Guns taken by Guns Save Life to one of Chicago's Gun Buybacks in 2015. Image by Boch.

Guns Save Life has developed something of a reputation for repeatedly stinging government gun buyback events (see here, here, and here). We collect and trade junk guns — some of them utterly trashed — for perfectly good cash that we then use to support youth shooting programs across the state. Oh yeah, we also use some of the money to buy guns to give away to the kids.

Eleven years ago, we popped Chicago for about $6,500 while turning in almost 70 guns at one of their gun buybacks. The international publicity caused such a black eye for Murder City, USA that they suspended the “doing something” kabuki PR programs for a couple of years. Even today, the city’s buyback program is only a weak shadow of its former self.

Guns Save Life kids guns summer camp
Courtesy Guns Save Life

In the past month or so, however, I’ve taken at least four phone calls from supposed GSL members who each say they have multiple guns to deliver to me for us to take to our next buyback adventure. One was a member I knew from Peoria, so factor him out of this equation.

With each phone call I got from people I didn’t know, the number of guns they say they have to deliver to me has grown. The most recent one didn’t give an exact number but said he had “probably close to a dozen.”

In past years, I’d only get one of these phone calls every now and then. The people would identify themselves and I’d sometimes even recognize their voices. Or they’d approach me at Guns Save Life meetings.

florida SB 1310 kids gun pictures photos social media
Courtesy GunsSaveLife.com

These past three phone calls, however, have struck me as odd in that none of them identified themselves. Not only that, but they they all were willing to bring them to my house. In fact, they seemed just a bit eager to do it.

These days I remind everyone that under the terms of the Protect Illinois Communities Act, as of July 1st all private firearms transfers must go through a dealer to do the required background checks, paperwork, etc. All three of the callers, though, said they had no need or desire to run these “clunkers” through a dealer.

Failure to do so, however, is a felony. In Gavin DeBecker’s The Gift of Fear, he teaches people not to ignore their intuition. I didn’t.

I’m pretty sure these calls were sting attempts. I don’t know if it’s some rogue officers from Chicago’s infamous CAGE unit or if this is was a bright idea by the boys over at the Illinois State Police. But I’m reasonably sure that these callers, given their frequency and their eagerness to bring the guns to me, weren’t interested in helping us collect more money from another gun buyback event for the kids.

I’ll state this for the record: Guns Save Life isn’t collecting guns any longer given the end of private transfers in Illinois under the new law. With that in mind, the ISP/CPD/whomever is trying to run sting…you can stop calling.

Then again, I might have you bring them and call local law enforcement to meet you for attempting to engage in felony gunrunning. I’ve got 4k surveillance cameras all the way around my residence so that would make for some great video, audio and pictures.

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39 COMMENTS

  1. I bet you it was FBI or ATF glowies. These are the same sc*mbags that frame r*tards for terrorism, or poor whites for assassination plots against governors. In my neighborhood, these provocateurs show up at the gun range ranting and raving about “doing something” about the uncontrolled tyranny in the country, then try to recruit people to a meeting at the local pizza place.

    Obvious as s* on a stick.

    • That reminded me of a game my dad used to play.
      Shit on a stick.
      Hed role a stick around in horse or cow manure then poke it at you, you’d naturally grab at the stick then hed pull the stick back leaving your hands all shitty.

    • The last time I was on a public range I saw something like that and realized a lot of various races are on gun related social media and/or the chans as they told the glowie to fuck off with far more charged language. Was good for a laugh ATF. Shame the ammo check is making getting into the hobby a royal pain in the ass for those limited to rentals.

      • In my experience they are obese neckbeards wearing tacticool clothing and shooting kitted out $3000 AR-15s. The latter is something few if any shooters in my neck of the woods could afford. Soon as someone like that shows up, I leave.

        • For obvious reasons we do not get as much of the tacticool items (well except muskets and manual actions anyway) but typically the cheap turkish shotguns are our version of such a warning sign as the permit systems distort the typical market.

    • I would be so tempted to rant about “ending it all” and then explain you need a day “to prepare” for the meeting.
      Imagine if governments worked to suppress those who actually do harm?

    • Troll them back.

      Start screaming about how we have to do something because it’s all going to end in a terrible calamity. Amp it up many levels but keep it semi-vague so that they have to want to believe you because you’re not really saying anything.

      Then as soon as they engage you, tell them VERY excitedly you’re talking about the asteroid sent to destroy us by the Xenomorphs from the Grand Spiral Galaxy in the alternate timeline [insert babbling nonsense about time travel and string theory here] and offer them a spot on your spaceship to save themselves but only if they help build it on the weekends which of course requires them to collect a ton of entirely random but completely inert objects in stupidly massive quantities.

      Like, 27,364 Corelle, specifically Corelle coffee mugs in a specific color because look this is complicated but you engineered this thing with help from yourself from the future because, well it’s too hard to explain the intergalactic wars that raged for millions of years in the future in our timeline but in the past in the other timeline but godfuckingdammit those things are CRITICAL to our success because the ship must have a specially built collector for quarktimeneutrinos of a specific flavor and SPIN or we’re all going to die!

      Basically just make up the most asinine version of the Back to the Future explanations of time travel that you can but with aliens and yourself in alternate timelines and coffee cups.

      As soon as you make that offer for them to come over and help build this thing, switch to being clingy as fuck.

      And then enjoy watching them get really, really, really uncomfortable trying to get you to go away while you winge about how they know what’s up so why won’t they help type shit.

