Grainy surveillance video shows two masked men breaking into Little's Bait & Tackle & Pawn shop In Perry, Ga., in 2011, making off with 23 handguns. The Wall Street Journal says one of the weapons surfaced Monday under a cardboard box in the grass behind a New York City home—the weapon that police believe was used to kill New York City police officer Brian Moore. Authorities are tracing how the .38 caliber handgun allegedly made it from small central Georgia town into the hands of Demitrius Blackwell, a 35-year-old with a long criminal record who is charged with the officer's death.
The federal Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco Firearms and Explosives says that in 2012 the National Crime Information Center received reports of 190,342 lost and stolen firearms across the U.S.; Georgia had the second-largest number of firearms reported lost or stolen in 2012, with 12,906. Of the 23 weapons stolen from Little's, 10 have been located. One was recovered in Nantucket, Ma., while the other nine have been found across New York City. Only the revolver used in Moore's shooting has been directly linked to a crime.