In Queens, police say a man fired a homemade gun at them on Thursday. He is now being charged with attempted murder and other crimes.

NYPD Officers.Photo byJusdevoyageonUnsplash

Joel Kelly, who is 60 years old, was in Edgemere on Saturday night to visit his sister. The Queens district attorney's office says he fired two shots outside her apartment when she told him to leave.

Someone called the police to say they heard gunshots, and two cops saw Kelly on Beach 51st Street, a few blocks away. When the police chased Kelly, the DA's office said he turned around and shot at them. Not a single cop was hurt.

Homemade Ghost Gun

The lawyers report that police discovered a homemade gun, also known as a "ghost gun." These types of guns are illegal in New York because they circumvent safety regulations such as background checks and typically lack serial numbers, which aid in identifying the guns used in crimes.

In recent years, more and more people in the city have been making their own guns. There were 359 ghost guns taken away by the NYPD last year, up from just 17 in 2018. The number of seizures went up even more in 2022.
The DA's office recently filed court papers supporting federal ghost gun laws, revealing that Queens has seen the highest number of ghost guns taken by police in the last four years.

39% of The Homemade Guns Discovered In Queens

Lawyers for the government said that between 2020 and 2023, almost 39% of the homemade guns that cops found were in Queens. The NYPD took 121 fake guns in the first half of this year. About 58% of those guns came from Queens. The DA's office said that in the past few months, the number of 3D-printed guns has also grown a lot.

The reason behind the high number of ghost guns seized from Queens remains unclear. But Melinda Katz, the DA for Queens, has said that getting guns off the streets is her number one goal.