On Tuesday afternoon, the city of Calera, Alabama Police Department posted news of a firearm bust that’s sure to make firearm collectors weep. A suspicious individual, or so the cops there say, was carrying a high-end, custom handgun. The man, unable to present a valid carry license, was taken into custody for interrogation and temporary accommodation at the local graybar hotel.
His custom-made work of ballistic art? Cops snapped a photo of it and posted it on Facebook along with a cheeky explanation. Frankly, unlike some of the so-called “illegal” gun seizures posted by police agencies that look more like toy guns or BB guns, this one might have actually prevented a crime. So kudos to Calera PD.
This afternoon two Calera officers noticed a person acting suspiciously in a neighborhood. When approached, the person ran and was later found at a local gas station. The suspect, from Chilton County, had a concealed firearm and is a prior convicted felon with two active arrest warrants from separate cities.
The firearm, while not a thing of beauty, appears to be functional.
This used to be someone’s .22 caliber bolt action rifle but has been modified apparently to be concealed.
I’m proud of our officers for actively patrolling our neighborhoods and preventing crimes. This happened at a time when we are extremely short staffed.
Convicted felons, drug dealers and gang members should not have firearms regardless of the quality. (Chief Hyche)
Comments about the firearm and it’s craftsmanship are expected!
The comments didn’t entirely disappoint. Yes, there’s a lot of electrical tape used in this masterpiece. Thirty feet of it, according to the Calera PD in a follow-up comment.
One person wrote: “I feel sorry for the embarrassment the criminal surely suffered from being exposed with this shootin’ iron.”
Stephanie snarked: “That is definitely some Chilton County redneck engineering at its finest. Glad I live in Shelby County.”
And Andrew wrote this one: “Gahhh why go with the cheap Dollar Tree flashlight with such a beautiful relic?”
What sort of self-respecting bad guy would carry that piece of junk? Especially with a Dollar Tree tactical light taped to it?
Apparently a bad guy who doesn’t have a spare $25 to buy an air pistol that looks sort of like a real gun instead of something that looks like it came out of an Alec Baldwin-esque film production set on the high seas. Sleep safer, Alabamans. Another dangerous weapon is out of circulation.
Fake news! This is an unregistered short barreled rifle, not a pistol. Once a rifle always a rifle.
You’re expecting your local PD to actually know the law?…
I guffaw in your general direction!
That is state law in Alabama as well
Fun fact: In Canada, firearms are classified differently from the U.S., and short barreled rigg do les/shotguns are regulated like handguns over there.
The more you know!
Are they available for U.S civilians? What is the MSRP?
Also, can I get my tact light in blue?
The crime is that “firearm.” Perp is sentenced to three years of comments on TTAG.
sentence him to 3 years with dacian.
Definitely one of Dacian’s thermonuclear ghost guns.
For f*ck’s sake! That’s a gator gun! Not a “terrorist gun” or a “liquor store” gun.
That gun has probably terminated 100% more gators (or other illegally trapped/poached animals) than it has tax paying (or tax evading) bipeds.
Good grief.
Great collar! Keep it up!
That looks more like what’s left after the gator ate and digested the rifle.
can you kill a gator with a .22LR?
You can kill anything that has a nervous system with a .22 lr if the shot placement is just right.
and you have a few bricks of ammo.
Poke it in the eye.
“Poke it in the eye.”
That will just enrage the ‘gator.
About 8 inches behind the eyes for an adult ‘gator…
Yes, alligator trappers use both handguns and rifles chambered in .22 LR all the time to kill the gators that they trap. A single shot to the brain does it every time.
Kyle, dispatched many a gator with a .22 LR.
Then you know what will happen if you shoot a ‘gator “Right between the eyes”.
One very pissed-off alligator… 🙂
If you can wait for it to die laughing.
Obrez.
Ghetto obrez.
Obrez IF made by Hi Point. I want my Obrez to actually have the fireball. Carbine not enough fireball. I wanna see someone attempt a new improved Obrez outta a Barrett. That would be a fireball.
I made better looking guns than that one when I was ten.
That tac light looks like the same cheap crap they try to give away for free by e- mail for just $15.00 shipping and handling. Glad I never bought one.
Well that’s some ingenuity!🙃🤓😎
In gun control speak: its a semi-auto weapon of war, he would have had to semi-automatically operate the bolt enabling him to repeatedly fire bullets like a ‘machine gun’ with single trigger presses.
In related news, it was announced today that manufacturers of electrical tape are preparing a lawsuit for defamation of character.
