APD seizes over 4K firearms over two-year period

AUSTIN, Texas - Austin Police are seeing thousands of guns end up in the wrong hands. 

Gun safety advocates argue many probably started out legally purchased. They said simple steps could help stop that pipeline before it turns deadly.

By the numbers:

More than four thousand firearms were seized by Austin Police over the past two years, pulled from crime scenes, illegal activity, and investigations across the city.

What they're saying:

How those guns end up in the wrong hands often follows a familiar path.

"The overwhelming majority of guns, of crime guns that are recovered by law enforcement start in the legal market and at some point they're diverted to the illicit market, often trafficked and then used in crime," Brady general counsel Josh Scharff said. 

Brady is the nation's oldest gun safety and gun violence prevention organization, named for White House press secretary Jim Brady, who was shot and partially paralyzed during the 1981 attempted assassination of Ronald Reagan.

Gun safety advocates said that diversion can happen in several ways, including through gun traffickers or through straw purchases.

"Somebody buying a gun on behalf of someone else, often who doesn't want to go through the background check because they will fail it or because they don't want be associated with that firearm," Scharff said.

Many times, Austin Police Chief Lisa Davis, said diversion happens during break-ins.

"A lot of the guns that we have stolen are out of vehicles. And we know that if a gun is stolen out of a vehicle, within 80 days, it most likely will be used in a crime," Chief Davis said.

What you can do:

Chief Davis said that is where the public can step in.

"That's how everybody can help, is just being responsible gun owners," Chief Davis said.

She said gun owners need to lock up their firearms, not leave them in cars, and report immediately if they’re stolen.

"You don't want to be associated with a stolen firearm that's later used in crime because it was stolen from you," Scharff said.

Advocates also point to the role of gun sellers, saying even a few irresponsible dealers can have a big impact. Brady tracks gun store inspections across the country.

"We really encourage gun dealers to adopt the safest business practices, to screen purchasers, to make sure that they are safe purchasers and not to prioritize profit over public safety," Scharff said.

In Austin, police said every recovered gun is tracked and run through a national database.

"We make sure that they run through NIBIN, make sure they're not associated with crimes and then if they’re not, they’re returned, most of them are returned to the owner that we can identify and if they can't, they're destroyed ultimately," Chief Davis said.

Police said most of these cases have one thing in common; they could have been prevented.