When a man drove up to a Capitol Hill barricade carrying a rifle and live hand grenades last week, dozens of officers were ordered to the 1st District to be armed with newly bought AR-15 assault rifles, just in case. But the safe where the rifles were kept was broken, defying efforts to equip officers with the extra firepower, according to an internal e-mail and police sources. “It appears that our safe became inopperable [sic],” 1st District Cmdr. David Kamperin told his officers in a Sept. 6 e-mail obtained by The Examiner. “As such we will have to suspend deployment of the weapons until the armorers [sic] office can respond out Monday morning and repair.” A week later, the officers were still waiting to get their hands on the high-powered weapons, police sources told The Examiner. The sources spoke on condition of anonymity. There are at least two dozen assault rifles in the 1st District, which covers Capitol Hill as well as the White House, sources said. Chief Cathy Lanier has promised to bring her department into the 21st century by upgrading the department’s technology and weaponry. But she has had mixed results. Earlier this year, she was blasted by the D.C. inspector general for ignoring warnings about substandard conditions in the city’s evidence warehouse. The Examiner reported earlier this week that the department had mislaid hundreds, and possibly thousands, of criminal reports. Lanier didn’t respond to multiple requests for comment. Her decision to buy the 500-some assault rifles raised eyebrows from civil rights activists who questioned the need for heavy weaponry. The 1st District’s safe was bought earlier this year but apparently wasn’t designed to be opened every day. It broke within a few days of being installed, and District officials will have to rebuild it — once they get it open again. Kris Baumann, chair of the D.C. police union, told The Examiner that the lapse was shocking — and might endanger the public. “Why in heaven’s name wouldn’t they call in officers from a district where the safes were working?” Baumann said. “But the biggest question is, why weren’t these guns already out in the cars with the officers who were trained?”
