Hi all.  Sorry for the delay in updating.  We have been moving forward on a bunch of things.

First of all, if you are planning to attend Kevin’s celebration of life on Sunday, June 11, in Rye, NH, and you haven’t RSVPed, please do so by sending an email (subject line: RSVP) to hognosecommunity@comcast.net.  I have a feeling there are many people who are planning to attend but haven’t RSVPed.  (And just a reminder, everyone in the Weaponsman community is invited.)

Second, if you know somebody (maybe another teammate) who has mentioned that he is coming, but is not a Weaponsman reader, tell that person to RSVP.

Why do I care so much about RSVPing?  Because we are only going to have food and seating for the people who have RSVPed.  You don’t want to be the hungry standing guy who didn’t RSVP.

I don’t think Kevin mentioned it much in the blog, but in the last few years, he had become interested in cooking.  This is the guy who thought “oven” was always preceded by “microwave” up until about 2012.  He really liked cooking for other people and did some interesting experiments.  They didn’t all work, but he made up for the occasional error by always making a lot of food.  Sunday dinner at our house might be burgers and tater tots.  Dinner at his house was a seven-course extravaganza.

My point is that he would really feel bad if people came to his party and there was nothing to eat.  So RSVP!

Now for some bullet points.

• We got to visit Zac (Small Dog) yesterday at his new home.  He’s doing great!  My sister-in-law and her husband, who are wonderful people, have a lot of experience with dogs and they’ve made him very comfortable and happy.  How much does he remember about his life with Kevin?  Hard to say.  But I hope he’ll always remember, at least a little.
• We really need to get in touch with a friend of Kevin’s named Joseph Cunningham.  If any of you folks know Joseph, would you please ask him to reach out to me through the hognosecommunity@comcast.net email address?
• We won’t need any help paying for the celebration or blog upkeep, such as it is, but thanks so much to all those who have offered.
• Does anybody have a simple way of getting a copy of a DD-214?  We can’t find Kevin’s.
• It may take a while, but we expect Kevin’s final resting place to be at the New Hampshire State Veterans Cemetery, which is in Boscawen, NH.
• I’m now updating the blog with my own account, which is awesome.

Keep the pictures and stories coming, and if you’re coming June 11, don’t forget to RSVP!

Hi all friends of Kevin, I have some updated information you will want to read.

First, I’m gratified by the number of people who have written some variation of “Don’t take down the blog!”  It’s great that you believe his work should be preserved online.  So we will find a way.  Rest assured that absolutely nothing will happen to the current blog for at least a month.  It seems to me the obvious choices are a) keeping it alive at weaponsman.com and b) handing the content over to one of the many tech-savvy folks who have commented.

I’m doing this because it’s the right thing to do, not because I’ve been intimidated by hundreds of people with military training and serious firepower.  Heh.

Second, we have specifics on Kevin’s celebration of life.  It will be on Sunday, June 11, at the Abenaqui Country Club in Rye, NH, from 10:30 am to 2 pm.  All are invited.  I hope you will come.  I’d especially love to see a heavy turnout from Kevin’s SF teammates, 122, USAFSA, Afghanistan, other Army buddies and fellow members of SOA.  I have already heard from a number of those guys.

We will need a firm headcount to provide Abenaqui.  So when you know you can make it, please email hognosecommunity@comcast.net with “RSVP” in the subject line.  Let us know how many people will be in your party.

This is also a great opportunity to meet new friends with shared interests or reunite with old friends.  My wife and I will be hosting an informal get-together at our house the day before and you are all invited to that.

I would not be at all surprised to see some of you guys plan other informal meets.  Will you let me know about them (where and when)?  I’ll try to stop by.

The New Hampshire seacoast is absolutely beautiful and is a popular tourist destination in the summer.  This is my way of telling you to book your hotel early.  We may also be able to provide “sleeping bag” accommodations at Kevin’s house.  We can provide advice about things to do, where to eat, etc., for anyone who asks.

Now, about the official celebration.  We want it to be a positive affair.  Please feel free to speak.  It’s okay to make jokes at Kevin’s expense.  He would have done it to you.

