LOUISVILLE,Ky — Under current Kentucky law, firearms used in crimes — including the rifle used to kill five people in downtown Louisville Monday — will eventually be auctioned off by the state.
Ever since she was elected to the Kentucky State Senate, Karen Berg, D-Louisville, has tried to change this.
“They have been used to kill people and we’re literally cleaning them off and reselling them so they can be used to do the same thing again,” Berg said.
The current state law related to seized firearms was passed in 1998. 20% of the proceeds from the sale of the guns go toward purchasing police body armor, and the rest of the money goes to the Kentucky Office of Homeland of Security.
Berg wants to change the law to have these guns destroyed.
Louisville Mayor Craig Greenberg (D) agrees.
“It’s time to change this law and let us destroy illegal guns, and destroy the guns that have been used to kill our friends and kill our neighbors,” Greenberg said at a news conference Tuesday.
In February, Greenberg announced changes in how Louisville Metro Police handle firearms that were used in violent crimes. Before those guns can be transferred to Kentucky State Police to be sold at auction, they’ll be “rendered inoperative” by having their firing pin removed.
At the beginning of the 2023 legislative session, Berg filed Senate Bill 168. She filed the same bill the year prior. The bill was never given a committee hearing.
On the other hand, bills expanding open carry and preventing the enforcement of federal firearm bans did receive committee meetings.
“Those are the bills that are getting hearings, those are the bills that are getting attention,” Berg said. “Anything on the other side, anything to say, can we limit this chaos somehow, won’t get a hearing.”
Berg, who is a doctor at UofL Health in Louisville, points to the pandemic as to why children and even adults are mentally in a worse place than prior to COVID.
Still, she adds the impact of gun violence on her line of work, emergency radiology, has been growing for years.
“This is not new. This is old, this has been going on, and going on, and going on. It’s just getting worse because we’re doing nothing. Nothing to try to change the trajectory,” Berg said.
In the days since Kentucky’s worst mass shooting in years, leadership in the state legislature has not called for stricter gun laws.
A number of state lawmakers, both Democrat and Republican, have previously supported the passage of a CARR bill in Kentucky. Standing for Crisis Aversion and Rights Retention, the measure would allow firearms to be temporarily taken from a person who wants to harm themselves or others.