The Harrisburg Police Department seized nearly 200 firearms from city streets in 2018.
Department with officials Friday showcased about 60 of those firearms at a news conference, ranging from handguns and shotguns to an AK-47 with a high-capacity drum magazine.
The firearms at the press conference only represented about a third of the 198 seized during 2018, said Capt. Gabe Olivera. Of those 196 firearms, 181 were handguns, 11 were rifles, and 6 were shotguns.
Olivera said the firearms were seized from juveniles and adults during arrests.
The department will try to return firearms that were reported stolen to their rightful owners after a hearing process. If owners can’t be found, the firearms will be destroyed, Olivera said.
“In 2016, the (police) commissioner gave our department a mission,” Olivera said. “That mission was to take as many illegal guns off the street.”
Since Commissioner Tom Carter gave his department that mission, the department has removed a total of 646 illegal firearms from the streets of Harrisburg.
“We can’t say that each one of these guns would have been used in a shooting, a robbery, or even a homicide,” Olivera said. “But our department has taken 646 opportunities to injure citizens of this city with some kind of violence.”
While the number of firearms on the streets has declined, so too has violent crime.
Olivera said that from 2017 to 2018, there city saw a 10 percent reduction in violent crime, adding that more specific data will be available sometime in March.
Here’s how many firearms were seized in previous years:
2017: 252
- 233 handguns
- 10 rifles
- 9 shotguns
2016: 196
- 174 handguns
- 3 rifles
- 19 shotguns
Carter explained the mission came to fruition due to “rampant gunfire” throughout the city in 2016.
“It was something we had to try to stop,” he said. Carter added he opted against a gun buyback program, as more often than not, elderly citizens hand in their firearms for cash for food and supplies.
“The people we want to get the guns from, they never bring their guns in,” he said.
Carter vowed that the department would continue its mission to get firearms off the streets, both for the safety of the public and the officers who patrol the streets.
“Harrisburg is changing, Harrisburg is moving. There’s a lot of good things going on here,” Carter said. “The people of Harrisburg deserve better than to worry about getting their property shot up.”
