Use of Fake Guns on the Rise

07/10/2009
Dallas officers concerned about toy guns
By Steve Thompson Dallas Morning News

DALLAS — Twice this week in Far North Dallas, police have drawn their weapons on people who turned out to be carrying toy guns. One of the cases involved a 15-year-old boy, and the incidents have raised officer concerns about the dangers of such situations. "It's summer, it's hot, these kids are out here with these guns that look real," Dallas police Lt. Elaine Barnard said. "When officers go to the scene, that's what they see – they see a gun that looks real. So they have to react to that."

In the first case, on Monday, officers were dispatched to a report of a man carrying what looked like a shotgun. They forced the man to drop it at gunpoint. The man, 26-year-old Alejondro Whaley, was arrested on unrelated outstanding warrants and his toy gun was seized.
"My concern is in a situation like that, that could quickly turn into a shooting," Barnard said.
In the second case, on Tuesday, officers responded to a report of a female waving a handgun near an apartment complex. They found a teenage boy and girl sitting on a retaining wall with their backs to the officers.

Police say the boy, 15, was holding something that looked like a black semiautomatic pistol.
"Drop the gun!" officers yelled, raising their own guns.

During a tense moment, the boy did not immediately drop the gun, police say, but officers moved in and restrained him and the girl. The weapon turned out to be a plastic toy pellet gun.
"It's just kind of alarming," Barnard said. "I don't want there to be a police-involved shooting, and when the dust settles, it turns out to be a 15-year-old with a fake gun."

In 2007, the City Council passed an ordinance outlawing the display or brandishing of replica firearms in public places. In the cases this week, officers did not write tickets.
"It's officer discretion on that," Barnard said. "So they just chose to confiscate the weapon and put it in the property room."

The 15-year-old's mother, Christine Certain, said such toy guns are common and lots of kids were shooting them back and forth that day."This is a big apartment complex; all the kids play with these guns," she said. "They go across the street to the 99-cent store and buy them."
But she said she'll no longer let her kids have them."No more BB guns in my house," she said. "No more fake guns, play guns, anything that has to do with bullets."