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Police Raid Toronto Toy Store For Fake Guns
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 Peel Regional Police say they weren't playing games Tuesday when they raided a toy store in the western suburbs of Toronto and carted off more than 3,000 realistic-looking handguns. "We did this in the interest of public safety," said Detective Sgt. Gordon MacKinnon, one day after investigators confiscated dozens of cardboard boxes crammed with black plastic toy pistols modeled after Berettas, Sig Sauers and Glocks. So far, no charges have been filed in connection with the raid, and it was unclear whether any would be. "It's a gray area," MacKinnon said. Although Canadian law prohibits the sale of replica firearms, the law so far has only been applied to fakes fashioned from wood or plastic, and the raid Tuesday marks the first time that children's toy guns have been confiscated, MacKinnon said. Prosecutors from the Crown Attorney's Office and Peel Regional Police officials were meeting this afternoon, trying to determine whether the law can be applied to the toy guns seized Tuesday, MacKinnon said. Despite the legal ambiguities, MacKinnon said he has no doubt that the plastic toy guns represent a threat to public safety. Since November, there have been 27 crimes committed in western Toronto suburbs with fake firearms, he said. "What put [police] on to this is ... an incident several weeks ago," MacKinnon said. "We got a call in which there were guys with ... guns abducting a girl. Our people responded to it and ... it turned out to be some kids. ... They were horsing around, but, of course, our guys didn't know that and they ended up doing a gunpoint takedown, and then we realized that these things were just replicas," he said. Investigators traced the toy guns used in that incident to a nearby toy store, and then got a search warrant to raid the shop. Inside, they found boxes upon boxes of the guns, fabricated in China with such attention to detail that they even carry the trademarks of real gun manufacturers, he said. "You've got some trademark concerns here, too," MacKinnon said. "We've been in touch with all the major firearms manufacturers whose guns have been involved in it, and they're very interested." But more important than the trademark issue is the danger that the fake guns could trigger a very real tragedy, MacKinnon said. "Some day a policeman's going to draw down on a kid with one of these things and shoot him justifiably because, how do you know?" MacKinnon said. "You can't wait for the thing to go bang." By Seamus McGraw, an APBnews.com staff writer [Posted 5/11/2000]
  
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