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Cops still have museum's guns
01/02/2005 21:32 - (SA)
Ficksburg - The State was unable to produce a charge sheet on Tuesday against two Ficksburg brothers more than two years after police seized about 300 firearms from a private museum.
Charles Barrett and his brother, Essex, appeared in Ficksburg regional court in connection with about 300 antique firearms that police seized in February 2003.
The case was postponed to Wednesday to give the State time to find the docket.
Charles Barrett said on Tuesday the firearms that police had seized were part of a private collection of about 400 firearms kept at the Pinedene small-arms museum on his farm.
"About 73% of the firearms seized are black-powder guns."
Barrett said the seizure of the firearms in 2003 followed an earlier incident in 2001 when the police and the defence force also seized firearms from the museum.
"I bought weapons from Fort Klapperkop and in Lesotho just before the incident.
Returned with an apology
"They probably thought they were stolen military weapons," said Barrett.
He added the arms were later returned with an apology after it was found they were "never scrapped from the asset register".
He said police again seized weapons from the museum in 2003 after they heard that "most were in working order".
"They seemed not to understand that a collector's firearms have to be as close to original working condition as possible to be worth something."
Barrett said that after the office of the public prosecutor laid no charges in 2003 they tried to get their guns back, but in vain. They were being kept at Ficksburg police station.
"We were eventually told by the end of last year that new charges had been formed and that we would appear in court."
Barrett said his firearms, "mainly infantry weapons", came from different stages in history and included Anglo-Boer War weapons, like Martini Henrys, Sniders and Lee Enfields.
Some were machine guns like the "Vickers" and the "Bren" used in World War II.
Barrett said all the firearms were "fully licensed" with permits in terms of section 32 of the Firearms Act.
The Pinedene Small Arms Museum was a registered museum.
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