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Guns for groceries in LA, a gut reaction to Sandy Hook - Los Angeles

Butter or guns? Many LA residents chose butter.


Hundreds of Los Angeles residents lined up over the weekend to exchange their guns for groceries. Moved up from Mother's Day in reaction to the Sandy Hook shootings, the buyback gave people grocery cards in exchange for guns, no questions asked.

Some of the guns exchanged for groceries.

Some of the guns exchanged for groceries.

LOS ANGELES, CA (Catholic Online) - From young adults with handguns, to elderly citizens who felt they had with no more need for a firearm, weapons poured in from across the city. One of the first guns exchanged was a camouflaged Bushmaster XM-15, the same kind of weapon used in the Sandy Hook Elementary shootings.

The LAPD haggled with the public, offering cards that were redeemable at Ralph's chain of grocery stores in exchange for the weapons. At least one person made off with $1,000 worth of cards after exchanging 22 guns.

Generally, police offered up to $100 for handguns, shotguns, and rifles, and up to $200 for assault weapons.

Some of the weapons were illegally altered, but this did not deter owners from giving them up, nor police from accepting them. No questions were asked during the buyback.

Such programs can remove thousands of firearms from the street in a single day. The event in Los Angeles is an annual affair. It is unclear if it will be repeated on Mother's Day in May when it is traditionally held.

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Keywords: buyback, LAPD, guns, groceries, Sandy Hook

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1 - 2 of 2 Comments

  1. Bill Sr.
    4 months ago

    Guns, being weapons to protect lives or to defend them, are now determined by government to be a violent threat to our new society of today. And yet today our people are suffering so that they feel the need to exchange them for food is greater than personal protection they provide from their threatening environment?
    Then how long will it be before government has determined for us that religious beliefs, especially Christianity which attempts to impede the proliferation of abortion, homosexuality, euthanasia and pornography, are also threatening the progress of the secular progressives now guiding moral conduct of our country.
    Will we be turning in our Bibles and Crucifixes for food???

  2. vance
    4 months ago

    The guns we see in this picture came from law abiding citizens. These are the people who you and I have no reason to fear. No bad guys showed up to turn their guns in. Again, the bad guys have weapons and the good guys are vulnerable.

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