So-called ghost guns scare a lot of people. They really shouldn’t, in part because we have no evidence that people who use them illegally wouldn’t be able to get a firearm through some other means, but they do.

And those who prefer to ban anything related to firearms never miss an opportunity to try and stoke those fears as much as they can.

A prime example of this comes from Pennsylvania. Sure, Philadelphia got smacked down by the State Supreme Court earlier in the day on Wednesday, but that doesn’t mean other parts of the state don’t have some time to scaremonger, too.

Officials in Montgomery county have arrested a 24-year-old man after, they claim, officers discovered ghost guns — homemade, untraceable weapons — and a firearm production laboratory in his Upper Pottsgrove home.

On Wednesday, Nov. 20, 2024, law enforcement officials announced the arrest of Tahmeir Wilson, 24, of Upper Pottsgrove, on gun trafficking charges related to manufacturing and trafficking ghost guns.

“This defendant created and distributed firearms,” said Montgomery County District Attorney Kevin Steele in a statement on Wilson’s arrest. “Since privately made firearms have no serial numbers, this makes them virtually untraceable and poses a serious danger to the safety of our community.”

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In a search of this room, court documents claim officers uncovered a “highly sophisticated, clandestine firearms laboratory.”

When officers arrested him, Wilson reportedly said, “I’m completely cooked, it’s over.” That suggests that yes, he was in fact selling firearms illegally.

But let’s be real here. This “highly sophisticated, clandestine firearms laboratory” was a home workshop. This wasn’t some high-end firearm manufacturer that was really on par with Glock, Ruger, or Smith & Wesson. It was a guy with one or two 3D printers and a few other tools in a spare room in his house.

Upon searching the room, they found a grand total of two completed firearms as well as some parts. They also claim they found evidence that he was selling the guns online.

They’d better have that because making your own firearms is perfectly legal in Pennsylvania and unless he was selling them, he didn’t do anything wrong.

As it stands, Wilson is charged with a number of firearm offenses, but to me, the greatest offense is the police acting like this was more than it was.

Look, if Wilson is breaking the law, that’s one thing, but they do the whole “these guns are untraceable” while bragging about catching a guy who was allegedly selling them. It seems like they weren’t that untraceable. Plus, traditionally manufactured guns might be traceable, but gun tracing doesn’t necessarily solve that many crimes. Stolen guns don’t get traced to the thieves, generally speaking.

Then we have the old “clandestine firearms laboratory” to describe a workshop, all language made to make things sound a lot more terrifying than they really are.

So-called ghost guns are just a convenient boogieman, one that gets pushed as the new terror, but when you look at the numbers–if you can find them, that is–you still see they’re pretty rare in crime statistics. But that doesn’t stop the fearmongering from taking up a bunch of space on the internet.