The office of Alamance County’s sheriff has teamed up with the county’s largest municipal police force to warn area residents about some disconcerting trends in the illegal guns that are cropping up in this part of the state.
Sheriff Terry Johnson and Burlington’s police chief Alan Balog ultimately convened a joint news conference on Tuesday in order to deliver their metaphorical shot across the bow about the worrisome implications of these unauthorized firearms.
During the news conference, Johnson acknowledged that his own agency has recovered more than 194 firearms since August of 2023. He added that, while a couple of these weapons turned up by chance after they were discarded, although others surfaced in the course of investigations that proved especially troubling to him and his colleagues.
“A lot of our gang bangers – and the cartels – are using juvenile gang members to commit these crimes because they’re only getting a slap on the hand [if they’re caught].”
– Sheriff Terry Johnson
“We do have a concern about juveniles being involved in these crimes not only as offenders but, more frequently, as victims. To some of these juveniles, a handgun is a clothing accessory like shoes or a hat.”
“Our officers are encountering rifle-caliber pistols, ghost guns, pistols with high capacity magazines, and fully-automatic handguns.”
– Burlington police chief Alan balog
“They have been taken off of juveniles who were involved in shootings, drug dealers, and convicted felons,” Johnson told the assembled news media that morning. “A lot of our gang bangers – and the cartels – are using juvenile gang members to commit these crimes because they’re only getting a slap on the hand [if they’re caught].”
Johnson conceded that juvenile suspects accounted for just six of the 120 gun violators that his agency has logged over the past 12 months or so. He added, however, that this seemingly small figure doesn’t account for the untold number of young offenders whose cases have passed imperceptibly through the state’s juvenile justice system.
The prevalence of guns among young people proved equally vexing to Balog, who confessed that a growing number of teenagers seem to be packing heat in spite of a significant drop in the city’s gun-related homicides so far this year.
“We do have a concern about juveniles being involved in these crimes not only as offenders but, more frequently, as victims,” he added. “To some of these juveniles, a handgun is a clothing accessory like shoes or a hat.”
The city’s police chief added that two of the gun-toting juveniles that his officers busted this year had previous firearm-related offenses on their criminal records. He went on to recall a case when officers took a gun from a five year-old girl who had apparently gotten it from a juvenile relative with a past history of weapons possession. He noted that other juvenile offenders have broken into parked cars to obtain their status-conferring side pieces.
“There is an epidemic in this state,” he declared, “where juveniles are targeting cars in neighborhoods and apartment complexes in the middle of the night.”
In addition to the growing number of young people who are armed, both Balog and Johnson pointed to some unsettling developments in the sophistication of the illegal firearms. The sheriff recalled one recent gun seizure that turned up a handgun with an illegal converter that effectively transformed it into a fully-automatic weapon. He went on to show a video clip in which a deputy used this modified pistol to fire off 20 rounds in mere seconds.
Balog, meanwhile, alluded to other, equally dangerous weapons that are becoming increasingly common in this part of the country.
“Our officers are encountering rifle-caliber pistols, ghost guns, pistols with high capacity magazines, and fully-automatic handguns,” he said.
The police chief later explained that “ghost guns” aren’t the innocuous proton packs worn by the Ghostbusters but a ready-to-assemble firearm kit that’s available online – and which can be a real devil for law enforcement to track.
Despite the ratatat of dismal developments, Tuesday’s news conference also offered some words of reassurance for area residents concerned about gun violence.
To this end, Johnson and Balog yielded the podium to Jason Walsh, the resident agent in charge of the Greensboro office of the U.S. Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, and Firearms (ATF).
Walsh informed the assembled news media that his office has been making good use of some powerful new tools in intelligence gathering– including a computerized application that lets investigators map out the locations of firearm seizures by various state, local, and federal agencies.
“From that,” he added, “we correlate leads we use to follow the firearms.”
Walsh went on to commend the breakthroughs in law enforcement that have come from the high levels cooperation among the agencies that operate in this neck of the woods. He conceded, however, that these efforts will only reach their full potential if they’re accompanied by the support of the general public.
“I do believe that we’ll reduce crime, with the community’s help,” he added, “if we continue along this track.”
Balog also called on the community to take a more active role in the prevention of gun violence. Among other things, he advised law abiding gun owners to lock up their weapons – preferably somewhere other than their parked motor vehicles.
Johnson, likewise, stressed the importance of the public support in the ongoing battle against illicit guns.
“We have a problem, and we need the community to help us,” he said. “We need citizens to point us in the general direction of where the violations are taking place.”
