Amy McVey didn’t seem like the typical D.C. gun owner, at least not to the reporters who stood outside the Metropolitan Police Department on Thursday, the first day handguns could be registered in the District after the city’s 32-year ban.
“They looked at me and thought, ‘She doesn’t fit the profile of someone coming in with a gun,’ so they left me alone and I walked right past them,” said McVey, who was the first and only person to register a handgun Thursday when she entered the station with her Ruger .357 Magnum in a blue plastic bag around 1 p.m.
McVey’s experience was mostly uneventful, she said. The security guard who screened her belongings was surprised when she told him there was a gun in the bag.
Once he handed her off to policemen, the process was smooth.
“The cops were professional, polite and courteous,” McVey said. “A couple of them remarked what a nice gun it was.”
McVey found the cops very encouraging of her gun ownership. “I asked them, ‘Do you mind good people owning guns?’ ” she said. “One said, ‘It will help make our job easier.’ ”
McVey took a written test, had her fingerprints taken, and submitted her gun for a ballistics examination. She said the written test was fairly easy and required basic knowledge of gun ownership laws and some common sense.
“I got a 19 out of 20,” she said.
The process will likely be completed in a few weeks once police finish the requisite background check.
Among the 58 people who visited the police department to inquire about the registration or apply for a permit, McVey was the only one to complete the process.
Dick Anthony Heller, the plaintiff in the Supreme Court case who successfully challenged the District law, left without registering his handgun Thursday.
He was among the first people to arrive at police headquarters, but because he did not bring his gun with him, he returned Friday to start the process.
McVey said she was astonished that Heller did not bring his gun on Thursday.
She checked the police department Web site and called ahead to verify the procedure for registering her gun.
“I was surprised that nobody else had done it,” she said. “I figured when you do something, you do it right.”
