Arizona Town Launches Free Gun Program to Fight Crime

While Congress needlessly debates gun control, one group of concerned citizens in Arizona has already solved the problem. Too much crime in the neighborhood? Here's a free shotgun.

A group based out of Houston, The Armed Citizen Project, has started a national campaign that promises free shotguns to single women and homeowners who feel threatened in neighborhoods overwhelmed by crime. The ACP's Tucson chapter has announced it will provide a single-shot, break-action shotgun to anyone who can pass a background check and complete training, according to The Huffington Post.

"If you are not willing to protect the citizens of Tucson, someone is going to do it, why not me? Why not have armed citizens protecting themselves," said Shaun McClusky, local member of the project, according to ABC.

So far, advocates of the program have already donated roughly $12,500 to funds designated for giving away the guns and to McClusky. The Tucson chapter of the ACP plans to target the neighborhoods Pueblo Gardens, Midvale Park and the Grant-Campbell area, McClusky said. Statistics from the Tucson Police Department show that crime plunged to a 13-year low in 2010, and that the city averages about 50 homicides annually.

"Just like any other city in Arizona and in the nation we have our issues, but it is not crime-ridden," said Vice Mayor Regina Romero. "I would never say you have to carry a gun or you have to be afraid for your life."

After completing training that includes "how to properly store, handle, and use [the] weapon," those participating in the program also receive trigger locks.

"We are an organization that is not simply content to hold the line on guns.  If the fight does not come to us, we will go to it," the ACP explains on its website. "We are also training and arming single women in high crime areas, competing against gun buybacks, calling out anti-gun politicians as being pro-crime, and fighting the anti-gun establishment in general.   We are pissing off all of the right (left) people, having a blast doing it.  We hope that you join our fight today."

"It is our hypothesis that criminals have no desire to die in your hallway. We want to use that fear," said founded of the ACP, 29-year-old Kyle Coplen, a University of Houston graduate student.

Statistics are split across the board concerning guns and self-defense. No one study has provided definitive proof for either side of the gun control argument. 

"People don't want to confront an armed person at home," said Garen J. Wintemute, director of the UC Davis Violence Prevention Research Program. "But, separately, there is solid evidence that in communities with higher rates of gun ownership, burglary rates are up, not down, and that's because guns are hot loot."

A recent study conducted by The Harvard Injury Control Research Center, who analyzed gun and homicide data and literature, said that available evidence indicated that more guns equals more murders, a finding it said was supported across states, and countries.