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May 11, 2005
Some guys have all the luck
Would you believe this was hidden in the walls of a home for more than 70 years?
LOCKPORT TOWNSHIP — A local man rehabbing a house on Reverend Walton Drive made a historical discovery that Geraldo Rivera would have given his right arm for when he plumbed the depths of Al Capone's vault.
But Mr. Fixit says he turned into a loser on a lucky day when police stepped in to keep the mint-condition Tommy gun he found concealed in the walls of the house he had recently purchased.
The man broke down a wall in the home he bought to spruce up and resell and happened upon an immaculate 77-year-old Thompson submachine gun stowed safely in a canvas bag.
The discoverer of this buried treasure, real estate businessman Andrew Mayes, called police, and Deputy Dan Jungles arrived Tuesday afternoon to pick up the "Chicago typewriter," as the gun was sometimes called, and take it into the department.
"It's in pristine condition," Jungles said of the historic weapon, which was stashed with a cleaning kit and about 400 rounds of ammunition. The ammunition was accompanied by a 65-year-old receipt from Barrett Hardware Co. in Joliet. The hundreds of .45-caliber slugs cost $3.33.
Sheriff Paul Kaupas, a Marine, Vietnam veteran and longtime law enforcement officer, is well-versed in the history of firearms and appeared pleased by the recovery of the legendary Tommy gun. He said this particular weapon was manufactured for the Navy, but could be legally purchased by private citizens in the 1920s.
A brief check of the weapon showed that it had been fired before it was hidden away in the wall of the house, Kaupas said, but he does not know if it would be worth the effort to investigate if the machine gun had been stolen or used in a criminal shooting.
Kaupas said this particular model of the Tommy gun, a 1928A1, "shoots real sweet," and that he wants to keep it with the department for posterity's sake.
But Mayes wants it back and has contacted a lawyer about recovering his find.
"They took it, and they're going to do what they want with it," Mayes complained of this turn of events. "What right do they have to keep it?"
One right the sheriff's department does have to seize the weapon is that it would be illegal to possess, said John Birch, president of Concealed Carry Inc.
"In the state of Illinois, there are no fully automatic weapons allowed. Zero," Birch said.
"It's a felony (to possess the weapon)," said Birch, an Oak Brook resident.
Birch did say Mayes could get around the law by making the Tommy gun inoperable. While this might decrease its value as a collector's item, it would allow him to keep it.
Birch also pointed out the weapon could be kept as an artifact without putting the public at risk.
"The Museum of Science and Industry has a submarine, right?" he said. "Are they going to deploy it and sink ships?"
"I've been calling around about it, and it's worth a lot of money," Mayes said. "(A Florida gun dealer) said $10,000 would be the lowest."
Too bad he didn't live in a Red State. . . .
Check out the original article here.
Posted by Mike Lief at 11:22 PM