I am hoping to have a blessing and some military recognition at the celebration.  One friend of Kevin is a retired three-star general (nice work, bro!) who might be able to help with the latter.

People have asked about contributing to a cause in Kevin’s memory.  I’m inclined to direct such contributions to the Green Beret Foundation, unless someone has an objection.  FYI Kevin was not a fan of the Wounded Warrior Project.

Finally, I missed some opportunities to thank people.  Obviously I’m grateful to all of you for your support and love of Kevin.  The doctors and medical staff at Portsmouth Regional Hospital did their very best to stabilize Kevin when he was first brought in last Friday afternoon.  The doctors and medical staff at the Shapiro Cardiovascular Center at Brigham and Women’s Hospital in Boston did their very best to save Kevin’s life, and when we all realized that would not be possible, they were supportive and kind with us until the end.

Weaponsman commenter Mike_C is actually “Dr” Mike_C, a trained cardiologist and internist who does medical research in Boston.  He gave up his Easter Sunday to join my dad and me at the Shapiro Center and explained everything.

That’s all for now.  Hope you can join us for June 11!

I’m sorry to have to tell you all that my brother Kevin O’Brien, host of this blog, passed away peacefully this morning at Brigham and Women’s Hospital in Boston.

Let me start with some housekeeping.  First, the email address hognosecommunity@comcast.net remains active and you may get more and better updates there.  I say this because frankly I’m having trouble posting here.  I don’t know Kevin’s WordPress password and I’m afraid that if I restart his computer, I will not be able to post any more because the password will not autofill.  Therefore I can’t guarantee I will be able to make more updates on the blog.

We are planning a celebration of Kevin’s life for all of his friends some time in early to mid-June, here in Seacoast NH.  I will have details in a couple of days.  All those who knew and loved Kevin, including all Weaponsman readers, are welcome, but we will need an RSVP.  Again, I will make details available to those who write to hognosecommunity@comcast.net.  This is not restricted to personal friends of Kevin, but space will be limited, and we will not be able to fit everyone.  It will be a great opportunity to share memories of Kevin.

We will be looking for stories and pictures of Kevin!  Please send to the email address.

I expect that some time after the celebration, I will be shutting down the blog.  No one other than Kevin could do it justice.

Finally, you should know that Small Dog, whose real name is Zac, has found a home with other relatives of ours.  Of course the poor guy has no idea what has happened to his beloved friend but his life will go on.

Now I’d like to tell you more about Kevin and how he lived and died.  He was born in 1958 to Robert and Barbara O’Brien.  We grew up in Westborough, Mass.  Kevin graduated from high school in 1975 and joined the Army in (I believe) 1979.  He learned Czech at DLI and became a Ranger and a member of Special Forces.

Kevin’s happiest times were in the Army.  He loved the service and was deeply committed to it.  We were so proud when he earned the Green Beret.  He was active duty for eight years and then stayed in the Reserves and National Guard for many years, including a deployment to Afghanistan in 2003.  He told me after that that Afghan tour was when he felt he had made his strongest contribution to the world.

Kevin worked for a number of companies after leaving active duty.  He had always loved weapons, history, the military, and writing, and saw a chance to combine all of his interests by creating Weaponsman.com.  I think the quality of the writing was what always brought people back.  Honestly, for what it’s worth, I have no interest in firearms.  Don’t love them, don’t hate them, just not interested.  But Kevin’s knowledge and writing skill made them fascinating for me.

Kevin and I really became close friends after our childhood.  We saw each other just about every day after he moved to a house just two miles away from mine.  In the winter of 2015, we began building our airplane together.  You could not ask for a better building partner.

Last Thursday night was our last “normal” night working on the airplane.  I could not join him Friday night, but on Saturday morning I got a call from the Portsmouth Regional Hospital.  He had called 911 on Friday afternoon and was taken to the ER with what turned out to be a massive heart attack.  Evidently he was conscious when he was brought in, but his heart stopped and he was revived after 60 minutes of CPR.  He never reawakened.

