LANSING, Mich. (WZMQ) – The Michigan State Police (MSP) is changing disposal methods for firearms. After disposing of 11,582 surrendered firearms in 2023, the MSP made the switch to make sure they were destroyed entirely.
The discussion to make the switch to entirely destroy surrendered firearms has been ongoing since December. The Very Reverend Chris Yaw was one of the leaders in advocating for the changes, following his and his church’s experience with the previous system during a buyback program.
“Eight departments and us partnered together to do these buybacks. We gave away $5000 of gift cards in 20 minutes. the line was 2 miles long outside our church.” Reverend Yaw explained.
“This is not a red or blue issue. this is not a gun rights issue. the vast majority of gun owners in this country know how to handle a gun. We’re talking about that percentage of weapons that people don’t want.”
He explained that when there’s a firearm present in the home, women are 37% more likely to harm themselves, and males are 8%.
Reverend Yaw said the program itself was a success, but after a few months, he was excited about approaching his local department about hosting another event only to learn they had been overwhelmed by the number of surrenders and were struggling to have them all processed.
“You’ve got line chain of custody, so an officer gets it, again they’ve got 12,000 guns, they have to physically see each gun destroyed. That’s gonna take a lot of time.” Reverend Yaw said. “It was very clear that getting unwanted guns disposed of is very difficult in our present system.”
Previously, the Michigan State Police contracted the disposal of firearms to a company called Gunbusters, which provides free firearm destruction services to law enforcement agencies. In January, the MSP halted the destruction of firearms after discovering Gunbusters disposal only involves the destruction of the federal minimum: the receiver, the casing that has the serial number. A part that can be reproduced or 3D printed.
Gunbusters then recycled the leftover internal portions of the firearm by selling them, in some cases for over $2,000 per kit. This opens up the potential for the kits to be repurposed and used to make unregistered homemade firearms or ghost gun kits.
The Michigan State Police released a statement saying this month they will start using a scrap metal processing facility in Jackson for the complete disposal of firearms, the pulverized metal will then be melted down and recycled into flat-roll steel coils.
