I can’t say that I don’t understand stealing because I suppose there are situations where I can. If you’re starving–literally starving, not just hungry–and you steal food, I won’t approve but I’d get it.

Most people never reach that level of desperation, though.

Yet even if you are, one would imagine that the average person might think stealing from someone they’re working for is a bad idea. However, most crooks aren’t that bright. 

Or, at least, this one wasn’t.

The Atascosa County Sheriff’s Office apprehended David Alviso III, a Jourdanton resident, after finding 13 stolen guns, six vehicle titles and a computer that belonged to the homeowner, according to an Atascosa County Sheriff’s Office Facebook post. 

Deputies Tim Challes and Stephen Cook arrived at the Blackhill Community residence, which is roughly eight miles east of Pleasanton, after getting a call about a theft. When the two deputies got to the property the homeowner and Alviso were both at the home. The homeowner accused Alviso of stealing from him after watching surveillance footage, according to the release. Alviso had reportedly been hired to do work on the home.

The deputies followed footprints from the house into the woods where they found a bag with the stolen goods.

Yeah, this guy wasn’t in serious contention to join Ocean’s Eleven by any stretch of the imagination.

Yet think about what all it would have taken for him to get away with it. Without surveillance footage, it’s unlikely Alviso would have been fingered so early. It’s even possible that the homeowner wouldn’t have known about the theft for some time. By then, the footprints might have been gone from wind, rain, or someone covering their tracks. Literally.

And this, boys and girls, is how criminals get guns.

See, universal background checks don’t cover gun thefts. In theory, they should, but they don’t because criminals aren’t exactly going to follow that law when they’re already breaking the laws regarding theft. 

What people need to understand is that if someone will break one law such as theft, what other laws are they willing to break?

We can assume that at least some will draw the line at violence, but we don’t know which ones. We also know that many gun thieves steal them for resale later. 

Criminals aren’t generally that bright, but they don’t really have to be. One or two have some brains and can figure out how to bypass a law, while others just copy what they did or do.

You’re not going to stop them.

But you can stop the law-abiding from having the means to protect themselves from people like this. That’s all gun control laws do. They don’t stop criminals. They, at most, inconvenience them, but not even all that much of that.

This guy, who clearly isn’t a member of Mensa, darn near got away with his theft and were it not for the video, I suspect he would have, at least for a time. If he could get that far, how far could someone with a bit more brains get?

So stop focusing on the tools and focus on the tools using them.