On Saturday, he was transported to Brigham and Women’s where the medical staff made absolutely heroic efforts to save his life.  Our dad came up on Sunday and we visited him Sunday, Monday, and today.  Each day his condition became worse.

As of last night, it was obvious to everyone that he had almost no chance of survival; and that if he did by some chance survive, he would have no quality of life.  Kevin’s heart was damaged beyond repair, his kidneys were not functioning, he had not regained consciousness, and he had internal bleeding that could not be stopped.  We made the decision this morning to terminate life support.

I’m not crying tonight.  I got that out on Saturday.  What I feel is a permanent alteration and a loss that I know can never be healed.  I loved Kevin so much.  He was brilliant, funny, helpful, kind, caring, and remarkably talented.

At dinner tonight, we agreed that there are probably many people who never “got” Kevin, but there could not be anyone who disliked him.  Rest in Peace.

Please feel free to express your thoughts in the comments and to the hognosecommunity@comcast.net email address.

Hi, this is Brendan, Hognose’s brother.  I wanted to let you know that Hognose is dealing with a serious medical situation and has had to step away from the blog.  He cannot answer email or texts or take calls at this time.

I am not planning to post or moderate comments during this time and I will not be providing details here.

Hognose loves you guys, but I feel certain he would not want all the details of his situation shared with everyone.  However, I do want to reach out to his many friends who know him beyond his status as a blogger, especially anyone who comes here and served with him in the Army or knows him from one of his many other activities over the years.

For that reason, I have set up an email account at hognosecommunity@comcast.net.  Please email to that account if you are a personal friend of Hognose’s.  You can prove this by including his first and last name and a detail about how you know each other.  I will write back with more detail.

Please respect his and my wishes and:

1. Do email hognosecommunity@comcast.net if you are a personal friend of Hognose.
2. Do not if you only know him by reading the blog.
3. Do not try to email, text or call him directly.  I mean, you can, but he won’t answer.
4. Do not comment on this post.  I won’t be monitoring comments.
5. Do keep him in your prayers.  His situation is really quite serious.
6. If you know other friends of Hognose who may not be WeaponsMan readers, please let them know they can contact me through the email address shown above.

Thanks

Brendan (aka KevsBlogBrother)

We’ve been troubled by the apparent increase in the number of brazen FFL robberies and burglaries lately, and started tracking them to see if we were just seeing more reporting, or just seeing more spectacular thefts that got more media coverage — or whether these crimes are really up.

Well, ATF answered our question with a new report on thefts and losses from FFLs in the United States, and the answer is: hell, yes, thefts are up. In the last five years, the number of actual crimes is up 48% for burglaries and 175% (!) for robberies. Robberies are still much rarer than burglaries, because most criminals are not brazen and stupid enough to rob a place where armed people may expect them, but there were still 33 FFL robberies last year. And more guns are being taken in these thefts, too. Here’s a graphic depiction (source):

Along with the robberies and burglaries, larcenies are up. What’s a larceny? A theft that’s neither a robbery or burglary. In FFLs, these are often employee thefts — “inside jobs”. FFLs are plagued by shoplifters, but relatively few of these larcenies are that kind of theft. The shoplifters mostly steal small and highly portable items that are displayed openly, like ammunition or accessories.

There are many reasons for an upturn in FFL victimization. Crime is increasingly driven by organized gang activity, and gangs are well suited for some of the dynamic smash-and-grab burglaries we’ve seen in the last couple of years. Most gun shop burglars go uncaught, despite the common practice of rewards (usually, ATF will put up a reward and NSSF will double the money), so the probability of being caught is not much of a deterrent.

Judges and prosecutors tend to treat robberies and burglaries as beginner crimes, and “discount” them deeply, so the consequences of being caught is not a deterrent.  The very large delta between burglaries and robberies may exist in part because the fear of being shot by a store owner, worker or customer, is a deterrent.

ATF is certainly more concerned this year than last. Last year’s infographic was focused on alerting FFLs to their reporting duties (source):

Reporting a lost or stolen inventory item, of course, is a lead-pipe guarantee that you will be assisted in doing 100% inventory by your friendly neighborhood Industry Operations Inspector.