    • Golly Boch are you gonna do one of your glowing “back the blue hero’s” thing? You just kinda threw them under the proverbial bus. Fat boy prickster,Kwame & state bulls are on the same team. Satan’s team. Thank God we have some righteous county Mounties…but not in Cook!

  3. I hope he follows through on the last paragraph! It would be awesome to see the video go viral of a 3 letter agency agent getting arrested for gun running!

    • Agreed. Do a “pay per view” and he’d still make a nice chunk for training the kids, without having to wait in line for gift cards.

    • This is perhaps the biggest key to surviving. We were given these instincts then as children told to disregard them.

    • Yup.

      I recall an incident a few years ago (post Sandy Hook) where some “investigative journalist” / James O’Keefe wannabee was going around to various gun stores / gun show booths expressing interest in AR or AK platform rifles, and then was asking for information about how to make them full auto. You can imagine the story he wanted to write (and apparently believed that lots of FFL’s are actually into illegal MG conversions).

      Unfortunately, EVERY person he tried it on immediately said: “No. That’s completely illegal. You should not even ask about it.” and would not engage with him further. Closest he ever got was, I think, one person that gave him the card of a Class III dealer, while also telling him that it would probably cost him >$20,000 and he’d have to go through all sorts of government paperwork and approvals first.

      • …and the wannabe probably wrote his story anyhow, despite the dearth of facts supporting his position. Couldn’t let the truth get in the way of his agenda.

        • The WaPo did one a couple of years back, on how ‘Easy it was to buy a gun’.

          Well, that’s what they wanted to write. It didn’t quite go to plan, with all those permissions, background checks, and waiting periods to exercise a fundamental civil right… 😉

      • it was so easy to do back in the 80’s that many had a hard time believing it was illegal…wonder how many of those are still out there stashed away someplace?…buying a gun is relatively easy in some places..much harder in others…does seem more difficult than it used to be these days…seem to want you to sign all sorts of things…not sure why…

    • Had a guy from the gun club I belonged to and whom I knew had been busted for a felony fish and game charge give me a call and ask for the phone number of a relative of mine who was a deputy public defender and was that office’s official gun expert. The potential felon said he had some kind of automatic firearm he had to sell because he needed cash. Like a flash of light a big WARNING light flashed on in my head. I told him that my relative’s phone number was a private number and he had instructed me not to ever give it out, that everybody he wanted to receive calls from already had his number. Inasmuch as the caller didn’t have his number, obviously he was not someone my brother wanted to receive calls from. I got one more call from him and he received the same reply. I informed my relative about the calls and he assured me that his immediate thought was the same as mine and he was glad the guy and whoever was backing him were too dumb to discover his phone number.

  5. Everything glows these days. From white supremacists and insurrections to human trafficking and rogue nations.

    The only real grassroots crime left is looting and gangs fighting over territory but a convincing argument can be made that much of that exists because glow worm encouragement.

  6. Such a sad end of such a program. What you need to do is see if you can get a C&R FFL which would likely cover most of the stuff you’re talking about. You’re not profiting from it if the money is going to charity, are you? Obviously have a lawyer square this all away.

    • It doesn’t have to be the end of the program. All Mr. Boch has to do is ask the caller for their contact info, and he’ll notify them of the next buy-back. Owner turns in his gun, receives gift card, delivers said card to Mr. Boch. Easy as pie.

      • “Owner turns in his gun, receives gift card, delivers said card to Mr. Boch.”

        Yep, that’s all it takes. Pain in the ass they have to do it that way, though, here’s to all the lawsuits in progress so they can do that again…

  7. The Gift of Fear is a great book. Used some of his principles raising our daughter and we are all better off for it.

  8. “Then again, I might have you bring them and call local law enforcement to meet you for attempting to engage in felony gunrunning.”

    NO! don’t do that. you never know how those subservient to tyrant fat-boy might want to make you the bad guy some way or another.

    I hate its come to me having to say this…but if you live in an anti-gun tyrant state do not do anything to ‘assist’ law enforcement in the state or any federal agency with reporting any ‘suspicious’ or actual gun running and keep out of it. The vast majority of their tips for this kind of stuff come from law abiding gun owners or FFL’s…and they’ve shown they don’t care for law abiding gun owners one little bit or the 2A and are ‘waging war’ against us so do not give aid to the enemy.

  9. As far as I am concerned, Mr. Boch’s callers could just as easily have been non-law enforcement who were trying to set-up Boch anyway.

    (I have to believe that one of the civilian disarmament organizations would LOVE to do exactly what Boch described and use that to imprison him.)

  15. Regarding Gaven de Becker’s “The Gift of Fear”: One piece of advice he offers, alongside “not to ignore your intuition”, is not to have/use a personal firearm. Which is odd since his security agents are armed.

    • Just prosecuting “felons in possession” and “possession of a firearm while distributing a controlled substance” would have an immediate and significant impact on violent crimes in Cook County. Alas the demographics of those perpetrators do not allow it.

  16. Also note the many reports out of Chicago and elsewhere of thugs arrested with illegally converted Glock type pistol machine guns, who are NEVER Federally charged for the MG, or for possession of the “Glock Switch” which those sources report are available on Chicago streets for $20 to $50 each.
    No reports of Feds looking into the people importing these from China and wholesaling them to the street gangs.
    Feds are too busy defending trannys, protecting groomer school boards, and getting ready to suppress Trump votes and voters in 2024.

  17. Just because you’re paranoid doesn’t mean they’re not out to get you.

    Gets truer every day. God, what an interesting time to be alive.

    Now excuse me, I have A LOT of chartreuse coffee cups and 4.723oz bags of sawdust to collect.

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