Think BB, pellet and paintball guns are harmless toys, just used for fun? Think again.
Baltimore police say they have tracked more than 100 robberies committed in the city this year to such toy guns and are supporting a city council member?s bill to outlaw them on the streets.
“There is a diabolical market that fashions these weapons to look like submachine guns and real handguns,” said Col. Frederick Bealefeld III, the Baltimore Police Department?s chief of Criminal Investigation.
Concerned that paintball, BB and pellet guns are being used to commit crimes in Baltimore, City Council member Helen Holton is moving a bill through the Council?s Public Safety Subcommittee, which had a hearing on the proposed ban Tuesday.
Holton said she is concerned with two recent shootings in which police officers shot residents who were pointing toy guns at the officers.
“The sophistication of toy guns have reached such epidemic proportions that you can?t differentiatebetween what is a toy and what can do harm,” said Holton, D-8th District. “Officers should not have to make a split-second decision: Is it real or is it fake?”
Bealefeld told the subcommittee of three incidents this year in which BB guns carried by Baltimore youths and men led to actual shootings when rivals retaliated.
“I could go on reciting crimes people are committing [with toy guns],” Bealefeld said. “Many are being used by robbers.”
The police department supports the ban, both Jordan Watts Jr., assistant solicitor of legal affairs, and James Green, director of special programs, told Holton.
A rough draft of the bill seeks to prohibit the possession, sale, transfer or discharge of paintball guns and similar devices. At the hearing, officials discussed banning possession of the toy guns in public, while limiting the sale to adults.
Holton said she intends to exclude from the ban fields or facilities specifically designed for paintball shooting.
