Ammunition in an Easter basket: Gun discoveries are far more common in N.L. police searches

While you sleep, what’s in easy reach? It likely includes a lamp, something to read, your phone charger or maybe a glass of water.

When RCMP searched a house in St. John’s recently, they found a fully loaded assault rifle. It was tucked in between a headboard and a nightstand that otherwise looked normal.

In a closet, they found a tactical shotgun — also fully loaded.

These were some details in reporting this week by Ariana Kelland, my former colleague at the CBC newsroom in St. John’s. Kelland’s focus was on gun crime, and what police have been discovering when they search properties.

“When we execute a search warrant, we almost always find firearms,” said Insp. Dave Emberly.

“And it’s not a hunting rifle. It’s usually a pistol or an assault rifle or a tactical shotgun. It’s commonplace now.”

Police in Newfoundland and Labrador seized more than 900 weapons last year, often while executing search warrants. That’s an important distinction: the weapons — fortunately — are often not seized after they have been fired in, say, a robbery.

Guns are now part and parcel of the drug trade in Newfoundland and Labrador. The illegal weapons seem to have become part of the security system, as it were, that people use to protect themselves from theft from someone who knows perfectly well who the dealer is — and is willing to gamble on their chances of getting away with stealing from them.

“In this city, I would suggest almost every day there are drug rips,” Emberley told Kelland. “And typically in those cases, they don’t call the police. So you’re dealing with dangerous people. Firearms are part of that world. They need them for self-defence, protection, extortion control. It’s all part of that life.”

It seems that criminals aren’t the only ones with their eyes on properties where drug dealers dwell.

Search warrants are used by police to gain access to properties involved in a criminal investigation. It doesn’t mean that a crime has not necessarily been committed, but judges do (or at least should) not issue them lightly.

See Ariana Kelland’s investigation into why there has been a spike in gun seizures in Newfoundland and Labrador:

The key thing is that the police need to have reasonable grounds to believe that they will find evidence at the scene.

Finding a fully loaded assault weapon by a bedstand tells you something … but weapons are showing up in other places.

Kelland’s investigative piece opened with a discovery — by children — in a wooded area in the Shea Heights neighbourhood.

That’s not the only unusual discovery. In a provincial court case in 2023, Judge Harold Porter noted that a search of a woman’s house turned up a semi-automatic rifle, one that could up to 30 rounds.

From Kelland’s story:

Porter noted there was no safety or trigger guard on the carbine.

Shotgun rounds and rifle ammunition were found in a child’s Easter basket in the kitchen of her house.

“We are seeing the proliferation of firearms among serious drug dealers here,” Porter wrote in his decision. “Whether for their protection from other dealers, or from the police, it is clear that the drug world poses a very serious threat to public safety on multiple levels.”

In terms of seizures, the RCMP pulled in 672 firearms in 2025, up from 525 in 2023. The Royal Newfoundland Constabulary, which polices St. John’s and larger urban centres, seized 284 and 128 weapons for the same two years, respectively.

So, there may be more weapons coming into the province … but we may also see the results of better policing and targeted work inside the drug trade.

A big caveat. We know from experience that there can be a lot of other reasons for guns to be seized. A national report flagged what are called “administrative” reasons, including lapsed registration, improper storage and failure to renew a licence. These are not, of course, benign factors, and all raise the stakes for a risk to public safety.

Police forces across the country though have been focused on an escalation of organized crime.

Illegal movement of weapons has been a growing concern across the country for years now. We also know that the movement of guns from the U.S. to Canada has been picking up. Canadian authorities have been seizing more weapons at the border. There have long been gaps, though, in what Canada knows exactly of the sources of all these weapons.

Fortunately, the seizures we have been seeing have been nonviolent. The phrase “gun crime” suggests one being wielded (or worse fired), but that’s not actually the case.

As well, a Statistics Canada report once noted that “for an offence to be considered firearm-related, a firearm need only be present during the commission of the offence, not necessarily used.”

All that said, it’s chilling to know that the police have been, on average, seizing about 17 weapons (some fully loaded) a week, and finding rounds and ammunition around the house.

Other things to read

MUN Radio, also known as CHMR, is bracing for a possible closure, if the students’ union withdraws its funding. MUNSU says it has consulted with “stakeholders,” but the station manager says they were caught off guard.

Good news for press freedom: the Trump administration’s policy on revoking Pentagon credentials was ruled unconstitutional. In the fall, the Defense department said it would ice out journalists who solicit information the department had not authorized for release.

I gleaned some medical knowledge this week about the risks of excessive workouts: “Rhabdomyolysis, or ‘rhabdo,’ occurs when muscle tissue is severely damaged and breaks down, leaking enzymes and other substances into the blood. The painful condition can cause urine to turn the colour of black tea and it can lead to kidney damage,” according to a medical doctor in St. John’s quoted in this Canadian Press report. Cases of young women have been frequently presenting at St. John’s ERs, with evidence of exercise regimens that overdid it.

Can you trust Elon Musk’s tweets on important issues? Not really, says Elon Musk. He just lost a court battle that found he misled investors after he took over Twitter. Salient line from this BBC story: “While testifying in court earlier this month, Musk argued that he did not mislead investors and that people simply read too much into his public comments and tweets.:

A “huh” moment for yours truly: learning that plugging your phone in overnight actually degrades the battery, shortening the device’s life.

More bad news for prospective novelists: it can now cost you US $25,000 just to query an agent. (This sounds more and more like a racket for aspiring writers.)

Find of the week: Dashiell Hammett’s The Maltese Falcon — one of the books that entered public domain this year — is available online, and I can even embed it in this post:

Pairs well with a shot of rum, Mr. Spade might say.

Enjoy your weekend.

I’m writing a longer piece each Saturday on this blog. You can find earlier Saturday digest posts here.