Last month, Project HomeSafe announced it would voluntarily recall 400,000 gun locks handed out by police departments in 80 cities between September 1999 and October 2000. The Project HomeSafe giveaway was the largest in the country, Sarf says. The gun locks in question resemble a bicycle cable lock and have a red cable with a black padlock. The foundation is a trade organization for the firearms and shooting sports industry, with more than 1,800 members including gun manufacturers, distributors, and retailers. Even with all the recalls going on, the gun lock giveaway program has had an overall positive affect, Sarff says.
Any gun lock is better than no gun lock at all.
There have been other gun lock recalls, most notably last July, when the CPSC and Master Lock Co. recalled 752,000 gun locks sold in stores such as Wal-Mart, Kmart and the Sports Authority. When Project HomeSafe announced its gun lock campaign in October 1999, officials in some of the nation's most violent cities eagerly signed up. Police in Houston, New Orleans, Miami, and Philadelphia gave away thousands, hoping to curb accidental shootings. But last year, a Knoxville, Tenn., police officer was fiddling with a cable gun lock when he discovered that it would spring open if he bounced it against his hand. The Knoxville police department tested some of the 5,000 cable locks they had given away and discovered that the lock was easy to open.