Phoenix gun buybacks set before law forces sales

PHOENIX — Just days after Gov. Jan Brewer signed a law designed to hinder police participation in gun buyback events, the city of Phoenix on Saturday held the first of three buybacks that organizers are calling the largest effort of its kind in the state's history. The law Brewer signed April 29 takes effect this summer and requires cities and counties to sell surrendered weapons instead of destroying them.

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But Tucson City Councilman Steve Kozachik says the law is so full of loopholes he's confident the gun buyback events can still be held with police participation.

"I could do one through law enforcement, through (Tucson police), tomorrow and put a price tag of $100,000 on them and no one would bid on them so they'd sit in storage," Kozachik said Friday. "Or in the alternative I could put a price on them of a penny and sell them to an artist who would melt them down and make them into art.

"They've really achieved nothing but made fools of themselves," he said of the law's backers.

There's also nothing in the law that prevents private groups like the one backing the Phoenix events from destroying guns, although they say they need police participation.

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