james croft
Contributor
Congratulations. I know how good that feels. Just goes to show you that even a blind pig can find an acorn now and then.
I remember the first gun I ever found. We were asked to search a river that had eight bridges on it that ran through a city. Nobody knew what bridge it had been thrown off of. Interstingly enough we knew the make, caliber and serial number we were looking for as the suspect purchased a Bryco 9mm pistol a couple of years before and had to have a record check done. An informant had dimed out the shooter and told us the gun had been chucked off a bridge. We chose the most likely bridge and on our second day I found the gun lying on top of a boulder in about 6 inches of water. The boulder was in 8 feet of rapids. The area had been "cleared" the day before although nobody bothered to look on top of the rocks we had swum around and searched the previous day. I had been snorkling over the area on my way back to the Zodiac to get more air when it caught my eye. It was lying where I could see the serial no. and knew it was the murder weapon. I was really glad to have found the "golden egg". I tried to get the other divers attention but they were underwater and did not respond to my banging. About 5 minutes later they popped up a bouy and surfaced. They advised me they had found the gun. I asked "what kind of gun?" They told me it was a S&W 9mm. I told them the gun we were looking for was a Bryco according to the snitch. They told me the snitch was wrong. I then broke the news that the gun we were looking for was lying between my feet and it had the correct serial number. They came over and looked at my gun and I swam over and looked at theirs. Seems we had found the murder weapon plus a bonus gun. It was just about then that a FNG (Favorite New Guy) advised me he had something he wanted me to check out. I had loaned this guy mask, fins and snorkel and told him to amuse himself and stay out of our way. He found a hole with something shiny way down deep that he could not get to but thought it may be a gun. I dropped down and found a Ruger Security Six .357 mag revolver. Seems that gun was the real prize as it had killed 3 guys and there was a lot of investigators who were looking for that one as the three killings that occured 6 months prior were related by NIBIN computer. No one knew it had been disposed of or that it was in the river until we found it. Never learned the rest of the story on the S&W but the Bryco and the Ruger cases were solved as a result. All the guns were not associated with one another but had each been thrown into the same location just because it looked like a good place to dump a gun. Man, I had gun fever bad and hit those dump site locations bridges hard. I found a lot of guns over the years. I never cease to get a rush when I find a gun as it may be the piece of evidence that slips a needle into a bad guys arm on death row. My FNG was no longer a FNG after that day. I hope you have got the fever now and continue with your lucky streak.
I remember the first gun I ever found. We were asked to search a river that had eight bridges on it that ran through a city. Nobody knew what bridge it had been thrown off of. Interstingly enough we knew the make, caliber and serial number we were looking for as the suspect purchased a Bryco 9mm pistol a couple of years before and had to have a record check done. An informant had dimed out the shooter and told us the gun had been chucked off a bridge. We chose the most likely bridge and on our second day I found the gun lying on top of a boulder in about 6 inches of water. The boulder was in 8 feet of rapids. The area had been "cleared" the day before although nobody bothered to look on top of the rocks we had swum around and searched the previous day. I had been snorkling over the area on my way back to the Zodiac to get more air when it caught my eye. It was lying where I could see the serial no. and knew it was the murder weapon. I was really glad to have found the "golden egg". I tried to get the other divers attention but they were underwater and did not respond to my banging. About 5 minutes later they popped up a bouy and surfaced. They advised me they had found the gun. I asked "what kind of gun?" They told me it was a S&W 9mm. I told them the gun we were looking for was a Bryco according to the snitch. They told me the snitch was wrong. I then broke the news that the gun we were looking for was lying between my feet and it had the correct serial number. They came over and looked at my gun and I swam over and looked at theirs. Seems we had found the murder weapon plus a bonus gun. It was just about then that a FNG (Favorite New Guy) advised me he had something he wanted me to check out. I had loaned this guy mask, fins and snorkel and told him to amuse himself and stay out of our way. He found a hole with something shiny way down deep that he could not get to but thought it may be a gun. I dropped down and found a Ruger Security Six .357 mag revolver. Seems that gun was the real prize as it had killed 3 guys and there was a lot of investigators who were looking for that one as the three killings that occured 6 months prior were related by NIBIN computer. No one knew it had been disposed of or that it was in the river until we found it. Never learned the rest of the story on the S&W but the Bryco and the Ruger cases were solved as a result. All the guns were not associated with one another but had each been thrown into the same location just because it looked like a good place to dump a gun. Man, I had gun fever bad and hit those dump site locations bridges hard. I found a lot of guns over the years. I never cease to get a rush when I find a gun as it may be the piece of evidence that slips a needle into a bad guys arm on death row. My FNG was no longer a FNG after that day. I hope you have got the fever now and continue with your lucky streak.
