Sales of Old Police Arsenals Draw Criticism : Law enforcement: Some agencies sell revolvers they no longer use. Gun control advocates object to making weapons available.

At a Northridge gun shop, a .38-caliber Colt revolver with a wood-grain grip is one of the shop’s best bargains.

Priced at $99, it is far cheaper than most new handguns--a similar model would cost about $340 new. Although it is used, the shop owner guarantees it has been well maintained.

The gun is on sale because of a policy that has been criticized by gun control advocates and by some law enforcement agencies.

It is a “police trade,” one of thousands of service revolvers originally purchased by law enforcement agencies for their officers. The departments are selling the weapons to gun dealers nationwide as the .38 revolvers--which were the standard police weapon for generations--are replaced by semiautomatics.

Faced with the expense of rearming their officers with costlier weapons, the departments are squeezing out what reimbursement they can from the sale of their used pistols.

Over the past five years, nearly 4,000 “police trades” were sold or traded by the Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department, California Highway Patrol and Burbank Police Department, according to a survey of the 10 largest law enforcement agencies serving Los Angeles County.

Another 2,000 to 3,000 guns are expected to be sold or traded in the next year by the Sheriff’s Department as it completes the complicated task of updating its huge, aging arsenal.

The sale of aging firearms by law enforcement agencies has drawn criticism from gun control advocates and other police agencies who see it as a shortsighted measure that only increases the potential for gun violence on the streets. They compare it to police departments reselling guns confiscated from criminals, a once-common practice now abandoned by many departments.

“The police should be doing everything possible to lessen the number of guns on the street,” said Jeff Muchnick, a spokesman for the Coalition to Stop Gun Violence, a Washington-based organization that wants to ban the sale and manufacture of handguns and assault weapons.

Santa Monica Police Sgt. Gary Gallinot said his agency switched five years ago from the standard .38s to 9-millimeter semiautomatic handguns. But rather than sell 175 old revolvers, the department has kept them in the Police Department armory.

“We just felt we didn’t want to contribute to putting the weapons out on the marketplace,” he said.

Gun dealers and police agencies that sell guns defend the policy, saying the proceeds from sales are needed to modernize police arsenals. Besides, they say, the guns are sold to legitimate gun dealers who deal only with buyers who undergo a state-required background check.

“Part of (the decision) was an economic concern to help offset the purchase of new weapons,” said sheriff’s Lt. Jeff Spring, referring to the 2,000 handguns the department sold in 1988 to the Beretta U.S.A. Corp. for about $160,000. The money is being applied toward the purchase of about 7,000 semiautomatics for $2.5 million.

Spring said some guns sold to Beretta were resold to other police agencies. But an independent contractor who helped negotiate the exchange said he could not determine how many ended up in police holsters.

The Burbank Police Department seems to have avoided the controversy by selling 15 of its Smith & Wesson revolvers to a gun dealer who guaranteed that they would be sold only to other law enforcement departments.

The question of what to do with aging police arsenals has sparked heated debate in cities nationwide as law enforcement agencies gradually convert from revolvers, whose design has changed little since the 19th Century, to the semiautomatics that became common in the military by World War I.

The Oakland City Council last year shot down a police plan to trade in 525 .357-magnum revolvers toward the purchase of 769 semiautomatics. In 1991, the Detroit City Council turned down a police proposal to sell 8,482 .38-caliber Colt revolvers toward the purchase of more up-to-date 9-millimeter handguns.

For some police agencies in cities such as Pasadena, Inglewood and Long Beach, the question of what to do with the old guns has not arisen because they have yet to make the switch or are beginning the process.

The abandonment of revolvers started for many police agencies in the late 1980s as officers found themselves outgunned by criminals armed with semiautomatics, or even fully automatic weapons--submachine guns.

Semiautomatics fire more shots, faster--as many as 15 for some models--and can be reloaded easier in the high-stress atmosphere of a gunfight. Semiautomatics use pre-loaded magazines, boxlike containers of cartridges that can be simply slammed into the butt of an empty pistol in a few seconds.

