A man named "Kem" printed 110 firearms on a $200 printer he got for Christmas and turned them into a gun buyback program held at the Utica Police Department in Oneida County, New York.
"I 3D-printed a bunch of lower receivers and frames for different kinds of firearms," Kem told local media WKTV.
He drove six hours across the state to turn in the firearms he printed in August, collecting a whopping $21,000 from the New York State Attorney General’s Office.
"And it ended with the guy and a lady from the budget office finally coming around with the 42 gift cards and counting them in front of me ... $21,000 in $500 gift cards," Kim added.
WKTV contacted the state Attorney General’s Office about 3D-printed firearms, though there was no response to that question besides it being a 'big success and that the program, in general, keeps New York families safe.'
"I’m sure handing over $21,000 in gift cards to some punk kid after getting a bunch of plastic junk was a rousing success," laughed Kem.
Asked where he got the idea, he told the local media outlet he saw people on Twitter talking about using 3D printers to make big bucks by printing guns for buyback programs.
Perhaps he was referring to the story of a man who recently turned in 62 3D-printed guns to Houston’s buyback program and collected $3,100.
Some police departments have changed policies on accepting 3D-printed firearms as more and more people take advantage of flawed buybacks.
Keith Taylor, an adjunct professor at John Jay College of Criminal Justice, which is part of the City University of New York system, recently told Pew Research that buybacks are mostly ineffective at reducing homicides:
"It’s a waste of resources if the entities that are sponsoring believe that it’s going to have a positive effect on reducing crime."
Kem concluded to the media outlet: "Gun buybacks are a fantastic way of showing, number one, that your policies don’t work, and, number 2, you’re creating perverse demand. You’re causing people to show up to these events, and, they don’t actually reduce crime whatsoever."
