Missouri gun sales spike in runup to Brown shooting grand jury decision

Gun sales are continuing to spike around Ferguson, Missouri, as security firms plead with authorities to make it easier for them to hire new guards in advance of a grand jury’s decision on whether to charge a white police officer for shooting dead an unarmed black 18-year-old.

Owners of regional gun stores said that concerned residents were stocking up on pistols and shotguns even after a call for calm from St Louis officials following earlier reports of a dramatic increase in sales. Meanwhile demand for private security is outstripping supply.

Tim Wheeler, the co-owner of Trail Creek Trade Co in nearby St Ann, said there was “paranoia beyond belief” among some in the area. “I have normal-seeming people coming in saying ‘Oh my god, they’re going to march down the streets looting and burning,’” he said.

Wheeler said that the sharpest increase in demand was for shotguns, “which is what we recommend for self-defence or home defence”. But he was reluctant to disclose sales figures and lamented the reason that business was booming. “We don’t sell guns on fear factor,” he said. “We enjoy firearms for what they were built for: target shooting and hunting.”

Asked about the rising firearms sales last week, Charlie Dooley, the St Louis County executive, urged people to “calm down”.

But Adam Weinstein, the co-owner of County Guns in Bridgeton, said that sales were “up tremendously” and estimated that his store had seen a 50% increase. Weinstein said he had sold 75-100 guns in the past three weeks and more in the past three months than all of last year. “It’s mostly handguns and a shotgun here and there,” he said.

“A lot of them are first-time gun owners just wanting to have something to protect themselves and their homes.” He estimated that 90% of customers made verbal references to fears of unrest around Ferguson when making their purchases. Sales of classes teaching owners how to conceal-carry their new firearms are also up.

Weinstein’s business only recently moved to Bridgeton. It had previously been based on West Florissant Avenue, a stretch of which to the south was the venue for nightly clashes between police and protesters angry over the shooting of Michael Brown by officer Darren Wilson.

At the height of the protests, Weinstein and his colleagues cleared their storefront of merchandise and became de facto armed security guards for the surrounding strip mall after a Dollar General store nearby was looted. “After they smashed and grabbed that they headed for us but saw what was waiting for them and changed their minds,” he said.

Private security firms are meanwhile lobbying St Louis authorities to waive the usual licensing application system for new guards so that they can meet demand from regional businesses. In a letter to St Louis County police, which was obtained by the St Louis Post-Dispatch, G4S requested special temporary licences for up to 350 guards.

“These security guards would only be used during the potential unrest that could follow after the grand jury decision in Ferguson,” wrote Daniel Getz, a director in G4S’s legal department. Getz said that the firm had demand from major companies such as Bank of America, Wells Fargo and Trader Joe’s.

The St Louis County police chief, Jon Belmar, told the newspaper that he would not not allow exemptions from the required checks due to the increased demand, but the processing of applications has been sped up.