The ATF is taking FFL thefts extremely seriously

Part of the ATF core mission is to protect the public from violent crime involving the use of firearms, including firearms stolen from FFLs and used by violent offenders in the commission of crimes, posing a substantial threat to the public and law enforcement.

A total of 18,394 lost or stolen firearms were reported nationwide last year from FFLs. Of those firearms, 9,113 were reported as lost. Firearms are considered lost when an FFL takes a firearm into its inventory and later cannot account for the disposition of the firearm from its inventory during an inventory reconciliation.

Losses (some if not most of which are certainly thefts, but can’t be proven to be thefts) are up much less than thefts. Here’s the the 2015 version of those 2016 stats in the previous paragraph:

A total of 14,800 firearms were reported lost or stolen nationwide last year from FFLs. 8,637 were reported as lost. 6,163 were reported as stolen.

Tentative conclusion: thieves have found thieving effective, and will continue thieving.

There are about 140,000 FFLs, and normally IOIs only get to about 9,000 of them in any given year. Their major focus is on documentation, regulatory compliance and inventory control.

One interesting table in the report breaks down firearms lost, burgled, robbed or larcenized by type. It’s interesting to see that (as you might expect) thieves really prefer pistols. It was a surprise to us that machine guns were stolen by burglary, but an even bigger surprise that over two dozen machine guns were lost by FFLs. As the table makes clear, pistols are more likely to be stolen than lost, but more uncommon firearms are much more likely to be lost than stolen.

Here is one of the more brazen burglaries of 2016:

At least some of those gang members were bagged soon after the crime.

The tactic remains popular, as does the simple smash-and-grab, like this burglary in Montgomery County, Maryland last month:

You can find literally dozens of these videos on YouTube, and it is plausible that criminal organizations have learned and been inspired by the criminal equivalent of tactics, techniques and procedures as displayed in these shows. Note for instance that they’re gloved and masked, suggesting at least a minimal awareness of investigative techniques. They also proceed with minimal conversation.

Without knowing how many weapons the FFLs are holding, it’s not possible to develop usable rate information. That is a pity, as the ATF provides by-state breakdowns of losses and thefts that would be fascinating to compare to FFL numbers and inventory totals… but we can’t.

There are presently about 136,000 FFLs of all types nationwide. That makes these lines from the ATF report all the more interesting:

ATF data provides that the 10 FFLs with the most firearms reported in Theft/Loss Reports are associated with 2,582 firearms reported lost or stolen. This data is limited to Type 01 (Dealer in firearms other than destructive devices) and Type 02 (Pawnbroker in firearms other than destructive devices) FFLs.

ATF data provides that the 100* FFLs with the most firearms reported in Theft/Loss Reports are associated with 7,664 firearms reported lost or stolen. This data is limited to Type 01 (Dealer in firearms other than destructive devices) and Type 02 (Pawnbroker in firearms other than destructive devices) FFLs.

* There were 8 FFLs tied in the final ranking of the 100 Type 01 and Type 02 FFLs resulting in 107 total FFLs.

Using the 18,394 total loss and stolen number, then, 10 FFLs (0.0074% of the total, seventy-four ten-thousandths of a percent) were the source of 2,582 firearms, 14% of the total lost or stolen.

100 FFLs (0.0735%, seventy-three point five thousandths of a percent) were the source of 7,664 firearms, 41.67% of the total lost or stolen.

But those percentages might be meaningless… perhaps those 100 FFLs stock over 42% of the total firearms inventory? (It seems unlikely, but it’s possible).

Note that this report only counts firearms that disappear from FFL inventories. Firearms lost by or stolen from the Feds (hundreds annually), State and local Law Enforcement (thousands) and private citizens (untold tens of thousands) also swell criminal armories.

In any event, as long as hitting FFLs is rewarding for criminals, we can expect to see more of it.

The ATF .pdf report is here; their press release on it is here; ATF’s public infographics here.