Strangest thing happened at the range sunday...

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Bad move. You should have posted a notice at the range.

Was the owner an idiot? I think not. Maybe his kid was ill. Maybe his wife called and said her father just died. It is easy to get distracted and leave things behind.
 
I would have turned it over to a range official instead of the police
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+1

I'm sure the owner would've came back to the range as soon he remembers it. If not, the RO can turn it over to police himself.
 
To clarify there was no supervisor / range official at the range, empty. No one else. This is VT, half the time I go to the range there is only a cpl other people there. I was there for 2 1/2 hours and there was no one shooting a shotgun there. I called the guy who runs the range twice, no answer.

My options were to leave it, take it, or hand it over to an authority of some sorts.
I didn't want to leave it in case some one less honest than me took it and someone lost there shotgun.
I thought if i kept it and tried to find the owner i could of potentially been in possession of a stolen firearm. I don't want that even if im innocent.
So I brought it to the police station. Again I'm in Vermont, where its not a crime to own a gun, and we can open carry sidearms and no one cares.
 
If I was the only person at the range I would unload and secure the shotgun in my truck and immediately call one of the club officers to report what had happened and discuss what he would like to do next.

I would not have involved the police at that point.

Tinpig
 
Tinpig said:
If I was the only person at the range I would unload and secure the shotgun in my truck and immediately call one of the club officers to report what had happened and discuss what he would like to do next.

I would not have involved the police at that point.

Tinpig
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Did that, no one answered, in fact i didnt get a call back until today.
 
Still better than what I saw

At least the shotgun was at the range when it was loaded. One idiot I worked with finds his duck shotgun under his back seat after work one night, 3 months after duck season ended. No case. Pulls it out, waves it around, then stops to think to open the action. 3 shells fall out. All this in a state that does not allowed uncased weapons going down the highway.
 
Originally posted by TwoWheelFiend

To clarify there was no supervisor / range official at the range, empty. No one else. This is VT, half the time I go to the range there is only a cpl other people there. I was there for 2 1/2 hours and there was no one shooting a shotgun there. I called the guy who runs the range twice, no answer....
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I've often thought I'd add "Isn't it amazing how many people post without reading the thread" in my sig line.
 
I would have left a notice "Found Shotgun" with an email or phone # and demand the respondent describe the shotgun. I can legally posses a shotgun so see no reason to turn it into the police.
 
So I went to my range yesterday, a membership only range. Went down to the short handgun range and what a find. There, sitting alone was a genuine Craftsman stapler.

As I was leaving I left it in the office. The guys looked at me and I mentioned I already had two much better staplers with a smile. Now in the case of a few grand worth of shotgun? I might have to give my new find some thought.

Be it a shotgun or stapler the right thing to do is try to arrange for it to find its way home.

Ron
 
I think you did just fine.

Ideally, if there's no staff at the range, it might be better to just call the cops and wait until they come pick it up. If that's not practical, then taking it to the police is probably the best you can do.

I think it would be very unlikely that you'd get in any trouble for doing this, even if it were later reported stolen. It's possible I suppose, but you can get in trouble for helping a lost kid, too. Sometimes you just have to do what's right.

If I spaced out and left my weapon behind, I'd hope somebody like you would stand up and keep everything safe.
 
Just a quick update, i guess they found the guy who owns the shotgun, everything worked out fine. He got it back, cops didnt keep it. He was very thankful.
 
HexHead said:
I probably would have unloaded it and left it there. When the guy got home and realized his gun was missing, probably the first thing he'd do is go back to the range.

You might have missed him by 10 minutes.
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^^^ this

I would not have taken somebody's gun that likely just mistakenly left the thing by accident. It is bad that he left it loaded, but I don't see that as cause to lose a firearm. Unloading it and leaving it there (maybe with a note stating that you might not want to leave loaded firearms laying around) would have been the best call in my mind.

Glad to see the owner got it back in the end.
 
The way the gun was found is more of a concern to me than the fact that a gun was forgotten at the range. That's just a seriously stupid way to be handling the gun off of the firing line. But, people do forget things from time to time, and sometimes they forget very important and/or very valuable things!
 
Field Tester said:
Does the Police usually confiscate and not return firearms to their owners?
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If the police ever confiscate your weapon, prepare to wait about a year to get it back. Sometimes more. This has happened to a couple friends. Oh, and prepare to get it back with fingerprint powder all over it, and they will have fired it to take bullet rifling and casing data to match with any current open homicide/shooting cases and to save for future ones.
 
The OP is in VT and probably knows the level of policing there. In some areas of these great USA the cops would say 'Oh, that's Charlie's. I will drop it off on my way home. In some like the OP's, they will hold safely for the owner to collect. Others may make it an expensive year long hassle. In some places you will never see it again.
I cannot project my area of the country on his local knowledge. Well done.
 
I have charitably assumed that when I drove off and left a beat up stapler and a battered homemade swinger, whoever found it may have assumed it was abandoned property.

But an abandoned high end shotgun left in the rack? If it happened at the local club, I would check the pot-o-john, then if no one came back in a reasonable amount of time, I would call the range officer designated for lost and found at the club (he runs a gun shop in town so is usually easy to reach even if the clubhouse is closed). I once drove off and left the ammo can with all my .455 and .45 AutoRim ammo; it was turned in to the lost and found officer and I retrieved it at his shop. I have witnessed a forgotten rifle returned within an hour of its discovery, cased, alone at the range (names withheld to spare embarrassment).
 
I would have never given it to the cops. Im not sure what I would have done but it would not have been that. I may have just unloaded it, kepts the shells in case some kids came across it, and left it there after contacting the range owner.
 
A friend of mine reported her car stolen. She live is about two blocks from the elementary school. When her kid came home from school, he asked why her car was parked in front of the school.

It was raining when school was starting, and she drove her kid to school. It stopped raining while she was inside...and she walked home. She normally walked her kid to school.

She was a bit red faced.
 
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