Next weekend there’s going to be a gun buy back program on the Lower East Side. It will be held Sunday, October 28 from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. in the community room at the Rutgers Houses, 200 Madison Street. The event has been in the works for many months. State Assembly Speaker Sheldon Silver first urged the New York City District Attorney to institute the program last March, following a shooting incident involving a fleeing suspect and cops on Columbia Street.
Anyone turning over a handgun will get a $200 bank card. Working rifles and shotguns are worth a $20 bank card. The buy back is being sponsored by the NYPD, the DA, the New York City Housing Authority and Speaker Silver. Since the incident last spring, there have been more gun-related crimes in the neighborhood. Among them: the shooting of a police officer at the Seward Park Extension during the summer and the murder of Charles Fernandez outside a Forsyth Street barber shop October 6. Click through for more details about the program.
