Coloradans can receive free gun lockboxes at educational event

Coloradan gun owners in need of safe storage for their handguns are in luck — a collection of local organizations will be giving away free handgun lockboxes at an educational event later this month.

The 17th Judicial District Attorney's Office — along with organizations and departments including the Boulder County Sheriff's Office, Broomfield and Lafayette police departments and Intermountain Health — will be holding a firearm lockbox giveaway event on July 25.

The event will take place at the Intermountain Health Good Samaritan Hospital in Lafayette at the back of the emergency department parking lot from 11 a.m. to 3 p.m.

The partnership will be giving away 430 lockboxes to first comers. The lockboxes, designed for handgun storage, are 10-by-7-by-2 inches and include a 1500-pound-rated steel cable that secures the box to any stationary object, like a vehicle seat or piece of furniture, according to a press release from the group.

Attendees are asked to not bring guns to the event.

Departments will also be available to answer any questions regarding the safe storage of guns — a legal requirement passed in 2021 under House Bill 21-1106.

According to the law, all firearms are required to be “responsibly and securely stored” when not in use. It's also illegal to knowingly store a firearm in a way that a juvenile can access.

In a subsequent law, passed in May under House Bill 24-1348, guns must be locked in a hard-sided container that is placed out of plain view when left in a vehicle unattended.

The free lockboxes are set to help residents follow these storage-based laws.

“Given the frequency and fatality with which guns are used in suicides, injury prevention experts advise that no person in suicidal crisis should have access to a gun,” Grace Greathouse, Intermountain Health injury prevention and outreach coordinator, said in the news release.

She went on to note that having a lockbox can slow down the process, potentially saving lives during a mental health crisis.

Outside of suicide, approximately 73% of all homicides in Colorado in 2022 were by firearms, according to the Colorado Department of Public Health and Environment.

While there are no current numbers on the amount of gun crimes involving stolen guns in Colorado, the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives released a national report in 2023 that said there were more than 1 million firearms stolen from private citizens and reported to authorities in the country between 2017 and 2021.