Four Homemade Submachine Guns Confiscated in Sydney, Australia, 2018

Four homemade submachine guns found during a drug raid in Waterloo, Australia.

Imager from twitter.com/7newssydney:

When extreme restrictions are placed on the acquisition of legal firearms, one of the easiest repeaters to make at home or in small workshops is the submachine gun. The four homemade submachine guns shown above were discovered with a number of other firearms, drugs, and 2.75 million Australian dollars, about two million in U.S. dollars. From facebook.com/nswpoliceforce:

Acting on information received, Strike Force Raptor, assisted by the Drug and Firearms Squad, executed a search warrant a storage facility at Waterloo in the early hours of Wednesday (30 May 2018).

During the search, police located 1.15kg of cocaine, 1.1kg of ice, 26L of GBL, 13 firearms, including five sub-machine guns, two semi-automatic pistols, and two revolvers; ammunition, a silencer, and $2.75 million cash.

The firearms will undergo forensic and ballistic examination.

Just after 9am yesterday (Thursday 31 May 2018), Strike Force Raptor arrested a 34-year-old man after he arrived at Sydney Airport from New Zealand.

He was taken to Kogarah Police Station and charged with three counts of supply prohibited drug, possess ammunition, deal in proceeds of crime, resist arrest, participate in a criminal group, and aggravated firearms offences.

He was refused bail to appear at Sutherland Local Court later today (Friday 1 June 2018).

 With that kind of money available, the fabrication of guns and the availability of ammunition on the black market is easy to understandable.

The most famous case of organized crime fabricating submachine guns in Australia is that of Angelo Koots. Koots was a jeweler who made copies of the MAC-11. He was caught in a sting operation and convicted in 2013. His copies were said to be of as good quality as the originals. He claimed that he had made a hundred of the guns selling them for up to $15,000 each, with two magazines and suppressor included.  Koots was sentenced to six years in jail, with parole possible after four years. $15,000 is on the extreme high end for a black market gun.

One of the Koots guns was recently confiscated in a raid in Sydney on 10 April, 2018. In that raid, less than $100,000 ($75,000 U.S.) was confiscated.

Such firearms are easy to make, taking only a couple of days each once the first one has been made and jigs fabricated.  It is probable that Koots spent less than a year's worth of labor making the hundred guns, which may have brought in 1.5 million dollars from organized gangs. There are many talented fabricators who would be willing to work for a small fraction of that amount.

A different black market submachine gun design, the "Carlo", is frequently encountered in Israel, made in small shops. Those guns sell for about $800-$1,000 on the black market.

In the United States, because of the extreme regulation of submachine guns, original, legal, MAC-11 submachine guns cost about $9,000.

Homemade, or small shop submachine guns are made all over the world where extreme gun restrictions are in place. They are commonly found in the Australia, Brazil, Canada, India, Israel, and the Philippines.

©2018 by Dean Weingarten: Permission to share is granted when this notice and link are included.

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