RNB65
Member
It doesn't say what was taken. Dominion had a couple FA sub guns available for rental. I hope those weren't taken.
http://www.inrich.com/cva/ric/news.apx.-content-articles-RTD-2008-03-25-0152.html
http://www.inrich.com/cva/ric/news.apx.-content-articles-RTD-2008-03-25-0152.html
Shooting range hit by thieves
At least 20 weapons have likely made it to streets, police say
Tuesday, Mar 25, 2008 - 12:08 AM Updated: 07:44 AM
By BILL MCKELWAY
TIMES-DISPATCH STAFF WRITER
Once thieves pried their way through an exterior, side steel door at Dominion Shooting Range, the world was their oyster.
The range's security system wasn't operating properly, and the thieves needed only to batter their way through a flimsy wooden door frame inside the range on Turner Road to get to what they wanted.
To the right, there was a wall full of rifles for sale and display cases of handguns.
To the left, there was a wall full of weapons for on-site rental, most of them handguns of various calibers.
"We think they went that way," Dominion manager Joel Kliesen said yesterday, pointing to the now partly empty wall to the left.
And the security system didn't work.
Chesterfield County police and federal gun trafficking investigators have sent out word since the burglary late Friday or early Saturday that at least 20 weapons have likely made it into the Interstate 95 pipeline and the streets of metropolitan Richmond.
"There are guns on the street and we don't know who has them," Chesterfield Capt. Paige W. Foster said yesterday, describing the situation as "ranking near the top in terms of getting priority attention."
Police declined to mention the specific number of weapons stolen; each weapon, though, has a recorded serial number.
And most of them are shiny, Kliesen said.
Foster said the guns likely will be sold on the streets in a matter of days. "The hope is no one gets hurt."
Dominion has thrived for some 30 years on Turner Road across Midlothian Turnpike from Virginia State Police headquarters. Security experts were working up estimates yesterday on a new security system for the building that houses 19 firing lanes, each 25 yards long.
Kliesen and owner Jerry Thompson said alarm systems on the doors and motion detectors inside the cinder-block building did not function.
Foster said police are still investigating why the alarms did not work, but Thompson confirmed yesterday that the business had not made monthly checks with a monitoring agency to make sure the system was operable. He said there was no record of the break-in when he checked Saturday, even though the system was online.
A spokesman for the company that installed the system said yesterday that the firm is not responsible for maintenance and subcontracts with a separate monitoring agency to handle specific alarms and surveillance.
"We've got to take some of the blame," said Thompson, who will upgrade security at the range with rolled metal partitions, video cameras and new door alarms. Video devices had been purchased but had not been installed.
Burglaries of gun shops in the Richmond area are hardly a rarity.
In January 2005, four men robbed Bob Moates' Gun Shop on Hull Street Road in Chesterfield and made off with 66 weapons, only 10 of which were recovered.
Two area men and two men from New England were charged and sentenced to prison terms of about 10 years.
Gun ranges typically are not targets because many don't have guns stored on the premises. But Dominion allows clients to rent guns, and there is a gun-sales shop in the same building.
A spokesman for an indoor shooting range in Maryland that bills itself as the East Coast's largest said customers there can store guns at the site. But the guns are locked in a steel vault that is accessible only by employees. There are also multiple electronic security systems.
