the trunk and told it "Stay!"  Seems the rifle obeyed perfectly.

I'm Baghdad Bob and I approved this message.

stay safe.

[HankB]

Wonder how often a rifle or pistol is left unattended and it's "Finder's Keepers?"

I'm personally looking forward to the long-predicted FLOOD OF WEAPONS on the street . . .

[Tallpine]

menacing-looking rifle

 

Eddie's Corner (a truck stop)

Spent a week camped out there in a blizzard at their RV park.  Didn't find any guns lying around (some people have all the luck), but there was some sort of HS athletic event going on in Great Falls and I think half the state of Montana drove through there that weekend.   

[Lanius]

Back after the DNV shooting in Slovakia, our brilliant interior minister named Lipshitz (transliteration of Lipšic) decreed that cops need more firepower and will have to tote sa.vz 58 everywhere.

Within two weeks, several assault rifles were forgotten... one on a bus stop, another on a gas station. I wish I had gotten my hands on one of those..

[230RN]

I've lost some stuff by putting it on the car.  Cane, sunglsasses, whatnot.  Recovered the cane after I saw it clattering down the street behind me as if it were trying to catch up.

So I made it an inviolable rule to not put stuff on the car.

So the next week I lost the sunglasses the same way.  I saw them go under the wheels of the car behind me.

So much for inviolable rules.

[Lanius]

@230RN

The one on the bus stop was found there because one of the cops left his vz.58 on the top of his squad car.. they drove away and didn't notice the gun clattering down..

[Tallpine]

I've lost some stuff by putting it on the car.  Cane, sunglsasses, whatnot.  Recovered the cane after I saw it clattering down the street behind me as if it were trying to catch up.

So I made it an inviolable rule to not put stuff on the car.

So the next week I lost the sunglasses the same way.  I saw them go under the wheels of the car behind me.

So much for inviolable rules.

I was out looking for a fire one time, and stopped and got out to look through my binoculars.  Indeed there was smoke so I laid down the binoculars on the rail of the pickup bed while I used the radio.  Sure enough, I drove off without retrieving the binoculars 

Amazingly enough, I mentally backtracked this scenario a couple days later when I missed the binoculars.  Even more amazing, they were still lying along the single track road, unharmed 

[vaskidmark]

I was out looking for a fire one time, and stopped and got out to look through my binoculars.  Indeed there was smoke so I laid down the binoculars on the rail of the pickup bed while I used the radio.  Sure enough, I drove off without retrieving the binoculars 

Amazingly enough, I mentally backtracked this scenario a couple days later when I missed the binoculars.  Even more amazing, they were still lying along the single track road, unharmed 

While realizing that everyone is subject to possibly forget some rather expensive item at one time or another, forgetting where you put your firearm is just "not allowed" and deserves both public derision and public punishment.  When done by a cop both are deserved even more so.

Last I heard them bullet-throwing devices can cause hurting, and not everybody who picks one up off the trunk of a cop car is filled with the urge to "Protect and Defend" or "Protect and Serve" or whatever motto is stenciled on the copcar.  Although I will say that based on published reports the average "Hey-look-what-I-picked-up-er" is going to have marksmanship skills about on a par with the trained policeperson.

stay safe.

[Tallpine]

While realizing that everyone is subject to possibly forget some rather expensive item at one time or another, forgetting where you put your firearm is just "not allowed" and deserves both public derision and public punishment

Oh, I agree.

While I have mislaid a $25 pair of binoculars, I have never mislaid a firearm.

[wmenorr67]

And yet how many times do we see or hear of the police officer who leaves his weapon in the toilet at some place or another?

[Balog]

A newly pinned GySgt in our comm shop lost an M9 on a ftx once. Base was locked down and a whole damn battalion wasted two days walking on line through the desert. Bastard didn't lose rank over it though. Conversely, a lance criminal who set his rifle down and walked away from got njp'ed and busted down to private. :/

[wmenorr67]

Not a surprise there.  I saw SPC/E-4 lose his M9 on a Blackhawk from BIAP to the IZ.  Pistol fell out of his holster and lodged in the seat of the Blackhawk.  Didn't have a lanyard/dummy cord on it.  Noticed it missing after the bird had been gone for 10 mins or so, thankfully he wasn't the last chalk and the M9 was found on the next trip.  The only thing they did to him was not let him carry the thing the rest of the deployment.

[Viking]

There's a military urban legend over here about a tank crew that handed in a "lost/damaged items slip" because they had driven a tank into a swamp or a bog, where it sank to the bottom .

[Scout26]

We had an entire ARTEP come to a complete screeching halt because a HQ mechanic leaned his M16 against a vehicle he was wrenching on and then forgot it once the vehicle sputtered to life and everyone drove away.

Fortunately, a German found it and turned it into the Polizei.  But it took about a day and half for the GP's to track down who was missing a fully automatic assault rifle.   A day and half of absolute hell on earth for the rest of us who HAD NOT lost our rifles.

That resulted in a Field Grade Article 15 and max 'im out.   I think he did receive a beat down in the barracks upon our return from the field, 2 days late.