In contrast, a revolver--which holds only five or six shots--is usually loaded by inserting one cartridge at a time into each cylinder chamber--a precise operation difficult to perform in the dark, while wounded, or running, or with shaky hands. A “speed loader,” a spring-loaded cylindrical carrier that is used to insert all six cartridges into the gun at once, can be used to load a revolver faster but not nearly as fast as a magazine for a semiautomatic.

In recent years, several cities and police agencies in Southern California were criticized for selling weapons confiscated from criminals. The policy prompted two state lawmakers to draft legislation that if adopted would make it illegal to sell confiscated weapons.

A third bill by state Sen. Tom Hayden (D-Santa Monica) is on hold until next year. If adopted, it would also prohibit the resale of weapons purchased by police for law enforcement use.

The Police Foundation, a Washington-based organization that provides research and technical support to law enforcement agencies nationwide, says it does not recommend the sale of used police guns to the public.

Hubert Williams, former director of the Newark Police Department in New Jersey and president of the Police Foundation, said the money to be made selling police guns does not outweigh the embarrassment that may arise if such guns are used in crimes.

“My problem is, you can’t tell what the guns will be used for later,” he said.

As of yet, police and officials at the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms say they have heard of no incident of a “police trade” handgun being used in the commission of a crime.

Nonetheless, critics of the sale of handguns note that criminals can easily obtain federal gun licenses and sell the guns to other criminals.

“It’s easier to get a gun dealers’ license than it is to get a diploma off a matchbook cover,” said Assemblyman Mike Gotch (D-San Diego), the author of one of the bills to prohibit the sale of confiscated guns by police agencies.

But Steve Helsley, a state lobbyist for the National Rifle Assn., defends police agencies that sell guns, saying the gun market is saturated and that providing more guns to law-abiding citizens is not going to increase gun violence.

“I have a difficulty with the notion that adding what’s here adds to crime,” he said.

Springs, the Sheriff’s Department spokesman, said economic factors were a prime reason why his agency did not destroy its stock of outdated service revolvers, as it does with confiscated weapons.

Deputy Laurence Jowdy, in charge of the department’s property unit, said Beretta paid the department about $80 for each revolver toward the purchase of the $375 semiautomatics.

Jowdy said he expects to rearm the department’s 7,660 officers with new semiautomatics by the end of the year. “The vast majority of the department has been converted,” he said.

The Los Angeles Police Department handled the conversion differently. Beginning in 1989, new officers were issued semiautomatic weapons. Those officers who came on the force before 1989 continue to carry revolvers, unless they buy their own semiautomatics.

Until 1990, the Burbank Police Department allowed its officers to carry and own an assortment of service revolvers.

But that created a logistic nightmare when it came time to train and supply officers with ammunition. For consistency, the department decreed in 1990 that all officers would carry Glock .40-caliber semiautomatics.

Only 15 handguns remained after the department offered its old stock of weapons to its officers. The revolvers were sold to a local gun dealer and the proceeds used toward the purchase of assault rifles.

Police Chief David Mewsham said he agrees with “the philosophy that we don’t put more guns on the market.” For that reason, the dealer who bought the guns was required to pledge that the guns would only be resold to other law enforcement officers.

The CHP converted about two years ago when it purchased about 7,000 .40-caliber semiautomatic handguns. Before selling its entire stock of 6,000 Smith & Wesson .38-caliber revolvers, the department was required by state law to offer to sell the guns to the officers that had been carrying them.

CHP officers purchased 4,300, leaving about 1,700 to be traded in to Smith & Wesson toward the purchase of the semiautomatics.

CHP Deputy Commissioner Dwight Helmick defended the sale, saying the guns were sold through federally licensed gun dealers. Besides, he said, the revolvers sold by the CHP are not the criminals’ weapon of choice.

“When you look at the (police) reports, very seldom does a young man use a revolver,” he said.

Probably the most important factor in the sale was the cost savings in trading the guns rather than destroying them.

“I couldn’t argue that we take those 1,700 guns and cut them up,” Helmick said.