The UK's Finest Independent Forum for Shooters and Gun Owners. Est 2010.

Outrageous. Mercer needs to go for that. The theft is bad enough, but if a paying member uses your 'secure' facility and that happens, then you apologise profusely and cough up.

Mattnall wrote:

Mezzer wrote:

ozone wrote:.

Is there a better copy of the article?

I can't read it because it is too small.

ozone

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+1

Anyone have a clearer copy of the page?

Mezzer

Middle shelf, WHSmiths

But not in Saudi Arabia unfortunately!

Mezzer

mmmm---- this whole story has a faint odour of bullshit about it. If the NRA armoury was really insecure, surely the police would have acted. Why was she so anxious to have a severly de-valued rifle back which needed gunsmithing and a new scope to be any use. Were the bolt and scope proved to have been in the armoury?
Fred

FredB wrote:mmmm---- this whole story has a faint odour of bullshit about it. If the NRA armoury was really insecure, surely the police would have acted. Why was she so anxious to have a severly de-valued rifle back which needed gunsmithing and a new scope to be any use. Were the bolt and scope proved to have been in the armoury?
Fred

Clearly the case was proved at court!

DW58 wrote:How much longer will the NRA membership tolerate Mercer, it's just one cock-up after another?

This ^^^

How do we get rid of this clown ? His recent comments about camo are a joke and insulting too. This is exactly what everyone said would happen when a non-shooter without any history in our sport is given the top job. It was so obvious that those who said to give him a chance must really start to ask themselves some serious questions too.

MiLisCer wrote:...who has access to the armoury?

Employees & agents of the RFD, in this case, NRA staff.

Wonder if the recent clear out "auction" was in anyway connected to this theft?
i.e. Local gendarmes revise the RFD entitlement & drop the numbers allowed to be held, or someone went through the books & anyone that had an item in for long term storage was told to remove it or it'd be sold & they'd be given the auction value for it once misc. fees had been paid?

While the original item DID have matching serial numbers, the valuation seem a little on the high side - for a missing bolt & a non-sniper scope.
Of the two, the bolt would be easy enough to replace & have matched to the gun; both in headspacing & serial numbers. K98 bolts are not a rare commodity.
The Zf41 was purely a "marksman" issue scope - and sans storage cases are up for sale regularly for £500-£600 or thereabouts. I don't see many examples with rifle numbers added...but it may not be unknown.

As to WHY Mercer MAY have wanted to keep the now useless rifle??
Maybe he had "found" a couple of desirable accessories for said rifle that he could have fitted to bring it back to original condition?

Did Surrey Police raid his house/offices to search for the stolen goods?
&
If not, WHY NOT?

Problem is that the NRA is so secretive that we will never know what is going on.

My view is that any membership organisation that is as secretive as the NRA must have something to hide.

A little honesty and openness would go a long way to heading off the continued bad press they have, if, which I doubt, the issues they are criticised over had no basis in fact.

I don't understand how anyone can have a good word to say about this bunch of sniveling, slithering masonic inadequates.

dromia wrote:Thanks bobbob.

Hope that this big enough and clear enough now.

Yep that's better.

Thank you

ozone

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FredB wrote:mmmm---- this whole story has a faint odour of bullshit about it. If the NRA armoury was really insecure, surely the police would have acted. Why was she so anxious to have a severly de-valued rifle back which needed gunsmithing and a new scope to be any use. Were the bolt and scope proved to have been in the armoury?
Fred

I'm sure, like every other managed storage facility in the land, that the NRA issues/records absolutely no kind of "items in store with us" receipt/description or condition report. In addition, no one attaches any value to any of their possessions other than monetary. Oh, wait.

I'm sure if the story is a fabrication of some sort the NRA will be appealing the verdict ASAP (and kicking themselves for not issuing a receipt, and telling every other storage business that issuing one might be a good idea in future) and pushing gunmart for a retraction, if necessary through the courts as well.

I suspect there will be no appeal. I wonder why that might be. Maybe the member concerned was issued with a receipt when she deposited her belongings with the armoury. You'd think one would be rather useful for when PC Plod shows up and asks "where is this rifle that is listed on your FAC?". Maybe the person issuing the receipt could have written "Rifle only, no bolt" on it as well?

I'm also wondering what an FLO's attitude towards an FAC holder with a CCJ that involves dishonesty in some form would be.

Annoyingly searching for a CCJ judgement costs £4, which presumably precludes publishing one on this forum for all to see.

At least this shows one of the many failings of the "Firearms should be stored at a central location" proposal that crops up every so often.