Posted on 04/01/2012 5:02:40 PM PDT by marktwain
The Harris County District Attorney’s Office and the Houston Police Department have decided to return a pistol confiscated from a 92-year-old veteran who fatally shot a man in his home in 2010, but was cleared by the grand jury last year.
When The Houston Advocate raised the dilemma last week, Harris County DA Pat Lykos and HPD Chief Charles McClelland responded by tacking the issue onto a previously scheduled meeting last Thursday.
“Due to the grand jury’s decision not to indict Mr. Hands and with the cooperation of the Houston Police Department, his pistol is being returned,” Donna Hawkins, a DA’s Office spokeswoman said this afternoon. “There was a cooperative effort between the Houston Police Department and the DA’s Office to ensure that his weapon was returned. He should have it back before the end of the week.”
There’s still been no decision on the other weapon, a beloved heirloom shotgun, that also was seized.
Authorities are still making a determination about the legality of Hands possessing that gun.
Reached on Tuesday, Hands said he was grateful to hear the good news about the pistol, but still wanted both weapons returned.
(Excerpt) Read more at blog.chron.com ...
/johnny
We are NOT winning the culture war — the man should not have had the gun taken away from him at all.
Wasn’t the gun used inside his home that he tried to protect?
This is what happens when Democrats run anything, even in Texas.
Like that has ever stopped a criminal from using that type of weapon.
Probably stolen and sold if valuable by the LEO’s or DA’s.
You can't return what you no longer have in evidence. I don't know about other states but a good quality firearm "disappears" regularly in Texas. You might go to the Feds and file a civil rights complaint against them but it's a "good ol' boy" deal and takes a lot of pressure.
We are winning right up until we end up in a FEMA camp...
I wouldn't be surprised if they couldn't give that one back because they've already passed it along to a 'friend'. Has anyone outside the law enforcement 'family' seen that one lately?
This is Houston you're talking about. Certainly not all cops in Houston are crooked, but there is a reputation that has followed the force from way on back to the 70’s.
I stay the hell outta Houston, can't stand the place.
I just moved back to Houston in August after 12 years elsewheres, including 10 years in Minnestoopid (talk about useless law enforcement). Only one HPD chief impressed me, and that was Sam Nuchia. I was in Minnestoopid at the time of the west side K-Mart fiasco(but read about it here on FR), and it was evident that Clarence Bradford had lost control of HPD.
Not impressed with Houston, ready to move to Deer Park. What the hey, I work there.
Goes further back than the 70s. In the 60s it was well known HPD was worse than the bad guys. You were very unlucky to get mixed up with them.
Houston is the top rathole of Texas, after Austin, of course. In a stupid contest, it would be a toss up between Austin and Houston.
I’m surprised the Houston crime lab didn’t lose it. It has to be one of the most incompetent crime labs in the country.
“the shotgun was cut off and is an illegal length (<18 inches).”
From what I gathered from a previous posting on this story the gun in question was a very old, rare and valuable coach gun that was made that way and not a sawed off gun.
The one they're pondering IIRC is a shotgun cut to an illegal length. Maybe they could make him come in with a legal length barrel, swap it out, and send him home with the now-legal shotgun and the under length barrel, not attached.
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