"I think it’s important for every city to step forward. We’re seeing rising gun crime in every city," said Mayor Sam Liccardo.Police investigators said the 24-year-old Sunnyvale man was selling stolen property, but also had a cache of so-called ghost guns, and parts to assemble ghost guns., particularly gun trafficking rings," said Liccard.
According to the San Jose Police Department in California, nearly 30% of weapons seized by the ATF are ghost guns. And in San Jose, detectives said approximately one-fourth of the 963 firearms taken by police officers in 2021 did not have serial numbers. "During the Cinco holiday, just this past week, we seized a large majority of ghost guns as well. And they were all seized from people who are prohibited persons – who are mostly likely going to commit additional crimes," said Officer Steve Aponte, a spokesman for the police department."This is really an area that there’s a lot of focus on here because it’s novel, but not because it’s the huge threat other kinds of stolen weapons are.
Liccardo is confident any dent, coupled with a concerted effort to attack a mainstay of street crime will break the pattern of gun violence.There will be a second reading of the measure May 17. The ordinance would then go into effect a month later. But enforcement wouldn’t begin for six-months to give people time to turn in ghost guns and ghost gun kits.