High alert after attempted gun purchase with fake ID in Beech Grove

BEECH GROVE, Ind. (WISH) — Police are on high alert after a man in Beech Grove was caught on surveillance video while trying to get an illegal gun repaired.

Then, he tried to buy another gun with a fake ID.

The suspect raised some suspicion by asking other customers in the store how much Indiana sales tax is, but what really tipped the scale was when he took off when the police arrived.

I-Team 8 obtained the surveillance video showing the suspect running away as police pulled into the parking lot Tuesday at Beech Grove Firearms. Minutes earlier, the man had been inside the store with a gun that needed repair; as it turned out, the gun had been modified.  

“I’m done with my inspection and have come across some troubling issues with the firearm and that was someone had cut the frame to accept a full auto seer, for the gun to run fully automatic, they had modified this Glock to run full auto. He said his brother is the one that had converted it for him,” said Garrison Burge of Beech Grove Firearms.  

The modification done to this gun is a federal offense. While the gun was being inspected, the man started filling out background paperwork for another gun. He gave the clerk an Indiana driver’s license, but something just wasn’t right.

“I was then called into the back to inspect his ID. At that point, just looking at the ID, it was clearly a fake based on it looked homemade,” Burge said. 

Pictures of the driver’s license provided by the store show a lack of security details found on state-issued licenses. So, the manager called police.

The man is believed to have been working with someone else who was driving a Dodge sedan and waiting in the parking lot.

The manager tried to keep the man occupied until police arrived, but the man grew impatient and headed for the door just as police pulled into the parking lot 

“So his getaway car had already left and he met them at Main and Emerson. He left his ID here and his firearm that he had dropped off, which is now in the hands of” Indianapolis Metropolitan Police Department, Burge said.

I-Team 8 has learn, though, that the information from the fake ID was used on a background check and approved to buy a gun; yet, the man has not been arrested.

The Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives would not confirm if it’s investigating.