Confiscated Guns Above Average at South Dakota Government Auction

Gun Watch ^ | 6 May, 2014 | Dean Weingarten

[marktwain]

Thanks for your summary. It is likely on the money. A contact that is a retired peace officer suggested that most of the guns might have come from Sturgis.

33 guns for the largest county in the state is not very many.

It also might account for the relatively high quality.

[schurmann]

” ... A contact that is a retired peace officer suggested that most of the guns might have come from Sturgis.

33 guns for the largest county in the state is not very many.

It also might account for the relatively high quality.”

Your retired LEO contact likely has a handle on it.

I ought to clarify:

Meade County is South Dakota’s largest in land area, but 49th in population. Daily traffic up and down I-90 is larger than the local population. Pennington County (contains Rapid City) and Minnehaha County (home of Sioux Falls) are second and first in population size, respectively. Each of those two “urban centers” are many times larger than the next largest in the state, but of course scarcely deserve notice, compared to even moderate-size US cities elsewhere. At some 850,000 people in total, SD can barely rival the average NY City neighborhood or Houston suburb.

SD west of the Missouri River is far more thinly populated, home to 1/5 of the total, or less.

Motorcyclists and those who tag along with them to Sturgis are more unruly than average, so they get entangled in more “incidents” than average, which can lead to higher rates of gun confiscation. And - curiously enough - many bikers are pretty well-heeled, so any firearm that might chance to get confiscated from them might be farther up the price scale than average. And higher up the quality scale.