Thieves increasingly stealing weapons from people almost certain to be armed

It doesn’t just take another slaughter to raise the specter of gun violence.
This week, two separate stories on gun thefts from gun stores in West Virginia point out the risks stolen guns potentially pose to public safety.
No, none of these nearly 250 firearms have yet to be traced from a crime to these stores’ inventory, but give it time.
On May 5, someone broke into a Fairmont-area gun store and stole 67 handguns, ammunition and a pick-up truck belonging to the business. The truck was recovered in Washington, D.C., but the guns were not.
In Huntington, a man pleaded guilty Monday to four felony charges involving three separate thefts of 180 firearms total in 2017 from the same pawn shop in Barboursville.
The number of stolen guns across the United States is not surprising. What is baffling, though, is that thieves are stealing guns from people often guaranteed to be armed
Recent figures put West Virginia in the middle of the pack for total firearms stolen from licensed dealers from 2012-’16. However, the total for those five years was a little more than 300 stolen firearms from licensed dealers.
During this period, nearly 31,500 guns were stolen from gun stores nationwide, according to the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms and Explosives.
Gun thefts from individual gun owners in our state during this five-year period totaled more than
11,500 firearms, according to an analysis of FBI data.
It’s extremely difficult to determine the exact number of guns stolen from individuals. Many such thefts are not reported to law enforcement. Estimates of such thefts range from 200,000 to 400,000 guns nationwide yearly.
The vast majority of these guns, of course, are never recovered, either. On average, states found around 11 percent of stolen firearms from 2012 -’16. Fewer than a dozen states require gun thefts be reported and ours is not one of them.
This is no indictment of licensed gun dealers and responsible gun owners. We suspect most of them are equally appalled by these numbers.
For good reason, too, because most of these firearms end up in an illegal underground gun market, where their sale fuels the crime these gun owners are up in arms against.
In light of the risk these firearms pose, not to mention lawmakers’ inclination to pass gun laws lately, here’s an idea.
We call on every responsible gun owner and dealer to rally federal and state lawmakers to pass legislation to curb these thefts and this illegal market for stolen guns.
For instance, require gun owners to report all stolen or lost guns to law enforcement. And require or incentivize gun stores to install certain security measures, such as alarm systems. Ditto for individuals to store firearms securely.
These common sense measures are long overdue.
Why wait for a massacre of some innocents to take place with a stolen firearm?