Silver duct tape would have made it much more legit.
Indeed, black tape makes it look more tactical, therefore scarier, therefore deadlier.
Not to mention the tactical light.
I am clutching my pearls in fear.
No trigger guard?
So, what did the holster look like?
It was one of those new fangled holsters designed to blend in with clothing. You’ve hear of “belly band holsters” well this one is called “waist band”.
Or “waste band”.
lol
lmao
roflmao
I actually researched this. There were many sources available on the internet that discuss building your own firearms. Before it was decided that this information should not be available to the public in a free Society. Several years ago The Firearms Blog did an entire series of photographs, from all over the world, of guns that were made in someone’s garage.
And the craftsmanship of some of these gun makers is pretty impressive coming out of a one-man shop. This example seems to be “a very sophisticated one” compared to a real bare-bones gun. Which is just two pieces of tubing one piece slightly smaller than the other and a nail. Used to set off the round.
Well it is black and rather scary after all, so there’s that…..
(snicker)
By the way where is the shoulder-thingy that goes up?
while the weapon itself is beneath contempt, the police do deserve credit. regardless of the small caliber, it is a lethal weapon. at least as much as the old zip guns.
Huh, the real surprise is this was found in Alabama. You’d expect this kind of thing somewhere like Brazil.
Or on the Black Pearl pirate ship.
“He was acting suspiciously.”
An undefinable grey statement that is neither a misdemeanor or felony requiring police intervention in any jurisdiction.
Criminals always seem to attract attention to themselves.
Can anyone tell me the make and model of that tactical flashlight holder? I really want one.
And is that a 1,000,000 candle power tactical light on there?
When is TTaG going to review that firearm for us?
(Paging Travis, Jeremy, or Jon)
Believe it or not, this is exactly what the old-time bolsheviks used to do with milsurp Mosin nagants, so they could have a “concealed weapon”.
I’ll bet it was fun to shoot one-handed.
That looks more likely to injure the shooter than the target.
“What sort of self-respecting bad guy would carry that piece of junk? Especially with a Dollar Tree tactical light taped to it?”
minus the light, this is as standard criminal fare as it gets
At least it was until trains in CA started letting anyone who wanted a gun steal one from them along the tracks (and called police racist for setting up sting operations and arresting the thieves)
Almost embarrassed to see this was found here in Alabama. Looks more like the kind of thing we used to see in Chicago or Detroit back in the late 70’s or early 80’s.
Would this be redneck engineering or afro engineering?
The point is, is it not, that no matter what it looks like it can still KILL YOU?? All other comment is totally irrelelevant
Within a few miles of where I am writing this comment an illegal arms factory was found on a small industrial estate [ try ARMS FACTORY HAILSHAM SUSSEX]. The pistols made were also pretty much junk but were apparently selling for several hundred £GB each and though, supposedly SLP’s, seldom got beyond one shot when tested by the Police. I don’t think that they would have passed muster with anybody with any knowledge and certainly not by anybody with anykind of professional interest in firearms.
Just to let you know that here on this side of the pond we do actually have our fair share of gun-nuts as well. Ammo on the other hand is exceedingly difficult to come by and I’m told that a SINGLE ROUND of 9mm will cost several £GB. I have no douibt whatsoever that if the UK [or European] PUBLIC had the same kind of access to handguns and ammunition that is available in the USA that we would have similar problems and that the same old, same old would be making the same old, same old utterences of self justification.
your crime rat wood bee more bigger den america is if it had gunms ibis .America have gunm long time
it no raisins why the united england ban kinds of knifes and crassbows and stuff , pointy stix.
English armor violent then a U.S. people I guess.
So its bester not to have gunms.
If he was safe enough to have his freedom back, isn’t he safe enough to have his right to guns?
if he’s not safe enough to have his right to guns, why was he allowed to have his freedom back?
There’s no kudos for the PD here, just a failure of the justice system. Either they let him out of prison too early last time, or they arrested him this time simply for a subjective “acting suspiciously” without a legal reason for arrest. It’s not illegal to run from the cops if you haven’t committed a crime and they had no reasonable articulable suspicion that a crime had been or was about to be committed. Since the stop and the arrest were garbage, any evidence they found will be garbage if a half-decent lawyer steps in. A good lawyer would have him back out on the street the same day, have the possession charge dropped, and have a friend without a criminal record claiming the gun back from the police (well, maybe not because it looks like it’s NFA now so it couldn’t be given back without the manufacturing paper trail).
Amen.
Soon to be a strike industries gizmo near you!